Winter view of the Great Wall

A view to the North toward the great wall of buckthorn during today's 15-minute break from snowfall.

More about tools:  I have an old 36-inch bow saw that got pretty dull years ago, but I haven't been able to find a replacement blade in the local hardware or home & garden stores.  I finally bough a pair of replacement blades (1 green-wood & 1 dry-wood blade) over the web and have been using the green-wood blade in my old saw.  I find that I do use the full length of the blade in most places, and in others I like the added reach that the saw gives me.  I have not found dry-wood blades to be much of an advantage on the dead wood that I've tried them on, so I usually use the green-wood blade on everything.

The 36-inch saw frame, however, is no deeper than my 30-inch saw, so the few larger-diameter trees that I've encountered require a little extra thought and maneuvering to get down.  So, I made a rudimentary rectangular prototype of a bucksaw, using 3 strips of maple, a threaded rod, and my old dull 36-inch blade.  It seemed to work OK on the few small branches that I tried it out on, but I'm sure it's way too flimsy for any real work.

What I'd like to make is something like this turn-of-the-century Fulton Clipper buck saw from Sears.  I bought one on eBay so that I can use it as a template, but I'll have to scale it up for the longer blade.  These were made of maple and painted red.  I may use laminated wood with a maple core and oak faces for extra strength and then apply a clear finish.

This is a buck saw from a sears catalog from around 1900.