The outdoors mantra “leave no trace” applies to the world of hunting when brothers Levi and Clayton Brown step into the woods during deer season.

When the trigger is squeezed, there’s little trace, barely a clue that they’ve brought down a white-tail. Venison disappears quickly during meals at the family table, but the teenagers put more than the meat to use.

They make knives from the bones and spend hours tanning the hide.

It’s like a deer-processing, knife-making emporium at the Brown household, situated beside a lovely stream northeast of Pea Ridge.

There’s the workshop where Levi and Clayton make knives and tan hides. Another room is cool and spotless with ample counter space and all the equipment needed to process deer the hunters takes during a season. With Arkansas’ liberal bag limit, that can be quite a few.

The family goes through the nutritious and tasty meat pretty fast, said Gary Brown, the boys’ dad. Bones don’t go to waste when the brothers put their noses to the grindstone, or in their case, a belt sander, to make a knife.

The teenagers have always admired hunting knives that are hand-crafted or factory-made.

They jumped at the chanceto make their own deer-bone knives. Their dad helped the two get started. So did a family friend, Robin Miller, a knife maker and flint knapper from Oklahoma.

When the belt sander quieted after making their fi rst knife, the teenagers admired it with asmile. “It turned out pretty good,” Levi said. Dozens of bone knives later, the brothers agree it’s one of the most enjoyable projects they’ve tackled. They give most of their knives away.

START TO FINISH

Big knife or small, it takes hours to turn out a deer-bone knife.

“You have to boil the bones and get the marrow out,” Clayton explained. “But first you take out the sinew.”

Sinew is stringy tendon material the young knife makers use. Deer-bone knives are made in two pieces, handle and blade.

Bone is shaped into a blade shape on a sander and theedges sharpened. Another bone becomes the handle.

The blade is inserted into the handle and secured with a homemade glue the teenagers make from pine sap, charcoal and horse manure.

Sinew is wrapped around the junction where blade and handle meet, to secure it more and give it a woodsy look and feel.

The brothers have made knives from larger game. “Some friends gave us some elk bones and you can make a bigger knife,” Levi said.

Sometimes they’ll find a feather in their outdoor adventures and use it to decorate a knife handle.

Their labor of knife-making love is short compared to the time it takes to tan a deer hide.

It can take 8 to 10 hours of scraping just to get the hair off a hide, Clayton said. They use a hand-made scraper that’s been fashioned out of a lawn mower blade.

The complex process has a lot of steps. All traces of meat have to be removed. The hide must be stretched just right. Another step utilizes the deer’s brain, so even more of the animal is used.

Miller, the Oklahoma knife maker, said Levi and Clayton are coming along well with their knife-making art. “It’s always good to see young people taking this up,” Miller said.

Don’t expect to shave the hair off your forearm with one of the deer-bone knives. They’re not as sharp as steel, but these by-products of their deer-hunting adventures are functional tools. What’s most important though, is the joy the brothers get from hunting and making use of somethingthat’s commonly thrown away.

Deer season will be here as quick as an acorn falls. There will be more venisonfor the Brown family freezer and more material for the brothers’ knife-making and hide-tanning ventures.

Outdoor, Pages 6 on 09/05/2013