DELAWARE — What once were somewhat-secret surprises have now turned into sights to behold at Boulder Park and the ravines at Olentangy Park in Delaware.
Along the two parks’ trails, folks may stumble upon a bear, hawk, gator and other critters carved into logs, but many didn’t know the story about the artist behind the impressive works of art.
That all changed when the city of Delaware made a Facebook post about one of their own that highlighted city arborist Hunter Smith’s chainsaw carvings and inspired lots of positive comments.
“I really hadn’t gotten any feedback about them before the Facebook post,” Smith told Delaware Source. “I didn’t really know if they were popular or not, but I liked doing them and the few kids that have been out when we are placing them always loved them.
“There are people I work with every day at the city who didn’t even realize I did them.”
Smith started his hobby three years ago with the bear carving at Boulder Park after struggling to think of interactive elements for the park’s natural play area.
“Our parks and recreation director, Ted Miller, wanted to make a ‘Nature Play Area’ at Boulder Park. When I had a hard time coming up with play features I wanted to see if I could take a different approach and try a carving,” Smith said.
“I’m self taught as far as the carving goes — it was more of me wanting to see if I even could.”
The carvings’ locations & inspiration
While Smith said the bear has been a community favorite, his personal favorite is the hawk that is also at Boulder Park with a carving of his dog, a wolf, alligator, turtle and deer.
“There was a little girl there when we put out the deer, and I told her she got to name it since she was the first one to find it,” Smith said.
“She named the deer Dorris, I think, and I asked her what she would want to see out there next. She said an alligator, and about a week later, I had it out there for her.”
An elephant carving also awaits visitors at the ravines in Olentangy Park, featuring two massive log ears.
Smith said it usually takes him 8-10 hours to finish just one carving.
“The inspiration for the bear was just because it seemed the easiest to pull off,” he said. “There are millions of examples of people carving bears, so I thought it would be a good place to start.
“Putting them at Boulder was mostly for the nature play area, but the carvings definitely feel more at home in the woods than out in the middle of a turf park.”
While Smith’s creations may not be the most hyper-realistic carvings, that’s for a reason.
“I really wanted to make these for the kids, which is why I go for more of the totem style instead of for realism, which is convenient because I’m not good enough for realism yet anyway,” Smith said.
Re-tree-cycling and a big addition this Halloween
Delaware has been recognized as a tree community by Tree City USA for 45 years and has earned a growth award for seven years. Additionally, Oak Grove Cemetery is recognized as a Level 1 arboretum.
“We get credit for our Tree City USA growth award for recycling all materials related to tree work,” Smith said.
“All of the logs from dead or hazardous tree removals go to Price Farms to get processed into landscape materials anyway, but repurposing materials in parks counts as a separate qualification towards that recycling goal.”
Impressively, Smith’s carvings have also helped the city achieve and maintain the growth award.
“These logs would sit at our shop waiting to get taken to Price Farms to get turned into mulch, so if it was gonna get mulched up anyway, might as well see if I couldn’t make a park feature with it,” he said.
Smith, with the help of his dog that he appointed as his “shop inspector,” is now about to turn a couple of the recycled logs into a big(foot) project, hopefully by this fall.
“The Halloween carving is a Bigfoot statue,” Smith said. “I wanted to do a kind of ‘find Bigfoot for the kids.’
“I think the Facebook post got confused, though, because that was my response when they asked me what the one thing I’ve always wanted to carve is. I had no real intention of doing it this fall, but I might be on the clock now.”
