I knew the cotton and wire wool could be used as tinders but I couldn't think of any way to use my keys or my mobile........but then I considered the methods I have previously used to ignite wire wool. I had no method to create a spark but I have used a battery with both terminals at one end to ignite it in the past and then realised that a phone (or camera battery) usually have such a battery inside.
I had never heard of or seen this demonstrated before I so I was rather sceptical about it working, so watch the piece of video below to see whether it did.
so imagine my surprise when I found pups sprawled across the footpath
This population are Eastern Atlantic Grey Seals. About half the worlds breeding population of Grey Seals are found around the coast of Great Britain.
The breeding site is known as either a rookery or haul-out. The pups are born with a white coat and start to moult at 2 - 3 weeks old.
They will suckle from their mother for about 21 days. After about 7 weeks the pups make their way to the sea and begin to feed.
I did get a nice piece of video of it though.
The previous evening it had been raining and then after the rain had stopped there was a frost.
The pattern reminds me of Ground Pine AKA Club Moss
which you can read more about in in one of my previous posts http://fenlaners.blogspot.com/2007/11/club-moss_10.html
Having cleared the ground around the fire sight I would then place half a dozen finger thick sticks on the ground to form a platform to build the fire on. I place the first two fine grades of material on the platform as the basis for the fire.
At this point I would light the fire (in this particular case, with a match).
Once the fire establishes you add the next grade of material
and then the next
The type and size of fire you require will dictate the size of fuel that you use. From a simple brew fire
to one that will keep you warm at night
When I am teaching how to build/make a fire, I tell people to look at and think about the branch of a tree.
We will use this fallen Birch as our example.
For the first stage you need very fine material equivalent to that found at the very tips of the branches.
Next you want material about double the diameter
Now we move halfway back along the branch for rather thicker material which I would consider to be fuel
Once material of this size is burning we are ready to use fuel material closer to the base of the branch
Finally we can now burn fuel of the diameter found at the base of the branch where it joins the trunk.
I am not of course suggesting that there needs to be a convenient branch available each time you make a fire, but looking at a branch gives you a guide to the size of material needed. For a brew fire you would probably only need material up to the size featured in picture three.
In the next post I will put these steps into practise.
