My students have been busy gluing their sound boxes together. This feels like a monumental achievement -- how far we have come together! -- as well as a little sad, as my year with them is coming to a close.
All we now have to do is scrolls, and to that end, I planed the scroll block and cut out the outline for my Peter- Guarneri-of-Venice-model head. I have been trying, with varying success, to stay a half-step ahead of the students in order to be able to demonstrate each new process, but with the LSF traveling I got a little behind. No matter! This is what weekends are for, I thought, as something caught my eye and I discovered, to my horror, a couple -- three -- four, actually -- small holes in the end grain of what is to become my neckroot.
OH, NO!!!! Woodworm!
I poked at the holes with a tiny scriber , and a small pile of sawdust fell out. I probed some more, then employed a drill bit. Situations like this present a tough call. On the one hand, you don't want to waste a scroll block, if you can help it. On the other hand, it would be more wasteful to carve a lovely scroll on a foundation rendered spongey by the voracious attentions of small invertebrates.
It turned out the cavities weren't very deep, and I was easily able to fill them with small bushings, but I was left to puzzle: If no holes are visible anywhere on the outside of this piece of wood (which there weren't), then where did the creature go?
All we now have to do is scrolls, and to that end, I planed the scroll block and cut out the outline for my Peter- Guarneri-of-Venice-model head. I have been trying, with varying success, to stay a half-step ahead of the students in order to be able to demonstrate each new process, but with the LSF traveling I got a little behind. No matter! This is what weekends are for, I thought, as something caught my eye and I discovered, to my horror, a couple -- three -- four, actually -- small holes in the end grain of what is to become my neckroot.
OH, NO!!!! Woodworm!
I poked at the holes with a tiny scriber , and a small pile of sawdust fell out. I probed some more, then employed a drill bit. Situations like this present a tough call. On the one hand, you don't want to waste a scroll block, if you can help it. On the other hand, it would be more wasteful to carve a lovely scroll on a foundation rendered spongey by the voracious attentions of small invertebrates.
It turned out the cavities weren't very deep, and I was easily able to fill them with small bushings, but I was left to puzzle: If no holes are visible anywhere on the outside of this piece of wood (which there weren't), then where did the creature go?
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