Recent content by Palaeolite

Hornbeam produces the best charcoal, if you can get hold of enough and sell it, restaurants that use charcoal will pay a premium for it. I find hazel to be a remarkably reliable firewood. I know in Scandinavia they love birch because it grows so well, and I think hazel is quite comparative...

10,000BC? Is that it? Seems a little futuristic to me ;) But seriously, I could never really get into it before. I'll hang around and find out if it is as bad as The Island or if its any good before watching it.

Thanks all :)

"Unfortunately", all the Southern beaches, as far as I'm aware, are all sandy, like Bournemouth and Poole. There are plenty of good sized rivers though, like the Kennet and the Avon, the Test, Lambourn and another I used to live by. Failing that, my grandad lives by a big river in central Wales...

I believe the great vein of flint/chalk of Britain starts somewhere near Birmingham and sweeps down to Sussex. Aside from this and Norfolk (part of the same deposit, glacial?) I don't know of any meaningful deposits in Britain. My wife is from just north of Glasgow, so I'm very aware of the...

But Grimes Graves isn't a quarry, is it, it's a mine surely?

I wouldn't dream of breaking apart the larger ones already there, though using a smaller one laying around sounds like a good idea. I am a lover of our dear sarsens, such as the polishers, I wouldn't dream of abusing them. Personal 'religious' reasons, as well as them being an enduring part of...

Unfortunately a huge range of price tags too! :( I would like to hope I can get this from nature, for free, with all due respect to the landscape, my taking of a hammer stone or two pales in significance against the quarrying that garden centre are involved in.

I don't know, I don't like the idea of eating Brits, pork is fatty enough for me! :P

John Seymour's guide to self suffiency book recommends around 5 acres for a family, 7 acres if you want woodland to be your income (2 acres would make enough money that by the time you've reached one end, the first rotation has matured)... This could feed a family, suppose 2 parents, 3 or 4...

Thanks, I've got an antler for gentler work, but the first stages of taking a general shape from the core, or taking a core from a nodule, is really testing me. I am sure it is my technique but trying to take an initial piece from a nodule usually results in a core that is ready to crumble or a...

Hi, I'm having problems finding and determining a good hammer stone for flint knapping. So far they've been shattering upon use on flint, only occasionally creating a flake, so I'm clearly not using a decent material. Where can I look to find a good stone, what mineral should I look for and...

If a bowl is ambitious I'm guessing a baby's rattle is out of the question? I'd love to make one of those. My dad and I are going to find space to make a pole lathe.

I wonder what happened to my post... What is meant by public open space? Community orchard? Forest? Urban park? What wildlife is there? These factors will determine tree species more than anything.

That's not bad. I need an in betweener. I have a 4lb Elwell (without handle at the moment) and a Kent pattern hatchet on the large side. Something around the 2-3lb would be great, and for £30 how can I resist? Hmmm. *strokes beard*