I got a little more time this evening, and spent a half hour making two trenails out of four ⅜ inch square scraps of live oak I got from Nathan. Split them out using a chisel, then whittle the end pointy and round-ish, then bash them through a dowel plate with a 2# hand-sledge (holes of ½, ⅜, 5/16, and then ¼ inch).

Of the four attempts, two suffered from mis-hits and broke, but two came out nice and straight (at least matching the grain) and should be way stronger than will be needed to hold the handle to the cane shaft.

I’ve decided the holes in the tenons on the ends of the shafts will be offset by between 1mm and 1/16 inch. I’ll boil these pegs just before doing the joinery, and once everything dries, the joint should last multiple lifetimes. I’ll also make a couple backups from other scraps in case I break one trying to drive it home.

About 3-3½ hours in so far. Really glad I decided to make a pair of canes, rather than just one, since doing just one would’ve saved me about an hour so far.