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How did bowyers harvest so much yew?

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poplar600:
The majority of yew in Europe is knotty, kanrly and twisted. The stuff doesn't grow straight, especially as compared to  other woods, such as ash. The good stuff also takes an age (hundreds of years) to grow, so it could hardly be tended to or farmed for the sole purposes of bow staves.
Yet England was making thousands of thousands of yew bows, and also importing thousands of thousands of bow staves. England even taxed merchants and required them to 'pay in yew staves'.
How was this even possible considering how rare good yew is to come across? Maybe they chopped all the good stuff down, but it's been hundreds of years since the warbow was decommissioned, so plenty of trees would have replaced the ones cut.

I keep hearing Alpine yew was also considered the best, but most of that is short, twisted and stubby, just like Juniper in the desert. The MR bows looked super clean and with only few knots, almost like pacific yew.

Thoughts?

Del the cat:
The first two lines of you post are entirely incorrect.

I'm not going to quote stuff I've heard or read...
But bear in mind, in the middle ages woodland management would have been the norm. It doesn't take that much effort and they probably knew a lot more about it than we do.
Here's a post on my blog that shows what a fallen Yew will do if left to it's own devices. Now if you imagine visiting that tree once a year, rubbing off unwanted buds and maying thinning out the odd shoot, cultivating and harvesting bow timber no longer seems such a daft idea does it.
You can also see they are growing straight and true.
Draw your own conclusions.
http://bowyersdiary.blogspot.co.uk/2011/04/yew-staves-in-tree.html
Del

Heffalump:

--- Quote from: Del the cat on December 14, 2015, 03:05:23 am ---The first two lines of you post are entirely incorrect.


--- End quote ---

Don't say you didn't ask, Mr.Poplar!  :o ;D

John T.

AndrewS:
In former times the sovereigns  have places where only yew is cultivated and thisplaces were strictly protected by the sovereign.
Often you can image where this was, if the place is called for example "Ibengarten" (Garden of yew).
15 years ago, I was on such a place near Dermbach  in the Rhoen, Germany and there are old yew trees in the woods more than 500 years old and you need minimum two people to encircle the biggest trees with your arms. There are over 350 old yews in this place.

Del the cat:

--- Quote from: AndrewS on December 14, 2015, 04:40:24 am ---In former times the sovereigns  have places where only yew is cultivated and thisplaces were strictly protected by the sovereign.
Often you can image where this was, if the place is called for example "Ibengarten" (Garden of yew).
15 years ago, I was on such a place near Dermbach  in the Rhoen, Germany and there are old yew trees in the woods more than 500 years old and you need minimum two people to encircle the biggest trees with your arms. There are over 350 old yews in this place.

--- End quote ---
V interesting, thanks for sharing.
Del

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