Hi all,
The majority of the account below has been pasted from a PM I sent to Harvestman. Therefore I apologise in advance for the distinct lack of pictures. I hadn't gone out with the intention of posting here but Mike suggested I did as lots of you lovely people would have some really helpful advice to enhance the experience next time I go. So here goes:
On a very damp Saturday morning last weekend I got in to the wood by about 7:30am just as it was getting light enough for woodland walking. I wanted to hear the morning chorus and enjoy the peacefulness an early morning brings. It proved worthwhile as I saw some rabbits in an adjacent field, bordering the wood.
I wanted plenty of time to explore and the plan was to eat breakfast outdoors too.
The walk in took some time as in a few places the path was blocked by a number of fallen tree's, some easier to get over or around than others. There's also a section which takes you perilously close to the river's edge. I really enjoyed the walk in although the river was particularly quick with the recent rain and I wouldn't have fancied falling in!
The plan was to set up and get some porridge on the go, although being the first time I've set up a tarp on my own, the whole process took me an awful lot longer than anticipated. The knot Mike showed me (which I'm fairly sure is just a different method of tying the siberian hitch) was really useful so at least once I'd decided how everything was going to look I could tie things out easily enough.
A great deal of time got used up tinkering with the configuration until it seemed well stretched out in all the right places. I went for a basic apex sort of shape but with the back dropped down a little more and the front more open. The biggest problem was keeping it pulled across the ridge line properly as it wanted to bunch up along the centre line.
Eventually I managed to find how to do a prusik knot with the help of google on my smartphone and it did the job. I suspended the tarp from its centre line tabs, threading the ridgeline through them but I think carabiners will be something to think about next time.
It may have been the way I had the tarp stretched out but it didn't seem to distribute the weight across all the tabs evenly. The centre tabs weren't really resting on the ridge line at all. Didn't really matter I guess, probably just my OCD
Once I finally finished faffing with the tarp it was probably going on for 10am. Next I needed a fire before I'd be able to eat or drink anything so I found some particularly damp logs and laid out a triangle with them to contain a modest fire. I then put some smaller sticks inside the triangle for a base and then got to work collecting lots of different thickness's of dead wood.
I set about the task of trying to start a fire completely naturally with just my firesteel and what I could find around me. This was only my second or third attempt at this. I'd found a large dead birch on the way in with stacks of bark peeling away from the damp inner. The bark was quite damp so I'd followed the tip of tucking a few large sections inside my coat.
I set about scraping at the surface of the bark but all I'd get was a sort of damp dust as opposed to any curled shavings. Inevitably I failed at getting a spark to the dust so I ended up using cotton wool and a bit of vaseline. I laid a stainless steel plate type thing down as a base (the remains of what proved to be a useless camping toaster) this time under my tarp after the lesson learned on a previous outing when an hours work got ruined by a heavy downpour and put the cotton wool on top of one piece of birch bark covered in dust.
Of course it went up well so I decided to use the remaining sections of bark as a sort of shelter over the existing flame. This proved really effective as a bit of a wind break to the flame and would also make a good rain shelter had I not been under a tarp. The sections of birch bark then took to flame very nicely and I then started layering on all my wet wood, firstly the finer stuff and building up from there. As soon as the medium/pencil sized twigs went to flame, I transferred the whole lot outside on the metal plate to the triangle I'd set up.
I'm chuffed to beans I'd managed a sustained fire in very damp conditions almost completely naturally other than initial flame. I will confess that there were times where I did add some of my dry wood but this was only to act as an accelerant in getting something substantial enough to cook on. I know if time hadn't been an issue that I could have got that fire going without any of my own dry wood. I finally got a brew going at around 11:30ish.
Eventually I wanted to remove the metal plate that had by now collected most of the embers and was stopping the fire from spreading out a little. I used my pan grips for this and tried to carefully tip most of the embers in the centre so as to keep the heat contained. At this point onwards it struggled for while as I'd obviously put hot embers on to a cold damp base so this was another point I added a little dry wood to get things going. Again, had time been on my side I'm confident I could have sorted this without dry wood.
It then took until about 2 O'clock for the heat to be enough to cook on. I think I was well past the prospect of breakfast in the woods! Instead came out the left overs of the Indian takeaway in the mess tin! Tasted wonderful!
The fire never really gave off a great deal of heat more than about a foot away but was red hot in the centre, ample for cooking on. I was kind of happy with this as I had deliberately gone for a small functional fire rather than a roaring one that may have attracted unwanted attention. It was also very damp in the area I'd set up. Most of the larger trees overhead were Alder. I didn't use Alder to burn, it was mostly downy birch but it probably had a higher water content than ideal. It's a good woodland though in as much as there's quite a variety of trees. I spotted beech, Oak, Birch, Hazel, Ash and Pine so lots of options for fire had a perhaps tried setting up elsewhere.
All in all I'd say a success. Learnt some good lessons and was very happy with how I'd fared with the fire in those conditions. Feels like I'm definitely gaining some experience with fire. I just need to master that final step of natural tinder which leads me on to needing to know more about Birch. From what I can gather there are different types with varying bark. The ones I tend to come across in woodland are much larger. The bark comes off of dead trees almost like roof tiles which was great for the above reasons but is not good for catching spark.
I've seen much smaller birch trees, typically on business parks where the bark is just flaking away by itself. If ever I could find a combination of both of these (probably wishful thinking) I think I'd be away!
Anyone have any other tips? Perhaps I should try some pine shavings instead if I can find some with a good level of hardened resin in.
Finally, the only two pics I took. Again apologies for this. I only took these because I was so pleased with my success of fire!
Untitled by davidpingu, on Flickr
Untitled by davidpingu, on Flickr
Thanks for looking. All comments and advice welcomed
The majority of the account below has been pasted from a PM I sent to Harvestman. Therefore I apologise in advance for the distinct lack of pictures. I hadn't gone out with the intention of posting here but Mike suggested I did as lots of you lovely people would have some really helpful advice to enhance the experience next time I go. So here goes:
On a very damp Saturday morning last weekend I got in to the wood by about 7:30am just as it was getting light enough for woodland walking. I wanted to hear the morning chorus and enjoy the peacefulness an early morning brings. It proved worthwhile as I saw some rabbits in an adjacent field, bordering the wood.
I wanted plenty of time to explore and the plan was to eat breakfast outdoors too.
The walk in took some time as in a few places the path was blocked by a number of fallen tree's, some easier to get over or around than others. There's also a section which takes you perilously close to the river's edge. I really enjoyed the walk in although the river was particularly quick with the recent rain and I wouldn't have fancied falling in!
The plan was to set up and get some porridge on the go, although being the first time I've set up a tarp on my own, the whole process took me an awful lot longer than anticipated. The knot Mike showed me (which I'm fairly sure is just a different method of tying the siberian hitch) was really useful so at least once I'd decided how everything was going to look I could tie things out easily enough.
A great deal of time got used up tinkering with the configuration until it seemed well stretched out in all the right places. I went for a basic apex sort of shape but with the back dropped down a little more and the front more open. The biggest problem was keeping it pulled across the ridge line properly as it wanted to bunch up along the centre line.
Eventually I managed to find how to do a prusik knot with the help of google on my smartphone and it did the job. I suspended the tarp from its centre line tabs, threading the ridgeline through them but I think carabiners will be something to think about next time.
It may have been the way I had the tarp stretched out but it didn't seem to distribute the weight across all the tabs evenly. The centre tabs weren't really resting on the ridge line at all. Didn't really matter I guess, probably just my OCD
Once I finally finished faffing with the tarp it was probably going on for 10am. Next I needed a fire before I'd be able to eat or drink anything so I found some particularly damp logs and laid out a triangle with them to contain a modest fire. I then put some smaller sticks inside the triangle for a base and then got to work collecting lots of different thickness's of dead wood.
I set about the task of trying to start a fire completely naturally with just my firesteel and what I could find around me. This was only my second or third attempt at this. I'd found a large dead birch on the way in with stacks of bark peeling away from the damp inner. The bark was quite damp so I'd followed the tip of tucking a few large sections inside my coat.
I set about scraping at the surface of the bark but all I'd get was a sort of damp dust as opposed to any curled shavings. Inevitably I failed at getting a spark to the dust so I ended up using cotton wool and a bit of vaseline. I laid a stainless steel plate type thing down as a base (the remains of what proved to be a useless camping toaster) this time under my tarp after the lesson learned on a previous outing when an hours work got ruined by a heavy downpour and put the cotton wool on top of one piece of birch bark covered in dust.
Of course it went up well so I decided to use the remaining sections of bark as a sort of shelter over the existing flame. This proved really effective as a bit of a wind break to the flame and would also make a good rain shelter had I not been under a tarp. The sections of birch bark then took to flame very nicely and I then started layering on all my wet wood, firstly the finer stuff and building up from there. As soon as the medium/pencil sized twigs went to flame, I transferred the whole lot outside on the metal plate to the triangle I'd set up.
I'm chuffed to beans I'd managed a sustained fire in very damp conditions almost completely naturally other than initial flame. I will confess that there were times where I did add some of my dry wood but this was only to act as an accelerant in getting something substantial enough to cook on. I know if time hadn't been an issue that I could have got that fire going without any of my own dry wood. I finally got a brew going at around 11:30ish.
Eventually I wanted to remove the metal plate that had by now collected most of the embers and was stopping the fire from spreading out a little. I used my pan grips for this and tried to carefully tip most of the embers in the centre so as to keep the heat contained. At this point onwards it struggled for while as I'd obviously put hot embers on to a cold damp base so this was another point I added a little dry wood to get things going. Again, had time been on my side I'm confident I could have sorted this without dry wood.
It then took until about 2 O'clock for the heat to be enough to cook on. I think I was well past the prospect of breakfast in the woods! Instead came out the left overs of the Indian takeaway in the mess tin! Tasted wonderful!
The fire never really gave off a great deal of heat more than about a foot away but was red hot in the centre, ample for cooking on. I was kind of happy with this as I had deliberately gone for a small functional fire rather than a roaring one that may have attracted unwanted attention. It was also very damp in the area I'd set up. Most of the larger trees overhead were Alder. I didn't use Alder to burn, it was mostly downy birch but it probably had a higher water content than ideal. It's a good woodland though in as much as there's quite a variety of trees. I spotted beech, Oak, Birch, Hazel, Ash and Pine so lots of options for fire had a perhaps tried setting up elsewhere.
All in all I'd say a success. Learnt some good lessons and was very happy with how I'd fared with the fire in those conditions. Feels like I'm definitely gaining some experience with fire. I just need to master that final step of natural tinder which leads me on to needing to know more about Birch. From what I can gather there are different types with varying bark. The ones I tend to come across in woodland are much larger. The bark comes off of dead trees almost like roof tiles which was great for the above reasons but is not good for catching spark.
I've seen much smaller birch trees, typically on business parks where the bark is just flaking away by itself. If ever I could find a combination of both of these (probably wishful thinking) I think I'd be away!
Anyone have any other tips? Perhaps I should try some pine shavings instead if I can find some with a good level of hardened resin in.
Finally, the only two pics I took. Again apologies for this. I only took these because I was so pleased with my success of fire!
Untitled by davidpingu, on Flickr
Untitled by davidpingu, on Flickr
Thanks for looking. All comments and advice welcomed
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