A fter watching jonny wilson fishing in canada on sunday,i was puzzled by what people do for wood.he was above the tree line,so there are no trees ,so what did native people in these parts do for wood?
winnipeg
- Thread starter wolf
- Start date
-
Come along to the amazing Summer Moot (21st July - 2nd August), a festival of bushcrafting and camping in a beautiful woodland PLEASE CLICK HERE for more information.
bambodoggy
Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Wood for different purposes was transported & traded and carefully used to its maximum as it was hard to aquire. Notice the Inuit spears have "removable" points that were socketed to the shaft and tied to kayak, could afford to loose point but not shaft, so shaft stayed in hand. Animal blubber was used to heat/sear and light but never hot enough to "cook". Bones and ivory were utilized as structural material as well as artisticly. They made due with what they had, you have to improvise, adapt, overcome (oh my bushcrafting at its basics) 
CG :yo:
CG :yo:
No, to the east, in Ontario just south of the artic watershed, in the bush as opposed to a forest setting (bush is much denser). In the old days travel was mostly by canoe and dog sled and shanks mare. Now of course like everybody else by roads and airplanes. Northern barren grounds are occupied by 2 distinct peoples the Inuit and further south, northern Indians of various tribes.
CG :yo:
CG :yo:
greensurfingbear
Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
didnt many inuit eat raw meat? I thought that is where the term eskimo came from. Isnt a Cree insult or something?
Some of the Inuit probably do eat raw meat and other traditional foods, as a way to re-establish a natural source of food as opposed to prepared foods that are associated with diabetis and more modern diseases and to re-establish a traditional lifestyle. Eskimo does mean "Eaters of Raw Meat" Inuit is a better name, theirs.
CG :yo:
CG :yo:
Bit off topic maybe, but I came up with a question that you can probably answer, CG, while I was running in my local woods yesterday lunchtime - I do a lot of my best thinking then. Anyway, current thinking on tree-felling seems to be that First Nation peoples rarely felled anything thicker than your leg, so how did those gigantic totem poles come about? And with stone tools? 
Ted W
Anyway, current thinking on tree-felling seems to be that First Nation peoples rarely felled anything thicker than your leg, so how did those gigantic totem poles come about? And with stone tools? Ted W
Lots of ways to "fell" a tree, even with stone axes it would take a long timebut they had patience and it would be done. One way is to ring burn the bottom of a tree and with stone axes/adzes gouge out the charred wood and restart the process over and over till the tree is down. Carving totem poles would be done with shells, flint, obsidian, stone tools that are very sharp; canoes would be hollowed out by the controlled burning of the interior space and gouging out till the desired shape was achieved. Eastern woodland Indians would use stone axes/tools and/or harvest already dry trees/branches for fire. Stone axes/adzes are very sharp and durable in their own way, still with the advent of the European colonist and their steel tools it then made life simpler and less physicaly demanding. Reliance on copper, brass, steel implements greatly reduced the workload on the indegenous population of both sexes, it also spelled the eventual demise of the stone tool makers. As with all new improvements in their lives, traditional skills were lost, some permanently. Aboriginals embraced the newer European trade goods with enthusiasm, when people talk about going back to a simpler life using primitive tools and such one has to think that when the primitive peoples themselves had the choice between the perceived "good life" and mordern "tek" they choose the modern over the old. Primitive life style while appealing for a "vacation" leaves much to be desired over the long run, watch your family continously go hungry and become sick because the quarry you hunt is 100 yards away out of effective arrow range (discount the lucky shot) that the muzzle loader could easily harvest and it doesn't take a genious to see the advantages. It is evolution
CG :yo:
CG :yo:
CG, thanks for that. 
And I agree with you about the primitive living bit, cultures evolve along the path to easier and better living or they die out, although I think modern western European industrialised society may have taken a bit of a wrong turn somewhere in the last 100 years. We all rabbit on about the loss of traditional skills, harmony with nature blah blah blah but who really wants to live in a cave and spend most of life cold and hungry? I guess my view is a bit like that of the aboriginals when they first encountered Europeans, take what seems good and useful and incorporate it into to your own lifestyle as it suits you.
Ted W
And I agree with you about the primitive living bit, cultures evolve along the path to easier and better living or they die out, although I think modern western European industrialised society may have taken a bit of a wrong turn somewhere in the last 100 years. We all rabbit on about the loss of traditional skills, harmony with nature blah blah blah but who really wants to live in a cave and spend most of life cold and hungry? I guess my view is a bit like that of the aboriginals when they first encountered Europeans, take what seems good and useful and incorporate it into to your own lifestyle as it suits you.
Ted W
Similar threads
