In this episode of the Primitive Camping & Bushcraft Podcast, host Chris Speir explores the art and science of fire-building, from selecting tinder and kindling to mastering feather sticks and unique techniques like using arrowwood. He also shares stories from recent camping adventures and highlights the practical and psychological importance of fire in the great outdoors.
Welcome to Season 2 of the Primitive Camping & Bushcraft Podcast with your host, Chris Speir! In this episode, we dive into the essentials of fire-building from the book Primitive Camping & Bushcraft. From psychological benefits to practical techniques, Chris shares insights into the mesmerizing power of fire and how to master its creation, even in challenging conditions. You'll also hear a recap of recent camping adventures and learn about Chris's favorite tools for fire-starting, including Black Bear Fire Plugs and classic techniques like feather sticks. Plus, get a sneak peek at Primitive Camping Blend Coffee—the perfect brew for your outdoor adventures. Don't miss this engaging and informative episode!
(upbeat music)
Welcome back to the Primitive Camping
at Bushcraft Podcast.
My name is Chris Speir
and I'm gonna be your guide
to enjoying the great outdoors.
Well, I hope everybody had
a wonderful Merry Christmas
and a happy, happy new year.
And we got a winter
storm or something like that
coming in tomorrow.
So it's gonna be like snowed in
for a couple of days
in South Mississippi.
They're calling for records of snow
that has never
happened in South Mississippi.
So for those of you wanting
to know what that record is,
I'll let you know tomorrow,
but they're
anticipating anywhere between eight
and 10 inches of snow
in South Mississippi.
That's silly.
That ain't ever happened before.
Not in my lifetime.
So, but anyway, we left
off last time with water.
We did the straw.
We did the commercial
filters, straw filters.
We did all the other
types of commercial filters
that you could take with you,
the squeeze filters, stuff like that.
So now we're gonna move on in to page 140
where we're gonna be discussing fire.
So if you're following along in the book,
Primitive Camping in
Bushcraft by yours truly,
this is going, we're
doing a step-by-step steel.
This is season two,
but we're still doing a step-by-step
of the actual book itself.
If you notice here on the desk,
if you're not watching the video,
I have my own Primitive
Camping Blend Coffee right here
and just showing you
guys what the K-cups,
the pods here look like.
And then you can get
this right here in six, 12,
two and five pound bags,
and you can get it on a recurring basis
and ship straight to
your house every month.
That's good stuff.
I've had hundreds of good
reviews about this stuff,
and I am in the top
three of coffee seals.
So if you don't mind,
go ahead and push that
and just make it.
I don't make a lot off
of it, believe it or not,
but it is something that
helps further the channel
and it helps further
the Spear Outdoors brand.
So, but anyway, we're gonna
get right into what a fire is
and I'm gonna read straight out of the
book for this, okay?
It says, "A good fire is often called
"the television of the woods.
"Beyond providing you
entertainment and relaxation,
"a fire can also cook your food,
"boil your water, or even save your life.
"I have spent many hours in woods
"coming up with new camping hacks
"while simply sitting and watching a fire
"with utter amazement."
And that in itself is a lot right there
that we can just take
and unpack, you know?
The television of the woods,
I don't know why it's so mesmerizing
when you get out into the woods
and you're on a camping trip
and you're just
sitting out there chilling,
you got all everything
set up in your campsite
and you're just having a
good time and enjoying your life
and you're just
staring off into the fire.
You could stare off into a fire
and not say anything for hours and hours.
And I don't understand what the
mesmerization of it is
is that even a word?
Mesmerization?
(laughs)
Mesmerization.
But a fire is
something that is just like,
it's important, it's extremely important.
It does so many things for us.
Psychologically, it's there for us.
It entertains us, it
helps us pass the time,
it cooks our food, it boils our water,
it provides warmth, it provides light.
So, I mean, a fire is
such an amazing thing
that we often take for granted
when we get out into the woods
because when you get out there,
and I've been camping
here in South Mississippi,
and for granted, it doesn't get as cold
in South Mississippi as
it does everywhere else,
but still winter's winter here.
We got a lot of humidity
and so it makes it feel
colder than it really is.
The wind chill down here is oftentimes
between the teens and
the 20s and dead of winter.
But a fire is psychologically something
that will boost your
morale no matter what.
If you could block the wind
from blowing you directly in your face,
you could set a fire up.
With a reflector, you can put like a
little reflector wall
out there if you wish, or
you can set up a shelter
to where it directs heat back to you,
reflects heat back to you, back onto you.
Then you're not gonna have a problem
and you're gonna
psychologically be comfortable.
I don't know how to describe that,
but you will
psychologically be comfortable.
And it's pretty cool because
you get out there in the woods
and you get your firewood ready
and you pile it all up
or you start your fire,
you do your little, who
sets yourself shelter up
or your little tent or whatever it is,
you're gonna be sleeping in.
And then you sit back through and enjoy
the rest of the time
and the fire is going to be one of the,
like I said, while it goes, a huge
psychological aspect
to your staying out there.
But anyway, so I just
recently come back from camping trip
and I went primitive camping
and I wanted to film some stuff.
I was actually hunting
while I was out there
and I get out into the
woods and sit up on the campsite
and I got there late in the afternoon.
And y'all probably seen the video,
that was a two-part video
camping on the Pearl River,
a long camping on the Pearl River.
And I was out there, just me and the dog
and then my nephew and I
went out there the next week
hunting and at the same
spot, same everything.
And I get out there and
I'm cooking some breakfast,
some warmness of coffee up,
some of the primitive
camping blend coffee.
And I look over and I see this book.
He was walking towards camp.
And I was like, you gotta be kidding me.
He wasn't even 30, 40
yards away from the camp
walking straight to me.
And then it stops and it
looks at me and it's like, huh.
And it just turns to the
left and just slowly meanders
all the way around the camp.
It did not, we did not
bother this deer at all.
And so I've been back out
there to try to find him again
for many, many trips and have not.
I have not filmed many videos
because I've been out
there looking for that deer.
Now I found a bunch of does
and I found a bunch of female deer,
but now I have not
found any bucks at all.
Anyway, so anyway, I'm
sitting there camping,
I got my fire going,
I'm cooking my breakfast.
And I see the deer and then,
but there's something about the fire,
the smell of the fire,
the way the fire cooks,
the all night long.
My little nephew, he is
just fresh out of the army.
It was infantry and I
showed up with a light load,
but I have all my camp gear in one bag
and then I got all my
video gear in another bag.
So whenever I'm filming my
YouTube videos and stuff,
I got all the batteries and the stuff
to recharge the batteries
because you go through batteries quick
when you're out there filming.
You go through SD
cards and stuff like that.
So I got all this
equipment and all the lights
and all that stuff just for filming.
And I look over at him
and I see what he brought
and he just brought a little bitty
tactical style backpack
with a sleeping bag, a sleeping pad
and a change of clothes
and an MRE and that's it.
Nothing else.
I was like, "Golly, what is that like?"
You want to talk about ultra light?
That dude, he probably
had it down to five pounds.
Had his entire pack down to five pounds.
And that one included his gun
and ammo and all that stuff.
But you could tell he was
just used to being in the army
and not having anything
when he goes out into the field
for weeks at a time.
Whenever he was over in
Syria and stuff like that.
But fire is one of those
things that if you're not prepared
for the situation and you don't
understand the components
of the fire, it's not gonna work for you.
What I'm talking about
is that starting a fire
can be a challenge and it
can actually be frustrating,
especially if you're
doing it primatively.
It's nothing to have a big lighter.
And let's cut to the chase.
A big lighter is
ultimately the way to start it.
A big lighter is the
way to start your fire.
It is the best way to
have a fire with you.
It is the most economical and feasible
way to start a fire.
I'm all about knowing how
to do it with a ferro rod
or bow drill or flint and
steel and all that stuff.
But at the end of the
day, forget all that garbage.
Let's just go with a big lighter.
Big lighters are the number
one best way to start a fire.
So fire is defined as the
phenomenon of combustion.
It gives off heat and light from a flame.
So what does this mean?
Think of a fire as a triangle.
And we've gone through this
a couple of times already,
but on top you have heat.
And then on the bottom corners, you have,
you have heat and then you have oxygen.
And on this side you have fuel, right?
When all three of these
start working together,
think of the recycling symbol, you know?
And I don't know how many
times I've referenced this
because the recycling symbol is a lot
when it comes to camping and bushcraft
and the great outdoors.
You know, the recycle is
just like, do this, do this,
do this, and it keeps
going back, you know?
Same thing with fire.
When you got all
three of these components
and they're all combined,
and everything's working
the way it's supposed to be,
you have a fire.
And, you know, oxygen is
necessary for the fuel to burn.
And, you know, it's always present.
It's gotta be present during
all stages of the fire build.
And, you know, building and maintenance
and all that good stuff.
So to put it another way, if you,
if a fire can't
breathe, it's going to die.
It's just like us.
If it can't breathe, it's going to die.
So, you know, you got
your, you got your tinder,
you got your kindling,
you got your fuel, you know,
your tender is going
to be real small stuff,
your real fine fibers that
are going to be catching a spark
and you could blow it into a flame.
You know, with, even with a lighter,
you use fine tenders to
actually start your fire.
And then your kindling is going to be
a little bit smaller stuff.
And then you put it all together
and that's really
going to start your fire.
You know, the smaller it is, the better,
the better it's going to catch,
the faster it's going to catch.
And then it starts
creating the little coals
and everything that is
actually going to help burn
your actual fuel, which
is going to be bigger logs,
split firewood, stuff like that.
So everything's small
has to start, you know,
everything has small and
then it starts getting bigger
and bigger and bigger, you know,
to the point where you can add a big log
and it'll last all night long,
while you set by the fire.
But, you know, one of the
things that I really love
about the Great Outdoors is the ability
to find natural tenders.
And, you know, I don't
have any with me right here
on this episode, but, you know,
dog fennel, and I've said this from time,
and I know you're
probably not going to have it
in your local area, your geographic area,
but dog fennel, goldenrod, you know,
some of those other
flowery weeds that in the fall,
they bloom, they die,
and then all of a sudden
you're left with
something that's kind of fluffy.
It's got like a
fluffy flower or something,
leaves got fluffed up
or something like that.
Kind of like if you was
to pull apart a cattail,
you know, it's going to have
some kind of fluffiness to it.
And when you ignite the dog fennel,
it's not like it is a
flash tender, you know,
it is more like a,
a guarantee that it's
going to light tender,
but it's not really a
flash tender, it's not,
but it, I mean, a spark will
make it light pretty quick.
Yeah.
You know, kindling is an
elementary part of the fire,
and kindling is, you
know, one of the things
that you have to have in
order to make it bigger,
make the fire bigger, stuff like that.
Now you could do feather sticks,
you've probably seen videos on that.
Let me read this to you.
If you're dealing
with wet logs or sticks,
you can still have dry
kindling by making a feather stick.
Now, number one, what you're going to do
is you're going to find a log,
roughly two to three inches in diameter,
and you're going to split it in quarters
to create a pie shaped
wedge or pie shaped stick.
Then you're going to
hold your knife still,
you're going to put one of
the sticks along the blade
to make it thin shaving
all the way down the stick.
Once you've gotten close
to the end of the stick,
repeat the process as
many times as necessary
until you've made the stick
look like the vein of a feather.
Now, this is going to
have varying results,
different people's going
to do it different ways.
You know, people that's done it a lot
is going to have a
lot of curls, you know,
people that haven't done it a lot
are not going to have a
lot of curls on their stick,
it's going to have it real
thin, real thick, you know.
It takes practice,
it's one of those things
that you have to practice
in order to get it right.
Now, one of the things that I found
when making feather
sticks that helps out,
and a lot of people be like,
"How do you come on?"
Is jamming your knife,
sharp edge blade away from you,
and then pulling the stick
against the knife like that.
You know, you're going to
jam that knife down into a log,
you're going to pull it back
and you can make it that way.
I find that that's a little easier
than doing the knife
straight up and down.
Now, I'm not, I'm not
discrediting people,
I'm not, you know, you
need to practice your skills
with your knife, you
need to practice your knife,
you need to practice your skills,
you need to practice
making feather sticks,
you can't just, you know, not do it.
But I find it a little bit easier
when the knife is
stationary and I'm pulling the log,
but you still need to
practice with your knife
without doing it that way or whatnot.
You know, by making these
thin strips on the stick,
you're creating more
material for the fire
to consume as it grows.
This method is extremely useful
when you're camping in a wet environment.
South Mississippi is wet, South
Mississippi is humid.
You can walk into the woods
and all, everything's wet.
I don't want to call it
a rainforest, you know,
it's really not a
rainforest, but you know,
with the humidity,
everything's wet in late summertime,
you know, it can be 900 degrees outside,
but the humidity,
everything's so insaturating.
So, you know, we talked about your fuel,
your kindling, and then we talked about,
let's back up and go back to your tinder.
Tinder is any material, all right?
It's gonna be any material that is
natural or artificial.
And this material
lights with a spark, okay?
So, and by saying lights,
I don't mean erupting into a flame.
I mean, it generates an ember or it just,
it creates a coal, it creates an ember,
or it lights into a flame.
That could be any, and let me talk about,
we talked about cattails, you know,
that's a flash tinder.
We talked about, you know, the,
my mind just went blank for some reason.
I don't understand why it does this,
but we talked about dolphin,
we talked about, you know, golden rods
and other type weeds like
that to have a flowery weed
that you can use, and you can use that
with a Flint steel,
drop a spark down in there,
and you can catch a fire,
and it can go, you know,
even with a Flint steel.
But, you know, it's
just gonna go right back
to the bait lighter.
(laughs)
But anyway, these materials,
even though they catch a spark,
you know, these
materials usually folded together
like a bird's nest to catch the spark.
And that's gonna help
initiate the combustion.
The material you select
as tinder should be made
from thin wood
shavings or very fine natural
or artificial fibers.
Now, I found one thing
that I absolutely love,
and I take a pack of these
dudes with me everywhere I go.
I have started a fire in
every single condition possible.
You know, I might even try it tomorrow.
I might even try to make a fire with,
in the snow, because, you know,
that's the only
environment I have not started a fire
with these dudes is the
Black Bear Fire Plugs.
You can't kill these things.
I mean, these things start fires.
I have started so many fires
where the Black Bear
Fire Plug is ridiculous,
and whenever it's out,
I'm buying me another bag
of the Black Bear Fire Plugs.
These things are amazing.
And I'm telling you
the truth that you don't,
you're gonna have traditionalist
and you're gonna have non-traditionalist.
You're gonna, me, I'm
more of a non-traditionalist.
I'm more of a primitive camper.
I am not your 100% bushcraft guy.
Primitive camping and
bushcraft go hand in hand.
Yes, they do.
I explained, I spent an
entire book explaining that.
But there's qualities of
bushcraft in primitive camping.
There's the qualities of primitive
camping and bushcraft,
but they're not exactly the same.
Neither is bushcraft in survival.
Those are not the same.
But there's gonna be
some bushcrafters out there
that look down on what I'm
saying and how I'm doing it.
And that's okay.
There's no right way
or wrong way to do this.
If you want to bring
a big lighter with you
into the woods to start a fire,
bring you a big lighter into the woods
and start you a fire.
If you wanna bring some
Black Bear Fire starters
with you, who cares?
As long as the end result
is what it is that you need.
Now, if you wanna practice your skills
with a bamboo fire saw,
because you found a stand of bamboo
on your way to the woods
and you cut you a
section of bamboo this long,
like I've done before.
I don't even know.
I'm probably still under a non-disclosure agreement.
But I filmed an
application for a certain something
and didn't get elected or didn't make it.
But I used in that video,
I used the bamboo fire
saw to start the fire.
And it was a creative choice
because I hadn't seen that before,
but I did that and it was a creative choice.
Going back, I would've been like,
here's my Ferro rod.
If you don't like it, I'm sorry.
I will.
But anyway, let's say,
now we're gonna get into
actual different methods
of starting a fire.
We're gonna start doing
Flint Steel Ferro rods
and stuff like that
and episodes coming up.
Today we're just talking about Kenland.
We're talking about tinder and fuel.
There's a, I never,
there is a way to
start a fire with tinder
from green living wood and arrowwood.
Arrowwood is a shrub and
it grows almost everywhere,
especially at Southeast.
And you know, the
arrowwood is a shrub as a tinder.
The first time I saw
this, it blew my mind.
And I believe it was,
who was it?
I don't recall who was
it, Buckeye Bushcraft or,
one or two was Buckeye Bushcraft,
or Corpus Colonel Corner
or something like that,
where they did arrowwood and
they scraped that stuff down
to a fine tinder on the outside edges.
And it's green wood, just
scraped it off a green stick
and they threw it out in the sun
and they let it sit for a
few minutes on one side.
They flipped it over,
let it sit on the other
and they threw a spark
in there and it went,
I was like, what?
So the first time I ever saw that,
if you can imagine, I ran
it for South Mississippi.
I was just like, what?
This blew my mind.
So, you know, this went
against everything I knew
about fire at the time.
Bart from a green limb
is saturated with water.
So usually the only way to dry it out
is by letting it sit for
days or set it next to a fire
to where it applies heat.
But, you know, with arrowwood, however,
that's not the case.
You can make shavings
and place them directly
in the sunlight.
They dry extremely quickly.
So if you're ever in
a desperate situation
and you have arrowwood, and
if I had the examples of it,
if I remember whenever I'm
putting this podcast together,
I'll put a picture of
it up here on the video
if you want to watch it.
But anyway, you can
identify arrowwood as a shrub.
You know, once you
identify it and cut off a section
about two feet long,
scrape the outer bark off,
set it aside for your fire,
then you should be left
with a yellowish stick
and then take the backside of your knife
and that 90-degree spine on your knife
and just scrape that puppy down
and you're gonna come up
with all kinds of shavings.
Now, you're gonna get a lot
of shavings off of this stick.
You're gonna get a lot of shavings.
Set them to the side.
And then once you get it set to the side,
in the sunlight, you just let it sit
and then flip it over and let it sit.
And then a few minutes later,
you can just go ahead
and throw a spark to it
with a ferrule rod or
would you be lighter
or whatever you want.
And I'm telling you
right now, it will, you know,
20 minutes, 20 minutes drying time.
You got yourself some dry tinder.
That's amazing.
Especially to be all natural.
But anyway, so that's it.
If you don't mind, Swing by Amazon,
they're still on sale, $14.40.
Pick up a copy of the
Primitive Camping and Bushcraft book.
And go ahead and use the
description in the video
or this podcast and
Swing by and pick you up
some of that Primitive
Camping blend coffee.
It's real good.
It's how bushcraft tastes.
So, hey, I hope you enjoyed
this video or this podcast
and I'll see you next time.
God bless you.
(upbeat music)