Nettle cordage question

[Toddy]

I spin and weave both nettle and flax (hemp too) and make ropes and nets from them all. I agree, just before flowering to pull for fibres, and if you walk along the stems to crush them lengthwise it makes it easier to pull the fibrous skin off in one piece. Urtica dioica for preference, but if D. urens is what you've got, it'll do.....)
Nettle is *very* strong and lasting, (bootlaces lasted three years continuous use) and it doesn't seem to crack the way linen can once woven. However, the fibres are finer, softer, and whiter than linen and not as strong when wet as the flax. If you boil and mash up the residue after taking out the main fibres and mould it around something like a pot or a stump it'll make a bowl that can be waxed to hold food or to collect berries, etc.

Toddy

 

[Stew]

If you boil and mash up the residue after taking out the main fibres and mould it around something like a pot or a stump it'll make a bowl that can be waxed to hold food or to collect berries, etc.

Never heard of doing that before. Nice idea! :biggthump

 

[Emma]

Speaking of nettles, this is I'm afraid: I have a nettle sting stuck hard in me, I only brushed against it and it still hurts a week afterwards. Is this an odd nettle variety or just an unusual case? :?:

That tends to happen to me whenever I attack our garden. I assume it isn't puffed up and only stings when something brushes it? If it is then it sounds like the same as I get. It'll stop after a while and you probably won't notice when. I haven't managed to pin it down to a timescale better than 'a few weeks'.

 

[DOC-CANADA]

Doc - was there a little "frost on the pumpkin" up there last night. Pretty chilly on this side of the lake. We'll see -21 C tonight

Hi Jeff;
Just read your post (1:57AM - Saturday Jan.22) so I checked the weather channel. Currently -17C with an overnight of -18C. Also storm warning in effect. They say, considering the 'lake effect' snow (I live in Hamilton at the extreme west end of Lake Ontario), we could get up to 30 cm (12") so it should be a good day to get out the snowshoes because I probably won't be going to work.

I think it was colder last night and even colder the night before, but, hey, it's winter!

Cheers!

Doc

 

[arctic hobo]

That tends to happen to me whenever I attack our garden. I assume it isn't puffed up and only stings when something brushes it? If it is then it sounds like the same as I get. It'll stop after a while and you probably won't notice when. I haven't managed to pin it down to a timescale better than 'a few weeks'.

No, it's just like you say... not puffed up or anything. I have just not had it before... although I'm no stranger to nettle stings! Cheers :biggthump

 

[PurpleHeath]

i was just wondering to get the fibres out of the nettle surely you must neturise the sting first, how do you do that?

 

[Toddy]

:wave:
Crush them, wilt them or overheat them.
Basically damage the cells enough and they can't function properly. If you drag your hand firmly up the stem pulling off leaves as you go, you're also less likely to get stung. Me?? I use gloves
Toddy

 

[Justin Time]

If you drag your hand firmly up the stem pulling off leaves as you go, you're also less likely to get stung.

Hmmm, that was what I was told on a course once... my hands took days to settle back down to normal size... :yikes:

Me?? I use gloves

and I moved on to that solution soon afterwards....

 

[tomtom]

even if you avoid getting stung you often get a "tingling" from the poisen bit.. i guess if you have a bad reaction to it then your going to have to use gloves!

 

[Justin Time]

I don't think my handles were actually swollen to twice their size, they just felt like it.. IIRC it's histamine which nettles use to cause the stinging/tingling feeling.

 

[match]

Yes - histamine it is - the nettle is covered in tiny hairs, which are actually 'glass' tubes made form silica. These pierce the skin and then break, 'injecting' a combination of histamines, formic acid and seratonin and acetylcholine (increases the sensitivity of the nervous system to histamines):

Lovely defences!

 

[PurpleHeath]

wow, great pic! :super: it amzaing that something so small could cause so much pain!

 

[jack29g]

we had to make nettle cordage on the juniour fundimental bushcraft course i went on, mine never turned out how the leaders did! :yikes:

 

[hootchi]

Yes - histamine it is - the nettle is covered in tiny hairs, which are actually 'glass' tubes made form silica. These pierce the skin and then break, 'injecting' a combination of histamines, formic acid and seratonin and acetylcholine (increases the sensitivity of the nervous system to histamines):

Lovely defences!

So why don't they sting you if you do the old 'Spartan Grip'? :shock: :?:

I dont have the ..err... nerves to try it!

 

[match]

So why don't they sting you if you do the old 'Spartan Grip'? :shock: :?:

I dont have the ..err... nerves to try it!

Well, I heard about this and tried it when I was much younger, and it sometimes works, but not all the time :shock:

I think the reason it works a bit is that these are very much like small hairs - but brittle, and it is when they snap and become sharp that they 'inject' their contents into you. Grabbing the leaf keeps the hairs still and just squashes them in place, but brushing across the leaf moves the hairs, making them more likely to snap and then cut into the bit of skin directly behind that which broke them.

Thats my guess anyway - still hurts! :?:

 

[hardr004]

How do you make cordage from nettles?

 

[littlebiglane]

I have rhumatism in my left thumb knuckle joint. Beating it lightly with nettles every 3 months cures the pain I get from the joint. Mind you it can tingle for days after and make the area also quite numb!

 

[Commoner]

Back to original questions... look for tall :wow1:stinging nettles grown in open with RED stems... fibres seem to be tougher

 

[Le Loup]

yup but steeping them in water would save you all the work of hand stripping them out .

Bacteria would do a lot of the work for you

leaving you to go back later and pick out bundles of fibres ready to be rinsed and used

Tant

What you say makes sense. I have made a lot of cordage in my time, but not from nettle. I will give this a go.
Thank you.
Le Loup.

 

[wedgie]

I have rhumatism in my left thumb knuckle joint. Beating it lightly with nettles every 3 months cures the pain I get from the joint. Mind you it can tingle for days after and make the area also quite numb!

when we used to do lots of martial art cometitions fighting we would get the odd broken finger ect
to recover quicker we would gather large hessian bag of stinging nettles and remove the straping and punch into the bag the stings numbed the pain and promoted increased blood folw and helped us heal quicker and thus get back on the mats faster.
i was taught this by one of the early uk bushcraft /survival men eddie mcgee