Unlike many texts on the subject, this valuable, revised and expanded second edition of the popular instruction manual for novice rawhide workers assumes no prior knowledge or experience. In over 180 drawings and photographs, the reader is shown every step of the process, beginning with a fresh cowhide, continuing through cutting strings and braiding, and ending with finished reatas, bosals, hobbles, or reins. Along the way, the author discusses the readily available tools and implements needed, which the beginner can make by following the included directions. The chapters on braiding provide simple techniques for producing many basic patterns, which may then be modified or enlarged to yield endless variations. Users or collectors of braided rawhide will value the book for its system of specific things to look for when buying materials, how to care for them, and how each item was produced in the past.
