The “Claws are out” Powder Horn

Playing around with this small Buffaloe horn and thought the shape would make a nice “claw” or “Talon” themed horn. Used some wetted 8-9oz leather for the wrap. Thought about dying it but may just leave natural and/or just oil. Still have to install a base plug and drill/make the spout. Should hold a decent amount of powder, maybe for a dozen shots?

Have fun drilling a straight hole into that curved tip. Will be a beaut when finished.

What, you don’t have curved drill bits?


Actually the recess goes in pretty deep on this one, shouldn’t be too bad.

That's a nice job of stitching the leather. Having had the hole for the spout come out the side of a horn once, I would have done the drilling first before all that other nice work.

Agreed, got way ahead of myself!

You can put the spout in the but plug like in those middle eastern leather covered wooden horns, I forget what they're called but they look pretty cool.

Today though was beautiful here in NC and while painting the front porch rocking chairs, I snuck in some time on this horn. I made and installed a plug from a nice piece of figured walnut and stained the leather wrap. Also spent ALOT of time figuring out and cutting the spout tip and installing the dowel plug while maintaining an almost nonexistent gap! What a challenge! I will install some homemade nails/tacks evenly spaced around the bottom end and should be done. Need to make 3 more. Almost there….

Finished it off today with the tacks I made.

Awesome job . It looks like a claw indeed. Great idea on the plug to as well.

It really dose look like a giant talon!! Well done!

Thank You for the compliments. I really enjoy making these “folk art” type pieces and love taking them back to the pet store to show them what was made from their “chew toys”!

I wonderd if I was the only one doing " pet rescues" saving some of those horns, hooves, bones and antler tips from a short ugly life as a chew toy.

It’s amazing how much pet store antlers have gone up in price! The great thing about their Buffaloe horn is it’s still relatively inexpensive. This piece was $5.

I like the fact that you can pick up and handle the items and see if your muse speaks to you ;^)