Living Primitively

Lately I’ve been experimenting a lot with a more refined way of working skins. Most of it is based on native Siberian tanning, just utilizing stone tools instead. I will not give you all the details of the process as of yet, but briefly show you one of two new tools which removes the need for sandpaper or pumice for removing the membrane.

Reindeer (and deer skins in general) are very sensitive when tanning hair on. The sharpness of the tool is important, otherwise you will put a lot of strain on the grain and produce a spotted piece of fur or in the best case scenario; eskimo tan. Eskimo tan is super soft, but the durability of the clothing is not satisfactory if you don’t shoot enough caribou to make a new set of clothing every year or two.

The scraper is made of flint, but any knappable stone can be used:

They don’t seem to need resharpening very often at all. This small one I use as a dry scraper and as a stretcher on small skins such as leg skins. I also have a big one that acts as a stretcher on bigger skins.

On the veidemann course this year, following the tradition, the students made a moose skin currach. I had to use it when crossing the lake a few times recently. The lake was just starting to freeze over and I had to break my way through at some spots.

The construction of this earth lodge was started in 2009 during the Veidemann course. Birch bark supply ran short two years in a row, but finally, this year I managed to complete the thatching. It would still probably be advantageous to extend the birch bark a bit further up in order to contain more heat. For now I am using some spruce bark slabs as extra covering.

In the lower half of the walls, the three layers of birch bark are covered by turf peeled from rocks. The upper part is spaghnum moss collected in the bog.

The inside of the earth lodge still needs some fixing to be as nice as it can be. I’ll also have to make a door, but for now I’ll use a skin as covering whenever I am using the lodge.

Lessons learnt for next lodge:

• Go smaller, the amount of raw materials needed for this structure was immense.
• Make it round, as it will then reflect heat better.
• Use a different solution for the top, so it is possible to close the top when the lodge is not in use.

This will probably be main camp for the fishing operations I do in the lakes during autumn. However it is too close to “civilisation” for where I want to have my winter camps.

Over the last year I have realised more and more that we humans have a role in most of the ecosystems on the planet. And I think for a very long time we lived in relative balance with it. Balance itself in it’s true form does not exist, neither in nature or in humans, but the interactions can be mutually helpful or marked by single sided destruction. These systems of mutually helpful interactions are the kind of balances I am talking about.

In this area, if nature was left alone at least within a couple of hundred years what would probably happen is that the Norway spruce (Picea abies) would take over and you’d get boom and bust cycles due to forest fires. This is a sustainable system, like any other natural system, but it’s not optimal for biodiversity, animal density and not least human density. In order to get a richer environment, there must be a kept a higher than “naturally occuring” ratio of open spaces,

All over the world, also locally, burning was one of the tools to keep open spaces and forest floors more productive and openly spaced. Whereas I have more or less given up the thought of burning forest floors in this area (would probably be too dangerous and might shift the vegetation too much), open spaces like dry bogs and meadows were burnt here traditionally to improve pasture.

Burning meadows is something I have done since childhood, so it was not a focus this year, although it could be very interesting to see specifically what kind of plants are favoured by burning.

Two kinds of patches were burnt this year. The ground underneath one hazel (Corylus avellana) bush that was coppiced last winter as well as a dry bog with grass, heather (Calluna vulgaris), various berries and spagnum moss. I was a bit concerned with parts of the bog area, which overlaps with a very dry patch with cowberries (Vaccinium vitis-idaea) and bilberries (Vaccinium uliginosum).

There is a relatively short window in which burning the lands is possible without causing damage to animals. It has to be done before the birds lay eggs and before the fire hazard becomes too great. The best is while there are still large patches of snow, where the fire can be curbed before it gets out of hand.

The burnings were done on two seperate days, in nice weather with almost no wind (although it seems that the fire calls upon the wind when it gets going to a certain size).

The hazel burn was pretty straightforward, and was a very slow burn, mostly grass burned and some leaves. Decideous woods seems rather safe to burn.

The dry bog burn was different… This time I tried not to limb the pines to see the effect. I didn’t remove the junipers (Juniperus communis) either. What happened was of course that the junipers burnt like petrol and flamed up quite a bit up into the smaller pines, killing the smaller ones.

Lesson number one:

Conifer branches must be kept out of reach of the fire if they are to survive the fire. If young trees are ever to develop in such areas one needs to take at least a decade of burning breaks every now and then in a particular spot.

Burning frequency is part of the experiment. With the hazels I plan on burning every year, to promote a rich herbal understory and since the regeneration of the hazels seems less impacted by fire.

If I burn the dry bog, what will happen is that after a few years, the understory will be grass alone, and I’d prefer to keep some of the heather and the berries for variety. I’ll start off with the guideline that when the ling is past it’s prime and is dying off I’ll do another burn. My hope is that this will increase berry production and reduce the amount of spaghnum moss, which very few animals consume.

After the burn everything looks kind of barren, but after relatively short time things regenerated. Especially with the hazel burn there was an explosion of growth after the burn. What was very interesting with the bog burn was that the patch of concern regenerated particularily well and might carry new berries already next year. Whether the species composition has shifted is too early to say. Only thing that is a definite is that a lot of the spaghnum moss was burnt and since they grow very slowly this will be a lasting effect when burnt every few years.

Hazel burn:

After a few weeks:

A month or two:

Showing hazel growth in midsummer:

Dry patch after burning:

After about a month:

At end of growing season:

From further out in the bog:

Same place about a couple of months after burning:

At high summer:

Showing the dead moss being replaced by grass:

It seems that burning promotes the growth of valerian (Valeriana sambucifolia), angelica (Angelica sylvestris), fireweed (Epilobium augustifolium) and wild strawberry (Fragaria vesca). The two first are probably due to their ability to spurt new growth quickly with their big roots. Fireweed probably due to prolific seeding and germination. Strawberry I have absolutely no idea to why, maybe because the burn removes competition. This burn from last year shows valeriana.

I´ve spent most of this summer in the woods with a few other people (you can read more about it on the Into the Woods blog). Since a few weeks, I´ve been back to the world of buildings, cars and phones, working on various projects, some of which take me back into the woods, others into more civilized environments. Amongst some of the major projects were (and are) harvesting and drying bull rush and marshgrass for future summer lodges, gathering large quantities of black walnuts and hickory nuts, getting firewood stacked and ready for the winter.

Recently I also visited Jarrod Stonedahl, a friend of mine who’s a skilled woodworker – those of you who have some interest in this subject may want to check out his new blog which has some great posts on birch bark canoes etc.

There are  a number of craft projects that I want to work on before the beginning of the white season: my fur parka needs some patching along the sleeves, the mukluk soles are worn through and need replacement and my snowshoes could use some new rawhide lacing…plenty to do. On the other hand, I´m looking forward to really test out the toboggan I finished last winter. I´ll be posting updates here along the way.

In the meantime, here are a couple impressions of the northwoods fall:

Beavers are getting ready for winter too and flooded this wetland

A typical fall scene...

I´ve been posting this on the Into the Woods blog a little while ago and thought some people who read this blog may also be interested in it…

It was spring – the maple sap was just beginning to flow and the white blanket of snow had disappeared from the ground. I had done some research about the styles of skin boats used by various Native peoples in the northern hemisphere and consulted a few people who knew a thing or two about that subject. I decided to construct a small canoe that would be ideal for exploring the small creeks and streams of this area, similar to the solo canoes made of fiberglass that my campmates and I use. Consequently, the dimensions are fairly similar, with a length of about 10 feet and the widest part being about two and a half feet wide (I can´t provide exact measurements since we don´t have any measuring devices at camp).

The frame was to consist of seven long saplings forming the sides and bottom of the canoe, with the keel/bottom pole connecting all the other poles at either end of the canoe. Hardwoods twist less when they´re drying than softwoods, and since I was looking for straight, flexible and preferrably light materials my choice of wood was limited to a few species…so let´s continue to

Part I: Assembly

On a fine cold spring morning, I ventured out by canoe to harvest the frame materials: I selected a dozen straight maple saplings for the main frame and about six dozen hazelnut shoots for the rib pieces. The first task was now to peel the bark off all the gathered materials for more rot resistance. Over the next days I slowly assembled the main frame, inserting wooden spreaders and support poles where necessary in order to give the canoe its intended shape. I ended up carving down and flattening most of the frame saplings and all of the rib pieces to achieve more evenly bend, and since the materials were green, no steaming or other treatment was necessary.

Lashing the rib pieces to the frame required a fair amount of rawhide, since each of the 60+ ribs was tied to seven frame saplings, with the rawhide being streched as much as possible prior to tying it off to prevent loose lashings. In order to more securely lock the individual ribs in place, I wrapped rawhide along three of the frame saplings, connecting each rib to the neighboring ones. Still, the lashings allow for a little bit of movement and flexibility, which makes the canoe more shock-resistant. Say you´re bumping against a rock: The impact gets dispersed throughout the frame rather than being focused on the point of impact (which might cause a break) as is the case with e.g. nailed frames.

The raw frame was now finished, and I applied several coats of oil & a little bit of pitch in order to preserve the wood and make the rawhide lashings more water-resistant. Besides its preserving qualities, the pitch also helps to keep rodents and other animals from chewing on the frame to get at the fat…

Now came the skin cover. Ideally one large hide would suffice to cover the frame – no sewing required, and besides that, every seam is a potential weak spot too. With no such hides being available to me at that point, I pieced several smaller hides together – one small buffalo hide and four deer hides proved to be sufficient.

In my research about skin boats I came across a waterproof stich that several Inuit tribes used for their kayaks and umiaks. It´s a rather time-consuming affair since the stiches do not go through the entire hide, but instead enter and exit from the same side.

Once the cover was finished, I folded it over the sides of the canoe and started cutting one side to match the shape of the canoe. The cut side was now ready to be lashed to the frame, and after a few ties were in place (starting in the center of the canoe) I repeated the same process on the other side. I was working my way towards the front and back of the canoe on either side, making sure the skin cover had no wrinkles and was tight (but not too tight as the rawhide shrinks and tightens on its own as it dries).

With the skins on but still wet I decided to go for a test ride, and after stiching up a minor hole, there was almost no leaking. Since it was a hot and sunny day it didn´t take long for the skin cover to fully dry – time for the last step, the oiling & pitching of the canoe.

Et voila – canoe finished! Or so I thought…which brings me to

Part II: Lessons

The cover was dry alright, but the shrinking action had opened up the seams too which meant the seams weren´t really waterproof anymore. What I realized then was that Inuit people usually pre-soak their boats prior to using them – this way the hide swells up around the seam and allows for no more water to come through. I decided to try another approach – pitching the seams similar to how it is done on birchbark canoes. Adding some powdered charcoal to melted pitch to help it set & harden, I covered the seams on both the inside and outside of the canoe with the mix.

As for the cover itself, it turned out that my first application of oil and pitch was leaning a little heavy on the pitch side – it kept being sticky even ater drying and therefore quickly adhere to anything it was touching -leaves, grasses, sticks…Scraping off the excess pitch and re-oiling the frame (with less pitch) seemed to remedy that.

Now…ready for the maiden voyage. There was some minor leakage and the sides of the canoe were a little lower than I had originally intended as the frame was warping somewhat during the drying process. Other than that, it seemed to work pretty well and it proved to be stable even on a windy lake. On another test ride, a stick protuding from a submerged tree trunk scraped along the bottom and got hung up at the seam, causing some leakage. Tamarack offered a practical suggestion for this particular issue – adding a keel pole to the bottom of the canoe, to protect the skin cover and seams from scraping on objects. And I can say, after going up and down creeks, through alder thickets and over beaver dams, that the keel pole truly works!

Keel pole on the upturned canoe

Something else I discovered on a longer canoe trip was that the skins do eventually absorb water (through prolonged rain or just being in the water, which, by the way, doesn´t mean that it´s leaking). And when this happens, the canoe gets a lot heavier – so heavy indeed that portaging become a lot more labor-intensive. I haven´t been able to find a way around that yet – maybe that´s just the way with skin boats (unless you use a modern varnish)…

Some lessons come the hard way, such as when I was re-pitching the seams after the aforementioned canoe trip. The next day I discovered that there were a number of holes along the seams. How cou that be, after just pitching it, and no prior holes? Closer examination left no doubt about it – the last application of pitch was so hot that it had melted through the hides! The lesson here seems obvious – make sure that the pitch has cooled down enough so it won´t damage the skin cover. I now test the pitch with my inger to make sure it´s not too hot. After weighing my options, I ended up cutting out the affected parts which gave me the oportunity to practice patching the boat.

Now, after having elaborated on all the “hang-ups”, I´d like to add that the skin boat is indeed a great pleasure to paddle…there´s a sense of connection and satisfaction that is unique to something crafted by one´s hands and the materials nature provides…

Resources

Feel free to contact me if you have any questions about the process, the canoe or anything related (just leave a comment and I´ll eventually get it, though it may take a while). I´d like to thank all the people who´ve been providing valuable information and suggestions, particularily Tamarack Song. Some books and websites were also particularily helpful, some of which I´m listing here for those who want to do more research about the subject:

- Skin Boats and Bark Canoes by E.T. Adney and H.I. Chappelle

- The Aleutian Kayak by Wolfgang Brinck

- http://www.bushcraft.ridgeonnet.com/building%20a%20canoe.htm