In this Memorial Day episode, Chris breaks down three field-tested tinders—arrowwood, mimosa, and tongue nut—and how even soaking wet woods can spark a fire when prepped right. He ties it all back to faith, asking: are you ready to catch the fire God is trying to ignite in your life?
Join me at Camp Wut-Da-Heck for a raw, hands-on breakdown of three primitive fire-starting tinder's you can find and process in the wild—arrowwood, mimosa, and tung nut. I walk through scraping wet bark, sun-drying techniques, and using tools like the ferro rod and Pull Start Fire to get real flames in real conditions. If you’ve ever asked, “Can green wood actually work?”—this episode gives you answers you can take into the woods today.
Spiritual Reflection:
But this episode doesn’t just deal with physical fire. It turns the corner into a deeper challenge: Is your heart prepared like good tinder—soft, stripped down, ready to respond? Using 2 Timothy 1:6 and Hebrews 12:29, we’ll explore what it means to fan the flame of faith and what happens when the spark of God’s presence hits something truly ready to burn.
Why This Matters:
If you’re looking to expand your fire-starting skills using local resources—this episode gives you real, tested results.
If you’ve felt dry, distracted, or unprepared spiritually—this message will call you back to readiness.
And if you’re just tired of overproduced survival fluff and want faith and fire, stripped back and spoken real—you’re in the right place.
Gear Mentioned:
Ferro rod
Lagom folding saw
Pull Start Fire
Char cloth
Sun-heated rocks
Natural tinder (arrowwood, mimosa, tung nut)
Scripture Anchors:
2 Timothy 1:6 – “Fan into flame the gift of God.”
Hebrews 12:29 – “Our God is a consuming fire.”
(upbeat music)
Welcome to the Primitive
Camping in Bushcraft Podcast.
I'm your host, Chris Speir.
So here we're gonna
talk about gear, grit,
and the kind of stories
you only get around a fire.
It's all about learning, adapting,
and keeping your faith strong.
So whether you're a seasoned outdoorsman
or just looking to unplug and reconnect,
you're in the right place.
So pull up a chair by the
fire and let's get into it.
All right, welcome back
to the Primitive
Camping in Bushcraft Podcast.
And today we're talking all about fire.
But first I wanted to
say happy Memorial Day.
Today is Memorial Day.
And it's a day that is
set aside to remember
the men and women who
laid down their lives
in service to our country.
And we pause to honor their sacrifice
and we hold close the memories of those
that we lost along the way.
For me, May always
brings around some weight.
My best friend Scooter, he
passed away in May of 2020.
He wasn't military, but he
was a warrior in his own way.
He was steadfast, he was loyal,
he was always ready to help
and to help carry the load.
And you know, Camp Wut-Da-Heck was named in his honor,
and we are in camp Wut-Da-Heck today.
So today's episode isn't
about loss, it's about fire.
We're digging into
what makes good tender,
what catches flame when it matters,
and how that ties back to the
condition of our own hearts.
So pull up a chair, let's
talk about Arrow Wood, Mimosa,
and the spark that starts it all.
(laughs)
So I released a video
yesterday on YouTube
and it was a full length video.
And it's all about fire tender.
And specifically using
green wood as a fire tender.
And I used arrow wood and
compared it with mimosa.
And I wouldn't say really compared it,
but I showed that you can
use this as a fire tender.
And so arrow wood, I found
some, I scraped it green,
I dried it into some for a little bit,
and I lit it with a ferro rod.
And it was a solid, solid fire tender.
And it was something that
you use when it's soaking wet.
When you take the bark off the Arrow Wood,
it is sloppy wet in there.
I mean, it is soaking
wet, like drenching wet.
Like I don't even know, you
can probably pierce the bark
and drink the juice that
pours out, it's that wet.
Now mimosa is invasive
all in South Mississippi.
And I haven't proven it.
I have not proven that you can use that
until I filmed this video
and I was doing my research,
I was doing my study.
And I got the idea
because it's everywhere.
And I got it on my property out here.
I've got trees and
trees and trees and mimosa.
And you can't get rid of it.
The more you cut it
down, the more it grows back.
Same thing with tongue nut,
and we're going to
talk about that as well.
If you don't know what a tongue oil tree
or a tongue nut tree is, then get ready.
Well, we're going to discuss
that here in a little while.
So then the wait
before I did a short video
on the Pull Start Fire.
And I believe I had that as the sponsor
of last week's video,
but it's still
something worth talking about.
It's still viable in a world
where you want to fire now.
A lot of us, whenever we get out there,
we want what we want.
We want it now.
And everybody, we all are subject to
instant gratification.
It doesn't matter how far along you want
what the Lord is or not.
At some point we all fall
and need the instant gratification.
And so that's where the
Pull Start Fire comes from
because it burns for 30
minutes, you pull that string,
and it's going to work.
But anyway, so the Arrow wood, man,
I first saw this
online and it blew my mind.
My mind was blown
whenever I first saw it.
And so I had to do some research on it
and find out what it is, why.
So Arrow wood is pretty
much indigenous to the States.
It's indigenous to the
Southeast or the Eastern Seaboard,
the Eastern States.
And it grows near creek beds.
It grows near roadways and field edges
and stuff like that.
Creeks, lakes, anything
is where there's an edge.
It always grows on an
outside edge of the tree line.
Now it doesn't get real huge,
but it does make
relatively straight shoots.
All its limbs are
straight, pretty much straight.
And what isn't straight,
you can actually hold over
the fire and bend them straight.
And one of the things,
the reason why they call it Arrow Wood
is because the indigenous people here,
that's what they use it for.
They used it for arrows for their bows.
Now these arrows are,
these Arrowwood plants are all over here
in South Mississippi.
And whenever I first saw it, I was like,
"Yeah, what's the odds of that?
I'm not gonna see it down here."
And then I went to
looking for it and sure enough,
it is everywhere.
It is all over the place down here.
But once we got out into the
woods and started finding it
and got to understanding
what we were looking for,
the kind of leaves and
then in the springtime,
like right now, it's late spring now,
it's starting in the summer.
In June, it'll be
summertime, but it's late spring,
but these things still have flowers.
And the beautiful thing about Arrowwood
is that the flowers are real small
and they clump together,
they're grouped together.
So the flowers on this is a
dead giveaway with the leaves.
It's like an oval shape with rough edges.
It kind of looks like a saw
all the way around on one side
and a saw all the way
around on the other side.
And that is a dead giveaway to this tree.
Now, another aspect of
this tree is the fact that
if you see one, there's gonna be more.
There's gonna be more than one.
You're never gonna find
just one Arrowwood bush.
There's gonna be several bushes
within a short distance of each other.
And everywhere that I
have found this Arrowwood,
this has been the truth,
that there is always more
than one bush next to each other.
And so I don't know if
that's a common thing,
just that's my observations.
So Arrowwood, once you cut it,
you cut you a nice little piece off.
You don't have to cut
the real big thick bark,
or not bark, but the big thick trunk
or the main branch of the tree.
You could just cut a
couple of the little shoot-offs
or the limbs off of it.
And that was suffice.
That will give you plenty
enough tinder to start a fire
and plenty enough
tinder to actually cut it.
And then you can actually go
out and start another fire.
So you can have that as backup.
Now, you cut your limb, you debark it,
and then you take all the bark off of it.
And the water in between that bark
and the actual wood
itself is very substantial.
You get a lot.
It's wet.
And you're probably thinking to yourself,
how are you gonna start
a fire with wet tinder?
I can't explain it
because it is slopping wet.
And if you got dirt on your hands,
and you touch this, it is
going to make mud in your hands.
That's how much water
is inside this Arrow Wood
between the wood and the bark.
Now, once you debark it,
then you take the backside of your knife.
In my case, I didn't use my knife.
I used the sharp edge
on my Lagom folding saw.
And that saw is
amazingly sharp on the spine.
I mean, it is ridiculously,
it's sharper than all
the spine of all my knives.
And I don't know why.
But anyway, this saw has
a great, great sharp spine
that you are able to go ahead and just
rub it back and forth.
And you wanna press down
with the angle into the wood.
And then you want to just scrape it.
And you scrape it.
And each scraping, it almost,
it gives off almost like a fluff.
The F-L-U-F-F, fluff.
Not just shaving, not shaving.
Not just shavings, but it
makes the shavings fluffy.
And I'm having a hard
time describing it, fellas.
And gentlemen and ladies,
I am having a very
hard time describing it.
So what you are going to
look for is that the fibrous,
that's it, it's gonna
be extremely fibrous.
And when you look at
it, it's gonna be like,
oh, wow, that is gonna catch fire.
So, and once you get it shaven down
and you get you a nice little pile of it,
and you'll notice your stick,
as you're starting to do your stick,
your stick will start, it'll be like,
cause you're not gonna go all
the way to the bottom with it.
I never did.
And I mean, some people probably could,
but you'll start seeing it
where it's just start shaving
all the wood away.
And it just slowly makes
it thinner in the middle
and water in the edges.
And that is an extremely beautiful,
beautiful fire tender.
Now with the Arrow Wood,
I'm trying to describe it as best I can
without visualizing it with a video
or anything or a photograph.
But the Arrow Wood has a brownish,
orangish tinge to it.
It's wood, it's shavings are
going to be like a rusty color,
like a tan, like a, you know,
like a dead wood inside of a dead wood,
dead oak wood specifically,
how it's gonna turn
like a tannish rust color.
And so whenever I got
everything done with that,
then you set that out on
the rock or on some dirt
or on the ground, anywhere
that the sun is able to hit it
and let the sun dry what kind
of moisture that's in it out.
And it doesn't take
long, 15, 10, 15 minutes,
something like that, maybe 20 tops.
I had a couple of rocks out here
that I just laid the stuff on
and the rocks had been
sitting in the sun all day,
so they were already warm.
And then by putting the
tender on top of the rocks,
it just, you know,
acted like a reflector,
a heat reflector and just
drove all that moisture out.
So once I did that, I'm done with the,
with the tender from the arrow wood.
And then I go to the mimosa.
So mimosa is an invasive
species in Mississippi.
Oh, yeah, it's pretty
much invasive everywhere.
And it is much like the arrow wood,
as far as the bark is concerned,
the bark will come
off, you'd make a slit,
and then you just peel it off,
just like you would on the arrow wood.
Mimosa usually has a
very long curved shaft
or a curved main trunk.
Sometimes it goes straight up,
depending on the trees or
whoever's doing whatever,
you know, whoever, if
you're cultivating it
to grow in your yard,
which I don't recommend
because it'll start
taking over everywhere else
and start taking over
everybody else's yard.
But if you're using it as a tree
or ornamentation tree in your yard,
it'll grow straight up.
But if it is growing
on the edge of a root
or edge of a field or edge of, you know,
it's like arrow wood,
it's always gonna grow
the edge of something,
the edge of the tree line,
the edge of the root, the edge of fields,
the edge of creek banks
and, you know, stuff like that.
And it's always gonna grow on that edge.
And it'll start curving out.
And these things, they grow fast.
And from all the
research that I've been doing
about mimosa, and I'm
sitting here looking
at a couple of branches
of it right now from camp,
wut-da-heck.
But of all the research that
I've done on the mimosa tree,
the flowers are edible.
It has been used as a medicinal,
and I think that's how it ended up here.
It's also called the silk
tree, and it's from China.
And China all the way from Iran,
from Iran over to China
is where it's typically,
it's typical range.
And then it was brought
over here to the States,
and then it was just multiplied.
In several States,
like Florida, I believe,
it is an extremely invasive species.
They pretty much outlawed it, you know.
Kind of like Willow did in Australia.
You know, Australia,
the willow tree over there
started taking over, and
they just had to come in
with bulldozers and back
hoes and pull it all up.
And you can't miss a
root, because if you do,
it'll grow back.
Well, mimosa's the same way.
It will sprout from a seed.
It'll also sprout from the actual root.
And so that works the same
kind of way as a plum tree.
Some certain plums do the same thing.
So with the mimosa,
you're going to harvest it.
You select the one
that you want to harvest,
and you go right for it.
Now, here's the thing
that I found with the mimosa.
Once you cut the limb,
and once you debark it,
you need to get straight to work.
It works amazingly, and
it fluffs up amazingly,
just like the arrowwood does.
And this wood is a very bright white.
It's a real white looking wood.
It is, if you were to do
bow drills or hand drills
or fire plows and stuff like that,
mimosa is your candidate.
It is the one that you want to do
those kind of friction fires with.
And then the ranger over here,
you got him another turtle.
And he's dragging the
turtle to camp, Wut-Da-heck.
(laughs)
Silly dog.
But anyway, these mimosas are perfect
for any kind of friction fire set.
And they're real good,
and I'll have to do a demonstration video
on the mimosa tree.
Now, you go ahead and debark it,
and you can put one slice down your limb,
all the way down,
and it will just peel straight out
like a, hey, I don't even
know how to describe that,
but it'll just pop right on out,
like you took a jacket off.
That's exactly how it would take off.
It is wet, but not to the
extent of the arrowwood.
The arrowwood is more
of a yellowish color.
The mimosa is a bright white.
Now, what I was saying while I go
was that you have to take the mimosa
and you have to start working with it,
because the more it dries out,
the less fluffy the material is gonna be.
Explain that one to me.
I don't know, but of the several branches
that I did and experimented with,
this is what I found.
I had some sticks that
I cut the day before,
and then I had some
sticks that I cut the day of,
and I tried them out
because I was trying to see,
and I debarked both of them.
The day before I
debarked it right as I cut it,
I just didn't have time to mess with it.
I had somewhere I had to be.
And then, so the next day,
I went to start scraping it
and found that it did
not generate the results.
So I was like, well, this
one's kind of dried out.
Let me do another
one, and I'm glad I did,
because I found out,
because had I not done that,
I'd never know what I know now,
and that you have to
work on it pretty quick
before it dries out,
because that wood will dry out very fast.
And another option,
another thing, not option,
but another thing about that wood is,
you know, when I was researching as well,
that it burns extremely hot.
It burns fast, but it
burns as hot as oak,
from my reading online.
Now, that it burns a very hot fire,
and makes it real hot and real fast.
So whenever it's dry, it is,
if you need something to
get real hot, real fast,
mimosa is the way to go.
But it has to be dry,
because I don't know if
it's gonna burn real wet,
like a log, you know,
but it has a lot of
moisture content inside of it,
just like the air wood does.
Now, you take these
things and you scrape it
and with the backside of your spine,
just like you did the air
wood, and you just collect it.
Now, every time you scrape it,
you're going to get some
extremely fluffy material.
This stuff is fluffy.
It's almost like you can
make a pillow out of this.
And thinking about it,
you could probably
take it once you did this,
you could probably weave it together
and make cordage out of it.
And I'm thinking I'm
gonna give that a shot,
and see how that works.
Because once you rake
that end of your blade,
down the spine of that board,
and or that wood,
and you get a good six to
12 inch long piece of fluff
that comes off of there,
it's still pretty hard.
It's still got some
tensile strength to it, you know,
and it will be allowed to be rolled.
You can roll it up and
then you could twist it.
So, but the only problem with that is,
that I can foresee is
that the moment it dries out,
it might become brittle.
But who knows?
It might be one of those
things like willow bark,
where you have to peel the willow bark
and then throw it in a fire
and boil it with some hardwood ash,
or generally with the lye
in there to soften it up.
And then you have to take it out
once it generates a different color,
like a rust color,
and then you hang that
thing up and let it dry.
And that's when you start
twisting it into a fiber.
So that's neither here nor there,
we'll do a primitive
rope making on another day.
So, the,
once you get your tenders out,
and you got enough that you have,
that you need to start a fire,
let's pull this microphone
back closer to this chair,
but once you get enough to
actually start your fire,
you go ahead and set it on a rock,
set it on the dirt,
set it out in the sun,
somewhere where the sun
can hit it and dry it out.
And you're gonna be sun drying this wood,
not sun dried tomatoes,
but sun drying this wood.
And you go ahead and put that out there,
let it dry down a little while,
15, 20 minutes, 10
minutes, something to that effect.
And like I did in the
video, I did it for 10 minutes.
I did it for 10 minutes,
and then it, a ferro rod,
it accepted a spark from
a ferro rod real quick.
So that's the next step.
Then you would go ahead
and put it where you need it.
You'd already, while you
was waiting for it to dry out,
you already found all your
sticks, all your kindling,
you know, all that
stuff that you're gonna use
to ignite your fire or to grow your fire
and to kindle it into a fire.
And you're gonna go
ahead and get all that ready.
And then you throw a
spark into your tender bundle.
Now, here's the thing about that.
It will, it will, like
first or second strike
on your ferro rod, it
will ignite into flames.
And I found that mimosa does
burn hotter than the air would.
But both of them catch flames
with the first or second strike.
Now, once you put the mimosa in there,
it's gonna burn a little bit faster than
the arrow wood does.
It's almost like it is
a, it has no oils in it.
It's not a volatile,
but it just seems like
it's got more fire
catching properties to it
than an arrow wood does.
But arrow wood is still a viable option.
It's still used all over the place.
It's mentioned all over the internet.
And it's in the forums and all of the
such of that nature.
So once you get these things in there,
you get your fire
started, bam, it's over with.
You just throw your spark in there.
Now, bonus tip, it works
with char cloth as well
for both of them, the
air wood and mimosa.
It works with char cloth.
And, and there is another I
told you would come back to
in a little while and
that is the old tongue nut
or the tongue oil tree.
Now back in, you know, many moons ago,
Mississippi was one of the
top exporters of tongue nut oil
and tongue nut oil was
what was used to paint ships
during World War II and after that.
It was the oil base, the
oil for the oil base paints.
And tongue nuts were a
huge, huge commodity down here
in South Mississippi until
Hurricane Camille in 1969.
Once Hurricane Camille hit,
then it wiped out the
tongue nut orchards and well,
now they're just an
invasive species and these things.
Dude, let me tell you, you
get you a tongue nut tree
and in two years, like if you get a
sprout from a tongue nut,
it'll be eight to 10
inches that first year.
That's third year, it's
gonna be about 40 feet tall,
about eight inches in diameter.
And it's just gonna be a big old dude.
I mean, these things grow quick.
I mean, just like they grow fast.
The old expression grows like a weed.
That's it, they grow like a weed.
So the tongue nut, but
the thing about tongue nut
is typically it grows straight.
They grow straight and the
branches are only gonna be
at the top of the tree.
It does not grow like
branches like these other trees.
So you get you a very
straight, long stick.
And so if you get one that,
let's say two inches around,
you know, the whole girth is two inches.
And you cut that dude and you debark it.
It debarks the same way arrowwood does.
It debarks the same way mimosa wood does.
And bonus tip, it is just as good at
starting primitive fires
as the mimosa is.
Hmm, go figure.
Any kind of tree that has the little pith
in the middle of it, like a sponge pith
or whatever you call it,
is very good at starting
friction fires.
And this stuff right
here, like I've used it a lot.
I've also used it to
demonstrate how to make a bed
because it's light, the woods light,
it's not very heavy,
heavy, because it grows faster.
But this stuff is
amazing and it works awesome
as a firetender.
You just go scrape that dude
down and you're good to go.
You're our golden.
So Paul told Timothy, fan
into flames the gift of God.
That is 2 Timothy chapter one, verse six.
Starting a fire in
the woods is about more
than just skill, it's
about being prepared.
Good tender doesn't argue with the spark.
It's soft, it's ready,
it responds immediately.
Same thing with our walk with Christ.
You don't start with big
logs spiritually or physically.
You start with humility, readiness.
You gotta ask
yourself, if God struck a match
in your life today, would you catch fire?
Or would you just smoke and
sputter until he gave up trying?
Just like the arrowwood and the mimosa,
if you prep early and
set yourself up right,
the flame will come fast.
But you gotta be willing
to be scraped, exposed,
and laid out in the sun sometimes.
And that's how real fires start.
And don't forget, our
God is a consuming fire.
Hebrews 12:29.
You prep the tender, but
the fire belongs to him.
And when he moves, he doesn't warm you.
He consumes everything that isn't real.
So you better be ready.
So this week, don't
just think about fire.
Build one, get
outside, get off your behind,
get outside in the woods, go outside.
If you ain't got woods, go
find a park, go find something.
But experiment, test your tender.
Get your hands dirty,
get your boots dirty.
Prep something that's
real, not just in the woods,
but also in your heart,
in your walk with God.
Let the quiet remind you that the small
sparks still matter.
And as we honor those
who laid it all down,
military or not, let's
be people who are ready
when the flame comes.
Because when it does,
it won't be a campfire.
It's gonna be a consuming fire.
All right, guys, thank you
so much for stopping by today
and listening to me on this
beautiful Memorial Day 2025.
I hope y'all have a great day.
And just remember this, in
all your ways, acknowledge him.
And I will see you in the
next video or the next podcast.
God bless you.
Thanks for sitting
around the fire with me today.
If this episode gave you
something to think about,
if it helped you feel a
little bit more prepared,
or it even stirred your faith a tiny bit,
go ahead and share it with someone else
who might need it as well.
We don't go camping
to run away from life.
We come out here to
slow down and to recharge.
So grab another log,
throw it on the fire,
and remember this, in all
your ways, acknowledge him
and he will direct your path.
I'll see you next time.
God bless you.