Undersides of wings

     I realized yesterday that my hesitation in starting to carve the wing feathers was due to the fact that I had not yet drawn the feathers on the underside of the wings.  The ends of the primary and secondary flight feathers are on their own, out there along the trailing edge of the wing, where the wing is only one feather thick.  The carved edges of these feathers obviously have to match up on the opposing wing surfaces, accounting the the overlap between adjacent feathers.  In order to make sure that the shapes and orientations of these feathers are correct, I needed to draw the feather patterns on the underside of the wings, before I started to carve anything.  This is a lesson I had learned from my Archaeopteryx carving, but had apparently forgotten.

    Below are several images of bird wings, showing the arrangements of the major feather groups.  Wings are complex structures, with feather shapes and orientations adapted to the feather positions and roles. For example, the first photo shows the variations in shape of eagle primary feathers, from the tip (left) to the mid-wing area (right).

    The next image shows the reason for the distinction between primary and secondary wing feathers.  The primary feathers attach to the bones of the hand, and the secondary feather attach to the forearm bones.  Tertiary feathers (not shown in the diagram) attach to the skin overlying the upper arm, but are not attached to bones as are the primary and secondary feathers.  On my carving, some tertiary feathers will be located in the "underarm" areas at the base of the wings.  Notice how the feathers are numbered.  Each feather has its own number.  The primaries (usually ten) are numbered from the innermost outwards; the secondaries are numbered from the outmost inward.  This numbering reflects the molting pattern, which begins with the inner primary and outer secondary.

    The shafts of the primary and secondary feathers are covered by feathers called "coverts".  There may be several distinguishable rows of these on bird wings, depending on the species.  The images below shows how the feather groups relate to each other.

    The alula, or "little wing" consists of a few feathers attached to the nearly vestigial digit corresponding to our thumb.  On my Archaeopteryx carving, this was an unfeathered claw; on modern birds, the feathered alula helps the bird maintain lift while flying at slow speeds, much like the flaps on the wing of an aircraft.

    I include all this detail to explain what is involved in drawing and carving bird wing feathers and getting it right.  A random feather pattern carved or painted on a bird wing might look nice, but I take my carving seriously and want my partially folded osprey wings to appear accurate even to an expert birder or falconer.  Hence, all my fussing.

    The photo below, which I just took, shows my efforts this morning in drawing the feathers on the underside of the osprey's wings.  I am glad I took the time to do this, because the tips of the primary feathers need to be shaped a little more to conform to both the pattern I purchased and the images I have collected.  The shaded areas on the wings represent wood that will be trimmed away to better represent the delicate free ends of the primaries.

    Lastly, I got in the mail yesterday from MDI Woodcarvers a set of six new carving burrs of various shapes (ball, flame, cylinder, "stump cutter". etc.) made of carbide steel.  These will be perfect for carving the feather detail.  Their cutting edges leave a relatively smooth surface behind, reducing the amount of sanding.

    Time to get to work!

    Including the time spent this morning drawing, erasing, and redrawing feathers, I worked about two more hours, for a total of 32.