And my tricycle is the fastest on the block,....especially when mounted with a lawnmower engine. By your very statement, requiring sinew backing to especially make a suitable short bow, you reflect that the native woods cannot stand alone on their merits for the task.
There is a reason why the venerable and highly respected English/Welsh longbow evolved there; because you had the best wood for it. There is also a reason why the shorter bows evolved here (US, specifically Eastern and Plains) and that is due to the woods available. The aforementioned Osage orange (Hell, its even known as "bo darc" where it comes from, from the French bois d'arc meaning "bow wood".) couldn't have been designed in a lab to be better suited for short bows due to its easily defined grain/wood delineations and their respective and complimentary qualities of compressive vs.tensile strengths and qualities. But, it makes shyte longbows. Here, hickory and sometimes ash can make an OK longbow, but it sure as hell ain't English yew. Take the compliment when given.
Many of my books are in limbo, or I would cite a study done, iirc, in the early part of the 20th century. It consists of tables of data collected over many, and I mean MANY, woods and bows, including data on composite construction (ie; horn, sinew, etc). Quite informative and well worth a perusal for anyone with an interest in the subject.
A bow is a highly evolved tool. Yes, while you can bend a branch and tie a string to it and essentially have " built" a bow, it will not stand up to the daily demands and standards placed on the real thing. Along that same thought, bows should be built from the woods that best suit the demands placed on the tool. Whether a wood tends to whip in the limbs, or the bow has a tendency to "follow" the string, or any number of other negative characteristics are most often, if not always, caused by the particular material used and/or assigned to a style of bow which said wood doesn't lend itself well to while being superior for other styles.
Let's not talk about crossbow prods. They are not bows, are not built like bows, ....aren't even shot like bows. We might as well talk about wagons.