Antelope Horn?

Lerch

Lerch

Well-Known Member
Anyone ever use antelope horn for any portion of a knife handle? i recently acquired some and i was wanting to give it a try but i wasnt sure if anyone had any experince with it?

i sanded a piece up to 400grit and it seems to take a polish and hold together well.

the pieces i have are a couple of years old so i would think they would be dried out. I was going to use some of the solid pieces on the end of the horn, not the hollow center

thanks
steve
 
show us a pic... i would guess that it could either make a very good bolster or handle scales. Horn is pretty similar in terms of material from one animal to the next. But, I don't know anything about the specifics of antelope horn. Sorry I can't really help without some specs. A pic would go a lot.

My first impulse was to say, "no, and you should be careful with grinding it as a health hazard. If you want, send it to me, and I will dispose of properly for you."

take care,
kc
 
I have considered it as I have some on hand but once you pull the black sheath off the inner bone there isn't enough thickness there to make scales. It may be possible to filll the cavity of the pieces with black epoxy but end product would not be as solid as other horn and antler slabs. You could use some of the upper part to make detail spacers, etc but buffalo is less expensive and more solid, easy to work with. Be pretty cool if could pull it off, though.
 
I've used gemsbok horn before,
(looks like this)
the last 9" or so near the point is solid and that was the part used. A very interesting material, similar to buffalo horn but with more grain to it... polished out mostly black with fine whitish streaks following the grain. Tough and not prone to shattering, and looks good. The textured part near the head can be pressed flat for scales, I'm not sure of the process used for doing that though.
 
I got some of the horn cut up tonight while the Thunder game was on half time, the horn is hollow all the way up to about 6" from the tip so it doesnt give me a whole lot to work with at least for what i am wanting. anyway i took one of the larger pieces and polished it up and here is what i got.

this is the outside of the horn sanded to about 800grit and the polished to show some grain. sorry for the Iphone pics
photo-11-2.jpg


and here is the inside portion, you can see some really nice white streaking and good depth with nice dark and honey areas.
photo-12-2.jpg


I will use it for some accent pieces around 1" long just after the bolsters like i have done on a lot of past knives. it lets me stretch the material in to a few more knives especially when i cant really stretch the material into one whole knife.

oh and as usual it smells AMAZINGLY BAD!!! :)

thanks
steve
 
Nice, mine was almost pure black, your's has some of that honey creamy goodness going on.... ever figure out what species it is from?
Lerch said:
oh and as usual it smells AMAZINGLY BAD!!! :)
Click to expand...
Somewhere between rotten beef and burning hair, I suspect. Your shop will stink for days....:3:
 
Oh ya, sorry its antelope as in USA antelope (speed goat)

Yup burning hair would be my guess at the smell
 
American Antelope is in the goat family, it's not like most species that we think of with horns. Their horns are actually hair, (goats, hair) thus the lovely smell! I have never tried to use antelope but I have heard that taxidermist's use a fake horn as the smell never goes away!

Here is a link with a little info on antelope: http://www.fws.gov/southwest/refuges/arizona/pronghrn.html
 
well the taxidermists we use here uses the real antelope horn, and yes they pretty much stay smelling that way though it does lose most of its potency. my buddies coat he wore 4yrs ago when he killed his antelope still smells awful!!! lol

the section i cut and polished doesnt really stink today so maybe the exterior of the horn holds the smell mostly. My garage smelled mostly normal this morning so there is hope :)
 
I have used it for a handle, and it worked out fair. I left it in it's natural appearence on the outside. I removed all of the core, which was prety easy to do. I filled the inside with epoxy, and pinned it to the tang. This knife, as far as I know has never seen any use, just a show piece, so I can't say how it would hold up. I did do a home stabilizing job on it with wood hardener.
here is a link to a pic of it. http://whitesell-knives.webs.com/apps/photos/photo?photoid=22862991
 
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American Antelope is in the goat family
Click to expand...
With respect while pronghorn were often called goats in the past they are not in the same family. They are in fact the only remaining members of the Antilocapridae family, of which all other members are extinct. That along with being the only horned animal to drop it's horns makes them very unique.
They are vaguely related though being in the same same order (Artiodactyla) though as other even toed/cloven hoofed ungulates which also includes the family Bovidae (various genus include cattle, goats, bison, buffalo, etc.), the family Camelidae (camels, llamas, etc), and Cervidae (moose, deer, and elk).
In Biology the orders, sub-orders, families, genus, species, etc can be very confusing...........

And FWIW - while pronghorn horn can be nice it tends to ragged looking over time unless stabilized - I've used a bunch over the years for things like powder measurers and such so have a fair amount of experience with it.
 
Yes i had actually heard or read this before, from what i remembered it said they were not actually of the antelope family, that those were actually in africa and that american antelope were closer to sheep.

thanks for the info, interesting animals for sure

thanks
steve
 
Here is an exert from a taxidermist site, this is what I meant about using fake horns. I guess fake is the wrong word. A lot of taxidermists take the sheath loose and remove or treat the core, to eliminate the smell. So not really fake but, the special care has to be taken to treat the horn, (actually an antler) or the smell never goes away!

http://www.taxidermy.net/forums/BeginnersArticles/02/j/029314513B.html

http://www.taxidermy.net/forums/GameheadArticles/03/j/03FD4317B4.html

Here is some info on the American antelope. Chuck was right when I so loosely called them a goat, that they are not a goat!
http://www.gpnc.org/pronghor.htm
 
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