Friction Fire Class- August 2nd, 2008

If you are in the area of Oregon Ridge Nature Center, you may be interested in a Fire Making Class I am teaching there . It will be from 9-5 on Saturday August 2nd, 2008. Registration is handled through Oregon Ridge Nature Center. Cost for the class is $80.00 per person and the minimum age requirement is 18 years of age. If you're interested in more classes such as this, or this class in particular, you can find more information at www.earth-connection.com or Oregon Ridge Nature Center

Day in the woods

I filled up my gourd canteen and took it with me into the woods today. I've found it doesn't change the taste of the water and works quite well, though it still needs a stopper.
I've decided this summer is the time to make a good hunting bow. I've learned alot about what to do with an animal once you've taken it, and I hope to begin hunting my own animals. Up until now I have been relying on others to provide me with meat, hides, bones, sinew, etc.
There is a hickory tree I have been aware of for a number of years and it appears to be the perfect size for a bow. I want to get to know it before I cut it, so I'll visit it for a while until I feel its the right time to cut. For something like a bow, where so much goes into the making of the tools and hunting of the animals, I feel like this should be done right, and not rushed.

A Box Elder (Ash leaf Maple) fell near my old debris hut, which I am very grateful for since it it one of my favorite friction fire woods around here. I try not to ever cut live branches, and to come across an entire tree like this is an appreciated gift. Some of the upper branches are very straight so I've made a hand drill set. I tested it out but produced only white wood dust. I'll make a video so I can explain it easier. This is the first time I've made a handrill set with a wood other than yucca, cotton wood root or mullein.

Camping the Rattlesnake

Jared, Mariah, and I camped up in the Rattlesnake Wilderness last night. We brought some elk meat, sweet potatoes, dough, onions, and a few other food stuffs for dinner and breakfast. We found that the bears are indeed still moving around. When we arrived at the Rattlesnake creek and got out of the car, we saw a bear cub (probably Black Bear), on the other side of the road. It apparently didn't like us much, because it started to climb a nearby tree.
We used the handrill to make the fire, since my bow drill wasn't working well. I'll be collecting new parts for it soon.
Dinner was excellent, of course, and we all slept well.
The next morning we explored the surroundings a bit, and I gathered some Kinnikinik berries and leaves. I plan to dry the leaves, and use the berries to make pemmican. The berries are very starchy and tend to keep rather well, not unlike a potato. It's also a medicinal plant, used in many places to treat or cure a variety of illnesses. It grows as a groundcover in patches.

Here are the berries, which I gathered using my new elk ear pouch, as well as the branches with leaves.

There are also these green fungi type things? It grows on dead pondarosa pine branches in the rattlesnake and its bright green. If anyone knows what this is, send me an email.

Elk in Montana

I was invited to Jared's fathers house to help butcher an elk that was shot on the plateau near his house. The area is an amazing play, and I'm told the plateau is a viciously cold place, which makes it all the more interesting. We made a nice handdrill fire (yucca on cottonwood root) and slept by it. It turned out to be very nice night, considering it had been 18 degrees the morning before.
Anyway, the elk was a beautiful cow. It was an all day job, but very interesting. I'd never done any butchering, or skinned something that large. I used a chert blade of course to do all the cutting. We got the hide, many bones, tendons, leg skins, and even made a pouch from the ear (inspired from Torgus' blog post here). We also got some meat of course.

We had a couple of dogs who did their best to take advantage of my generosity with the scraps. Elk meat is very good, so I can't blame them.

Some of the things we wanted were cannon bones, scapulas, ribs (good for bow drill bows and scrapeing tools) as well as an ulna bone. I'll post pictures of that particular bone when we start to work on it. Also the leg skins were saved (much to the dismay of the dogs who happen to like to eat that part). The ear pouch idea was very interesting, so I'll focus on that.

I started by cutting the ear from the head. I didnt cut all the way to the base, though I wish I did. I didnt use any tools, except my fingernails to seperate the skin from the cartilage. The trick, I found, was to use your fingernail to pick at the skin until it seperates. Its very thin on the inside of the ear, so I took my time and tried not to rush, but I accidently tore it slightly (nothing major, I'll sew it up later). I found the edges of the ear to be a bit tricky, but not impossible. One thing I found was that skinning an ear isnt difficult, just requires patience.

Once I got to the end, its a bit tricky to remove the cartilage, but you just pull it away from the skin. I was worried I'd tear open the bottom of the pouch, but it turned out alright.

Finally, you have your ear pouch. You can see the tear, which luckily doesn't go too far down. I left it inside out to dry, and worked it with my hands until it was no long stiff. I suppose you could brain it, but I'm not sure it would actualy penetrate the hide, because there seemed to be some membrane that would be hard to remove without tearing the ear. I agree with Torgus that this is a resource that has been overlooked, and I plan to make many of these pouches (a few friends have already asked for one). I like that I can get more than just a brain from the deer heads we pick up from the butchers.

Mark of a good day

My day started fairly late yesterday, around 12 or so. My friend Jared and I were planning on getting some hides from the local butcher shop to do some hide tanning. So we got our tools together and drove out to the shop. However, when we got there, we found that our local source for hides was now keeping them all, because Pacific Hide and Fur buys all their hides at the end of the year. But I think we'll be able to negotiate some hides, since they probably pay the shop a flat rate for all of their hides at the end of the year, as opposed to a per hide basis.
We did get a head and several legs out of the visit though, so we cut open the skull and removed the brain to freeze it. We're considering re-braining out elk leg hides to make them just a bit soften. I remember a time when removing brains was a task I didn't really look forward to. But now its something I don't mind. I suppose its the appreciation for what the animals brain can lend us, the ability to turn a hide or a pelt into something usable, and even desirable.
Having taken care of the brains and legs, Jared wanted to try out his hand drill set. We tried yucca on yucca, but it just seemed to burnish. I'm not sure what was going on with that set, I've used yucca sets before with success. I get the feeling there was still moisture trapped in it. Next we tried the same hand drill, though on a cottonwood root fire board. After a short while we had an ember, which we promptly put into a cedar bark tinder bundle and rushed it outside to blow it into a flame. Theres something about making a hand drill fire with friends, everyone should experience it.

It was quite a nice day so a trip to the Bitterroot river near Blue Mountain was planned. It's an amazing place with alot of plant diversity and wildlife. To name a few there were Blue Heron, lots of Robin, Mule Deer, Whitetail, bear (their scat was everywhere), lots of fish, tule growing in the swampy areas, as well as extensive grasslands and willow stands. Another feature was that there is actual fine grained sand in areas (especially around the willow) with many insect and bird tracks, as well as what appear to be coyote tracks. The whole area is quite amazing. After crossing the river, we began making out way up river to a large stand of willow. On our way Jared spotted a fawn grazing in a dried up channel. We stalked up to it for the next 10 minutes (it was quite unaware of our proximity, and even laid down in the grass to rest). I was reminded of what Joey Murray had said about the first day of hunting season, that most of the deer brought in were very young. I could clearly see that even though we were stalking through very dry grass, this fawn (who was on his own) was not picking up on us at all. Eventually he must have heard something because he stiffened up and looked right at us, then got up and ran off.
We proceeded up the river, noteing the bear scat all the way along the path. We arrived at the willow, where there was also a marsh. There were alot of deer tracks here too, as well as patches of Tule. I had never seen tule in person before, it is not common in this area. I ended up collecting a bundle of it to work with it and see what could be made. We spent the rest of the day exploring the river. Shortly after leaving, we passed a flock of about 10 turkeys as well as a doe and fawn crossing the road. A fitting farewell to a great day at the river.
Our evening was occupied going from back alley to back alley collecting various fruits that grow in the alleyways in Missoula. We found salmonberries, raspberries, apples, grapes, and tomatoes. We often find and gather other fruits like plums, pears, apricots, and peaches. That's one thing I really like about Missoula is the abundance of these fruits that no one really picks.
Later last night I used some of the tule to make a Paiute Tule Duck Decoy. It turned out fairly well, thought I want to use more tule to fatten it up a bit. I used instructions from Primitive Ways. They can be found here. I'll put some pictures up of the decoys soon.