Blowgun Techniques. Amante P. Marinas, Sr.
in much the same way as the mouthpiece of the .625 caliber blowgun (Figure 2-6, right) does.
The Waoranis as well as the Capahuaris of Ecuador fashion darts from the spine of the leaves of the maximiliana regia palm tree and fletches their darts with kapok. The darts are poisoned with curare for use on the woolly monkeys, toucans, and on the nocturnal currasow that they hunt for food.
PERUVIAN BLOWGUN–The best known Peruvian pucunas (blowgun) is made by the Yaqua tribe. The Yaquas use the blowguns for hunting monkeys, birds, and other small animals such as the sloth.
The pucuna is 6 to 7 feet long and is made from pucuna caspi (blowgun wood). The bore is chiseled out on two matching halves then tied together with a cord made from the chambira palm. The bore is rough-smoothed using a rod made from the pona palm with the final polish made by passing fine sand repeatedly through the bore.
The assembled blowgun is wrapped with the skin of the huambe vine. For a smooth feel, the skin is wrapped inside out and glued to the blowgun with resin from the copal plant. The wrapping is stained black.
The darts are made from the ribs of the maximiliana regia palm tree fletched with kapok and are carried in a basket-like quiver called the cargajo. The kapok is carried in a nut from which the inside was removed. The dart is dipped in poison the main component of which is curare. The composition of the poison is a well-guarded secret.
CHINESE BLOWGUNS
One of two blowguns used by ancient Chinese martial arts masters is called the mea hua needle. It is tiny being only 2 inches long and is made from goose feathers. It is believed that a woman first used it because the shaft of the dart is a 1½ inch sewing needle. The dart is feathered with flannel.
One other blowgun created during the Yuan Dynasty is called the blowing arrow. It is made from a short section of bamboo that is about 6 inches long. The blowgun shoots a 5-inch dart with a bamboo shaft that is tipped with a metal point.
In the Chinese martial arts, both blowguns are considered hidden weapons.
JAPANESE BLOWGUNS
The Japanese blowgun is called fukiya. The traditional dart is called fukidari and is 2 inches long.
The ninja book Mansenshukai written in the Edo era about 200 years ago shows a picture of a paper blowgun dart. The Japanese novelist Saikaku Ebara, in 1688, wrote that the blowgun was popular at the time.
The website of Dr. Hironori Higuchi showed a 254 cm blowgun said to weigh about 2 kg that was made 130 years ago. However, there is no mention of how the blowgun was made and what type of wood (or metal) was used to make it.
Strangely enough, though bamboo also grows in Japan, there was no mention of it being used to make blowguns.
chapter 2
MODERN BLOWGUNS
Modern blowguns are made from heat-tempered, precision seamless aluminum. Thus, the barrel is relatively light and will not rust. The modern blowgun is provided with a mouthpiece and shoots darts with plastic tails and steel or bamboo shafts.
BARREL
Modern blowguns can be one-piece, two-piece or three-piece. The latter two can be assembled and disassembled in minutes. The short sections are connected to each other with plastic couplings.
Take-down blowguns are designed for easy carrying to the target site. A one-piece, 5-foot blowgun will be difficult to transport.
Some modern blowguns are also designed as walking canes (Figure 2-5).
MOUTHPIECE
The modern blowgun features a mouthpiece (Figure 2-5, Figure 2-6). Most traditional blowguns do not have mouthpieces. The mouthpiece allows the focusing of the blown air into the launching of the dart. Thus, there is little wasted air.
The mouthpiece, made of plastic, is a molded one-piece construction with safety rings to prevent inhaling the dart. There is no such provision in the traditional blowguns. Hence, the traditional blowguns required more skill in its use considering that they were oftentimes aimed at targets overhead. Thus, there is greater risk of inhaling a dart when shooting a traditional blowgun.
The mouthpiece is not necessary when you only shoot occasionally. There will be little harm if your teeth or lips touch an aluminum or bamboo tube. However, if you shoot a couple of hundred darts a day, you need to use a mouthpiece.
In my case, I shot the .51 caliber blowgun without a mouthpiece. However after shooting 200 darts a day for 5 days, I felt indentations in my lower and upper lip. So I made a mouthpiece for it.
You will not feel comfortable shooting a .625 caliber blowgun with no mouthpiece. It is just too big for the mouth.
PROJECTILES
The tail of the commercial dart can be either a cone or a spherical bead (Figure 2-7). The cone darts come with sharp or broad head point shafts or with plastic broad heads.
Commercial darts can have cone tails that are white, orange, green, blue, red, or yellow. The flange of the cone is constructed such that it collapses when pushed through the mouthpiece past the safety ring. As soon as the dart clears the mouthpiece into the barrel, the cone returns to its original shape. With this feature, the possibility of inhaling such a dart is unlikely.
The darts of .40 caliber blowguns have 4-inch steel shafts that have to be inserted into plastic cones or beads. The darts of .50 caliber blowguns have 3 1⁄8-inch shafts. The shafts of the .625 caliber darts are 4 inches long.
Modern blowguns can also be loaded with paintballs—thin nylon coated balls that break upon impact, releasing a water-soluble dye.
QUIVER
Most modern blowguns are provided with quivers that are attached to the barrel. The quivers can hold ten or eight darts (Figure 2-9).
FOAM GRIP
Most blowguns are provided with a foam grip for comfort and for protection against the cold of winter (Figure 2-9). The placement of the grip will depend on the length of the shooter’s arm.
chapter 3
MAKING YOUR OWN BLOWGUN
You can make your own blowgun from readily available materials. Whether it will cost more or less than a commercially sold blowgun will depend on the equipment you now have. It will definitely cost more than a commercial blowgun should you decide to buy the tools needed to make one.
A blowgun is essentially a barrel, a tube, or a pipe. Hence, pipes made of plastic or of metal such as copper, aluminum, or steel are, in