How to Tie a Left-Handed Bowline Knot

Bowline knots are used when you want a secure, non-slip loop at the end of a line, such as for hanging a hammock from a tree, mooring a boat, or attaching a safety line to a tree. Although it's the bowline is a simple knot, it's confusing until you have a system for making one. For the left-handed people of the world, it's even worse. These instructions make a "Dutch Marine bowline" or "left-handed bowline knot", with the bitter end lying outside the finished loop. It is as safe as the ordinary bowline, but easier for lefties to make.

Unlike the loop of a slip knot, a bowline's loop will not change size easily. If you make a loop that is too small, it's easiest to untie the knot and start over with a longer free end. If the line is taut, you can't tie or untie a bowline. If you are mooring a boat to a piling, make the knot with a slack line and then drop the loop over the piling.

Knot making terms: "Line" is what you probably call "rope". The "standing end" is the longer end of the line where the line will be carrying the load. The "bitter end" is the free end you are using to make the knot with, or the dangling end left after the knot is finished. Now you know where the phrase came from: when you have reached the bitter end, you are at the end of your rope and in deep kim-chee.

Let's get this hammock tied to the tree. You will have to imagine the tree as you look at the picture.

1 - Stand facing the tree and wrap the line around the tree from right to left so the free end is in your left hand.

2 - Grab the line near the tree with your right hand and make a loop by twisting the standing end under the bitter end. It should be about three times bigger than the line. One problem beginners have is that they make this loop too big.

3 - Pinch the crossover point between your right thumb and forefinger to hold the loop while you make the rest of the knot. (see illustration)

4 - Make sure the free end is crossing over, not under, the loop.

5 - Push the free end up through that loop you are holding, and pull line through until the line is snug to the tree. (arrow 1)

6 - Wrap the free end around the standing end, as you keep pinching that loop. (arrow 2)

7 - Push the free end back down through the loop you are still holding. (arrow 3)
Step 7 is where most people lose the knot: the bitter end has to come up through the loop, wrap around the standing end (not the free end), and go back through the same loop, but in the opposite direction.

8 - Grab the free end and pull the knot tight, then release the loop.

9 - Tug on the standing end to straighten the knot out.

10 - To hang the other end of the hammock, have an assistant support the weight of the hammock while you tie the knot.

I always use enough rope to leave about a foot of line dangling from the knot. That's for the extra safety knot. When line is alternately slack and taut, bowline knots have a nasty trick of coming apart without any help from you. The bitter end will work its way out of the knot and your boat goes drifting out with the tide. A figure-8 or an overhand knot in the bitter end helps prevent this.

To untie the bowline, take the load off the line and wiggle the knot until it loosens a bit then push the bitter end back through the loops.