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Birchbark – Woven Kindling

Here’s a great little project to do that will help you out when you want to get a fire going, especially if it’s a bit wet in the woods and you’re feeling a chill, or you want to get the coffee on the go and you need your kindling burning so you can get some heat into the coffee pot.

Here’s a little how-to from Woodswalker of BushcraftUK on how to create some good little firestarters, these are great for getting the fire going out in the woods but also strike me as a great environmentally friendly idea for getting your wood stoves at home going in the winter. I know I’m going to get some made and stored away.

I came across this idea when I was messing about with some birchbark. They make excellent firelighters for their size/burn time ratio and could with a bit of ingenuity be primed to take a spark.

Start with some bark and rip it into 1cm ish wide pieces.

©BushcraftUK

Then rip them carefully into 0.5 cm strips. You need four of them.

©BushcraftUK

Fold the pieces exactly in half and with the loop made in one of them, insert the tails of the other.

©BushcraftUK

Do this with another…

©BushcraftUK

And finally the fourth and you will have a square. in theory!

©BushcraftUK

Pull it in tight.

©BushcraftUK

Now this part is the middle and on either side, you must tie four strand crown knots. Sounds complex but really all you must do is loop and trap each of the four strands under the adjacent one. Perhaps researching the knot may help at this point if you are stuck.

Three strands folded over…

©BushcraftUK

Top half complete.

©BushcraftUK

And the other side.

©BushcraftUK

Here is a size comparison to a Bahco folding saw blade.

©BushcraftUK

And a whole load of them which took about 1/2 hour to make.

©BushcraftUK

And the most important part – it burning.

©BushcraftUK

Some of the tightly woven ones have lasted a long time with a consistent flame and are excellent as fire starter after igniting something with a fire steel. You probably could weave it a different way, but this is quite simple.

Have fun,
Woodwalker

If you have any tips or tricks this that you to share with us here on Outdoor Revival then feel free to message us on our Facebook we’d love to hear from you.

As with all things fire, be careful of where you light your fire and make sure that it’s always a manageable size. Remember – Leave no trace.

Paul Pinkerton