10 Great Fire Starters for the Bushcrafter
The ability to make fire is one of the most important aspects of bushcraft. It can be incredibly useful in a variety of outdoor scenarios, including survival situations. Fire is required for cooking food and boiling water to make it safe. It also gives out heat and light which can help to make life out in the bush more comfortable and give a feeling of security. In some occasions, fire may be needed to produce a smoke signal. Whatever the need, having an understanding of, or being prepared with, easy fire starters will make life easier.
Fat Wood
Fatwood is the heartwood of pine that is impregnated with resin, more specifically terpene. This is traditionally used for making turpentine and is highly flammable. It is an excellent kindling or great as tinder when small curls are shaved off as it lights even when wet. Fatwood is best found in pine stumps and at limb joints in most resinous pines. It has many other names such as fat lighter, lighter wood and pine knot.
Charcloth
Charcloth is the material equivalent of charcoal, with the production method being similar. Vegetable fibres such as jute, cotton or linen can be placed into a metal box with a small hole in it. It’s then “cooked” on a campfire until the cloth is properly charred. It will light with the smallest of sparks making it ideal for use with a flint and steel.
Foraged Natural Materials
There are so many natural materials that can be foraged for use in fire starting. Anything that is easily combustible can be used as tinder before building the fire up gradually. The fibres from the inner bark of standing dead wood can be scraped into a ‘wooly’ mass. This turns it into a very useful tinder. Some outer barks are also very useful, especially from birch, clematis and honeysuckle, as they burn well, however care must be taken not to damage the tree. The outer bark of birch can be scraped or peeled off in very small pieces to build up a nice fibrous mass of tinder. Downy flower heads such as those from cattail, thistles and rosebay willowherb can be used but maybe best as part of a tinder bundle.
The fungus, daldinia concentrica, is known by various names including King Alfred’s Cakes and crampballs. However, the term coal fungus perhaps best suggests its use in firelighting. It can be found on felled Ash trees and sometimes on Beech. An ember will develop from a spark and this can be easily transported. Tinder fungus, or chaga, grows on birch trees and looks like very dark, thickened bark. The red/brown inner material crumbles and can be used as tinder. It ignites easily and holds an ember for a long period if carried as a larger piece. The Birch Polypore and Tinder Hoof Fungus can be used in a very similar manner. Dried grasses etc are excellent especially when used as tinder bundles. Hay, bracken and cleavers all work well.
Flint & Steel
This is another very old method of producing sparks, this time by striking a piece of steel against flint. Although with practice sparks can be produced using the back of a carbon-steel knife blade or an axe head etc, the easiest way is usually to use the curved steel striker that comes with a flint and steel kit. Hold the piece of flint and tinder, charcloth etc in your less dominant hand and strike the steel, using your dominant hand, against the edge of the flint to produce sparks which fall on to the tinder.
Birch Bark
Birch bark is a fantastic natural firelighter. The oil contained within the bark makes it both waterproof and flammable, meaning it can be used even when wet. The structure of the bark, with its thin laminate layers, means it can be easily scraped with a sharp knife to form fine shavings that will be easily lit from a spark. The more papery form of the bark burns vigorously and acts like kindling.
Ferrocerium Rod
The Ferro Rod, or Fire Steel, is made of Ferrocerium, a synthetic pyrophoric alloy of Iron and Cereum which was invented in 1903 by Carl Auer von Welsbach, an Austrian chemist. When struck it rapidly oxidises, producing sparks (essentially tiny pieces of burning metal), which can reach 3000o C regardless of the weather conditions. These are incredibly reliable so long as you avoid the poorer quality versions, ensure the coating of the rod has been scraped off and use the scraper at an angle of about 45 degrees. Like many other methods, you must ensure that you have suitable tinder to light.
Friction
There are numerous ways of creating fire by friction. All are based on the heat resulting from the friction between two materials reaching a high enough temperature to either produce an ember from the ‘coal’ built up from eroded wood or to combust the particles. Examples include the firebow, or bow drill, the hand drill, fire plough and pump fire drill.
Petroleum Jelly Cotton Ball
These are arguably one of the best home made parts of your firelighting kit as they are cheap, light-weight and enable a fire even in adverse conditions. Combine any petroleum jelly, such as Vaseline, with cotton balls (use 100% cotton if you require ignition from a spark and preferably extra-large sized) and thoroughly knead the two together but ensure some fibres in the middle are not coated so that they can take the flame. A spark, for instance from a ferro rod, will quickly light the cotton wool but whereas an untreated ball will burn for about 30 seconds, the petroleum jelly ball will burn for much longer and the more jelly there is in the cotton wool ball, the longer it will burn.
Compression
When air is compressed under high pressure it becomes very hot. In a fire piston it can reach temperatures over 400o C allowing the tinder placed at the end to be ignited. Although there are commercial products available made with modern materials, ancient examples include pistons made of
bamboo and horn.
Stormproof Matches
Stormproof matches are designed to light up quickly and consistently in driving rain, strong winds and falling snow. Unlike ‘waterproof’ or ‘windproof’ matches they should stay alight longer. Even if they have
been immersed in water! These make a great addition to your firelighting kit.
There are other good firestarters, such as feather sticks and waxed egg cartons. Look more up. Note that it’s always a good idea to keep things as simple as possible. In a genuine survival situation it is important to conserve energy when there is limited food supply. For that reason, lighters and commercial firelighters are worth considering having in your outdoors kit. Prepare a firelighting kit for your Bug Out Bag, if you have one. However, practise as many natural techniques as you can and become proficient in their use. How about trying to create a firebow set from scratch and see if you can make fire with it.
