Bushcraft, survival and wilderness skills courses

Whatever your chosen method for fire lighting is the fundamentals of establishing, managing and maintaining a fire will always follow the same guidelines. First off what is the fire for? A few possible reasons are heat, light, signalling, cooking or most importantly boiling tea water.

Once you've decided on that then it makes it all a lot easier, but before I get carried away let us just go through some of the basics of fire. Most should know of the trinity of fire if not you will by the end of this paragraph. Fire needs three key components Oxygen, fuel and heat.

It is easy to forget what a difference a little string can make but once your out in the wilds one of the key elements of bushcraft is the making of cord. from short lengths for bangles and decoration to enough to make nets and baskets there are a million uses for string. Making it can become a little addictive and you will find yourself experimenting with anything vaguely fibrous no matter where you are. I have found myself on the London underground with the bark of an exotic tree getting many perplexed looks which turned to looks of bemusement when I handed a friend who was with me a bracelet to take home. Fibres can be taken from a wide range of plants nettle and bramble being my favourites. However for the purposes of this I've opted for raffia as it’s something that I have in great abundance for running workshops with local schools and groups. The key to tidy string is in keeping everything even and in two strand twisted string there isn't much to concentrate on so with a little practice it’s fairly easy to come up with something strong and presentable.