Sorry, my picture created more questions than it answered.
Yes, the small lighter triangle on the right between the ends of the outwales is simply a plug to fill that gap. It's made of cherry (like the gunwales). I could just as easily (actually much more easily) ended the gunwales at the end of the outer stem. This canoe actually does have stem bands. The band simply terminates by butting up against the bottom of that triangle rather than wrapping up over the deck.
Where the inwales end at the inner stem, they are about 3/8" wide filling the 3/4" gap created by the inner stem.
At the risk of sparking more questions that might not actually help you, here's a full description of the pieces of wood that make up the picture (starting in the middle).
The deck is made up of 5 slivers of wood (at least here at the end of the deck - it's actually quite a bit more complicated than that). 3 pieces of darker wood with 2 slivers of cherry separating them.
Outside of that immediately you will see the inwales (cherry) about 3/8" wide.
Outside of that are a very narrow slivers of white cedar (this canoe has ribs and these wedges start at zero thickness at the stem and taper to 1/4" thick over the length of the decks. This allows there to be no gaps between the deck and the hull in case I want to seal off the bow and stern for flotation chambers.
Next you will see the hull strips (1/4" thick) and then finally the outwales.
The inner stem is 3 laminated pieces of red cedar 1/4" thick.
Outer stems are 3 laminated pieces of cherry 1/4" thick but the outer lamination is entirely removed here to make a sufficiently wide flat area for the stem band.
Hope this helps.
Here's a wider view of the bow of the canoe:
