How I carved a three legged log bowl - tips that saved me hours

I did something similar last year with a section of silver maple from a neighbor's yard, though mine only had two mounds because the blank was narrower. The layout point is very real. My first attempt had one mound sitting right over a ray section and it tore out no matter how careful I was with the gouge, so I ended up starting over on a fresh cut. Spending an hour with a pencil before the first cut seems slow until you've done it the other way once. On the drying, mine went differently. I turned it close to rough thickness first and kept it in a paper bag in the garage for about two months. It still checked, just smaller and closer to the rim. Might be worth trying if a crack ever gets away from you, though I agree the natural checks read as part of the design.

I used the same stain and sanding trick with a dark walnut stain and some Danish oil, and the ridges do pop nicely against the softer areas between them. One thing I found, wiping the oil on with a rag and then buffing it off while still tacky keeps the brushed texture from holding puddles in the low spots. Same story on time, most of mine was spent watching the wood sit there and not move.

That reminded me of the ones my grandfather used to knock out from fence line culls back in the 60s. No grinders then, just a scorch and a scorp and alot of elbow grease. He'd paint melted paraffin on the end grain right after cutting to slow the drying, and the checks came out hair-thin instead of gaping. I still do it on anything green and thick. Question for you, how did you level the three feet after the bottom moved? I've had pieces rock like a chair with a short leg after a season in the house.

Gotta push back on the paraffin thing though. I've sealed plenty of green blanks with wax on the ends and it barely did anything on thick oak, the big splits always started from the side and ran deep no matter what. My take is the wax only slows the very face of the end grain, it can't stop the rest of the blank from losing water through the bark. If anything a fat green blank wants to check and you're better off picking wood that checks pretty, like the OP did, instead of fighting it. Did the fence post blanks acutally stay hair-thin or did your grandfather just pick tighter grain to begin with?

The wire cup part deserves more attention than it gets, becuase the failure mode is sneaky. On a beech bowl I did last spring I learned that the instant you pause or let the cup tilt even a few degrees off your stroke, you leave a burnished patch that takes stain completly differently from the surrounding furrows, and no amount of rebrushing afterwards blends it back in. Two light passes in one direction beats one hard pass every time. Also, before the oil goes on, blast the dust out of the low spots with compressed air, since packed dust in the furrows is what makes those areas go blotchy. Did the oak keep opening its checks between your weekends, or did it settle early?

Update: started a second one from a chunk of sycamore and took the wire cup advice seriously. Keeping the stroke moving without tilting the cup made a huge difference, no blotchy patches when the stain went on this time. Also tried melted wax on the end grain out of curiosity, and honestly the skeptics here were right, it still split deep from the side.