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Looking good there! I do like a bit of hawthorn :) And I approve of the first use too

I had a kelly that wasn't used for a number of years and it tasted a little odd the first time (but it also had spiders living in there, so I was mostly trying to get them out!). I boiled it a few times with changes of water in between and it solved the problem. I suspect that your problem is...

Normally I would suggest Danish oil, but if you can't get boiled linseed then that is likely out. Tung, etc as suggested are often used for outdoor furniture too. In reality ANY oil will be better than nothing, though vegetable oils often go sticky until they dry and mineral oils often a bit...

I've not tried it (nor any intention to, I like my milk to mammalian and preferably bovine rather than starchy plant or nut juice pretending!) but I'm told there is a very good powdered oat milk out there. Apparently you can make your own too by grinding oats very finely too

I used to visit River Cottage quite a lot before it got quite so corporate, I even used to sharpen their knives in exchange for an evening meal for two. Hugh has several of my knives in his own kitchen and a number of the staff past and present do too :-)

I used to be an archaeologist, of the cold/hot-wet and muddy, dig up the dead variety. Then having been distracted during the early years of the whole bushcraft movement, I ended up getting into Experimental Archaeology for a spell. But some 20 odd years ago I set myself up as a knife maker...

I have a bit of a billtong/jerky habit, so have also been down the rabbit hole of making my own. I've made small amounts with a standard kitchen dehydrator, but it didn't last long. So I built a drying cupboard from an oil drum and an LPG pilot light from ebay. Lots of space to dry lots of meat...

Pleased to hear that you are enjoying it already! :) Thanks

I couldn't imagine living in a town either! That looks very similar to my daily walk to work, though I see more cows than bees

Welcome! I too am an experimental archaeologist, well I did the experimental Masters at Exeter 20 odd years ago :lmao: If you've not already done so, I suggest talking to Prof Linda Hurcombe, aside from running the Msc at Exeter she has an interest in prehistoric fibres.

tengu, if you think that's probably-useful-clutter never look in my sheds! I've probably a small warehouse's worth of stuff in various sheds around my woods! :lmao:

i experimented with the auger tapping myself, since I have a lot of mature birch trees and 15-17 years ago had the time to to that sort of thing. I tried dry wood and fresh wood, wax, plastic, and rubber bungs. The best success for survival was amongst the trees that I just left the holes open...

I remember when they were just a decent hardware/tool shop in the town of Axminster (Devon) :) One of my first visits to the shop (when they only had the one!) involved me rummaging through their wood store and then wandering around the town trying to find my way back to the actual shop with...

you don't need a forge to anneal for drilling, just a plumbers blowtorch ;-) if you heat the area to be drilled to a very dull red then it will be soft enough to drill with standard HSS drill bits. Or buy carbide drills and don't bother, they will drill through hardened steel. Or even make a...

Nice looking knife :) Always lots of character in old files and rasps I've made lots of file knives and since I only use a couple of brands of file I took the time to try some heat treating recipes to make sure they worked. That then led to me just retempering the file instead of going...

haemerlin barrows all the way for me! They have the right sort of capacity, wide tops, relatively short legs (which means I don't have to lift the handles too high to get it above the lumps in the ground surface), solidly built and easy to handle. I always replace the wheels with solid PU ones...

All of the saddles that I know swear by Renapor and Sheritons leather balsom. They also swear about/against dubbin and neetsfoot oil. The oils make the leather flexible but weakens the fibres in the long run whereas the wax based balsoms nourish the leather, waterproofs and doesn't make it...

As just mentioned, any structure that is available to be slept in requires planning permission. Shepherds huts and caravans are movable so pass as seasonal abodes when working the woodland, but they should still be moved between seasons or they are thought of as permanent, I too have had the...

half a tonne would maybe build a kennel, not a 10x10 workshop! If it's stand alone cob without a timber frame I'm guessing something like 5 maybe 10 tonnes. Around my way the houses are built from cob and even a garage sized shed has walls of over two feet in thickness If it's a timber frame...

I live in Devon, where most structures over 80 years old are cob. I've also helped build iron age round houses as well as wattle and daub structures (I'm an experimental archaeologist by training), so yes, I'm aware of the need for clay :lmao::lmao: