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1
Transition Tech / solar cooker plans
« on: April 28, 2008, 01:02:07 PM »
Here's a good article from Backwoods Home Magazine on making a simple solar cooker from cardboard and tinfoil:
Making and using a solar cooker
Making and using a solar cooker
2
Fauna Food / Re: First successful hunt.
« on: April 11, 2008, 07:13:39 AM »Quote from: heyvictor
Stab the knife into the neck from the side, with the cutting edge of the knife facing away from you, then push forward/away from you.
Thanks for sharing your method, heyvictor. That makes sense.
Quote from: Andrew Jensen
Next time I'm going to try to break the neck with a sharp twist. If that doesn't work and I'm close to home, I'll use the ax. Failing those two, I'll try your method, heyvic.
I didn't think of wringing the neck. More good ideas.
3
Fauna Food / Re: First successful hunt.
« on: April 10, 2008, 10:36:47 AM »
Thanks for sharing your adventure, Andrew.
I had a similar situation once where I felt the need to put a hutch rabbit out of its misery after a feral dog had bitten it through the cage. I thought I could simply slit its throat and make a quick end to things, but as I felt under its neck at all the fur and something like a gland and tried to slit the blade through it all, I realized that I had no idea how to end it quickly and that I would probably end up hurting the rabbit more than helping it.
I don't know why I didn't just get a rock or hammer nearby to bean it with, but I ended up putting it in the truck with me and taking it to the summer camp where I had worked and getting one of the .22s from the rifle range and shooting it in the head. All the other animals I had killed in the past, I had done so with a gun, so this made the most sense to me at the time -- and seemed like the swiftest way to help the rabbit die.
After the whole event, I realized that my original lofty goals of killing, skinning and eating it faded in light of the nervousness I felt over not knowing how to help it quickly. I lost my constitution and found myself carrying it into the woods and leaving it for those who knew how to tend to its death better than I did.
Just some thoughts from an outside perspective on your hunt:
Could you have shot the squirrel again at close range to end its life faster? Should you carry a stout stick with you next time to better accomplish what you tried to with your slingshot handle?
Again, thanks for sharing this story. It makes me want to get started on making a slingshot (a project I have had in mind for too long) and get proficient with it. It also gives me a lot to think about in terms of what to do after the shot if it doesn't kill quickly.
I had a similar situation once where I felt the need to put a hutch rabbit out of its misery after a feral dog had bitten it through the cage. I thought I could simply slit its throat and make a quick end to things, but as I felt under its neck at all the fur and something like a gland and tried to slit the blade through it all, I realized that I had no idea how to end it quickly and that I would probably end up hurting the rabbit more than helping it.
I don't know why I didn't just get a rock or hammer nearby to bean it with, but I ended up putting it in the truck with me and taking it to the summer camp where I had worked and getting one of the .22s from the rifle range and shooting it in the head. All the other animals I had killed in the past, I had done so with a gun, so this made the most sense to me at the time -- and seemed like the swiftest way to help the rabbit die.
After the whole event, I realized that my original lofty goals of killing, skinning and eating it faded in light of the nervousness I felt over not knowing how to help it quickly. I lost my constitution and found myself carrying it into the woods and leaving it for those who knew how to tend to its death better than I did.
Just some thoughts from an outside perspective on your hunt:
Could you have shot the squirrel again at close range to end its life faster? Should you carry a stout stick with you next time to better accomplish what you tried to with your slingshot handle?
Again, thanks for sharing this story. It makes me want to get started on making a slingshot (a project I have had in mind for too long) and get proficient with it. It also gives me a lot to think about in terms of what to do after the shot if it doesn't kill quickly.
4
Flora Food & Medicine / Re: Dried Herbs
« on: April 03, 2008, 04:18:00 PM »
I tend to use the brown paper bag method a lot. Or pillow cases sometimes for bulkier stuff that can still breathe (like sumac bobs).
5
Language & Oral Tradition / Re: Image and Poetry!
« on: April 03, 2008, 04:01:27 PM »
You gotta watch out for those southern sayings. Elsewise you might end up like the boy who dropped his gum in the chicken house. He didn't know what the hell to pick up.
These plans haven't grown past secondary succession yet.
Quote
These plans aren't concrete yet.
These plans haven't grown past secondary succession yet.
6
Fauna Food / Re: Squirrels
« on: February 28, 2008, 08:45:46 AM »
congratulations, andrew!
it makes my heart glad to hear that the drowning worked well and quickly.
it makes my heart glad to hear that the drowning worked well and quickly.
7
Fire / Re: Friction Fire Help.
« on: February 28, 2008, 08:33:48 AM »
nicholas, willow should work fine, i have had success with a bowdrill with a willow spindle and willow hearthboard.
i think you hit on the answer with the downward weight issue. when i bowdrill, i can vary the weight based on the color of the powder color. you want to produce a dark brown to black powder, as that will ignite into a coal best. (see picture examples here)
if your powder looks light brown, then you probably don't have enough downward pressure on the spindle.
i think you hit on the answer with the downward weight issue. when i bowdrill, i can vary the weight based on the color of the powder color. you want to produce a dark brown to black powder, as that will ignite into a coal best. (see picture examples here)
if your powder looks light brown, then you probably don't have enough downward pressure on the spindle.
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REWILD FORUM / BlueHeron = SilverArrow
« on: February 26, 2008, 09:41:36 AM »
I just wanted to make an announcement that SilverArrow, our new global moderator, has a new account name: BlueHeron.
Due to problems with her SilverArrow account not working correctly, she made a new account. All of SilverArrow's old posts now show up as BlueHeron, so don't feel surprised to find the new name showing up on old posts.
I'll let Rebecca introduce her new account to you formally at her leisure, but I wanted to make this announcement so that the community understands that the same person sits behind the keyboard with both accounts.
Due to problems with her SilverArrow account not working correctly, she made a new account. All of SilverArrow's old posts now show up as BlueHeron, so don't feel surprised to find the new name showing up on old posts.
I'll let Rebecca introduce her new account to you formally at her leisure, but I wanted to make this announcement so that the community understands that the same person sits behind the keyboard with both accounts.
9
Seasonal & Bioregion Strategies / Re: Rewilding Possible in Artificial Surroundings?
« on: February 14, 2008, 08:44:42 AM »
I lived in Manhattan and Queens. You can find the wild there. It may have its own domesticated tinge, but so do we. At the very least, you can find primary and secondary succession life trying to reclaim the wild -- fighting with the civilized to take root and hold before the next foot falls.
I don't know what your land looks like in the Netherlands, timeLESS, but I know that everywhere I have lived, despite how hard man has worked to keep nature at bay, nature still marches right back again and again.
Now, in a broad-stroke view, I can definitely feel a difference between the wild that fought against the urban environment in NYC and the wild that fights against the sub-urban environment where I live now. I like this wild better because it doesn't have as much concrete, pedestrian and automotive traffic and pollution to fight against. I can see green all around me every day, whereas I had to go somewhere to see it in Manhattan.
In short, it comes down to a matter of degrees. What degree of the civilized/wild struggle do you want to put up with? Everything civilization does in terms of the land it does "to more easily control the land", and no stretch of the globe stands untouched from civilization today.
I don't know what your land looks like in the Netherlands, timeLESS, but I know that everywhere I have lived, despite how hard man has worked to keep nature at bay, nature still marches right back again and again.
Now, in a broad-stroke view, I can definitely feel a difference between the wild that fought against the urban environment in NYC and the wild that fights against the sub-urban environment where I live now. I like this wild better because it doesn't have as much concrete, pedestrian and automotive traffic and pollution to fight against. I can see green all around me every day, whereas I had to go somewhere to see it in Manhattan.
In short, it comes down to a matter of degrees. What degree of the civilized/wild struggle do you want to put up with? Everything civilization does in terms of the land it does "to more easily control the land", and no stretch of the globe stands untouched from civilization today.
10
Land / Re: Permaculture Links
« on: February 12, 2008, 10:49:20 AM »
Don't forget permaculture.info - a permaculture wiki
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Seasonal & Bioregion Strategies / Re: Rewilding you calendar: Full Moon Names
« on: February 11, 2008, 08:33:03 AM »
thanks for sharing that awesome article, tonyz.
i like they way it explains the lunar/solar disconnect and how you could reconcile it
i like they way it explains the lunar/solar disconnect and how you could reconcile it
Quote from: How was "The Tyme Appointed"?
Any effective lunar calendar must be in sync with the seasonal or solar year, which the crop cycle follows. But as nature would have it, the moon and sun have trouble living together in harmony. Our years of 365+ days can accommodate twelve lunar cycles, or 354 days, with a shortfall of eleven days, or thirteen with an overrun of eighteen, that is to say, 383 days. Our Roman forebears, who bequeathed us the calendar we use, force-fitted the two cycles together. They artificially lengthened the months to thirty and thirty-one days, a most unnatural choice for attentive sky watchers, which the Romans decidedly were not. Another solution for keeping seasonal time by the moon would be to keep successive twelve-month years, inserting a thirteenth month into the year cycle when necessary to make up for lost time, as we do with our Leap Year. Many Native American tribes, likely including the Powhatans, did just that.
Some were more precise with their lunar reckoning. We know the Delaware named the phases of the same moon; for example, the new moon, likely the first visible crescent; the round or full moon; and the half round, or probably last quarter, moon. The intervals between the directly visible phases—ranging from a few to several days—proved convenient in day-to-day practical operations. Think of how often in a given day you refer to activities that will take place "after the weekend," "early next week," or "in a few weeks."
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Seasonal & Bioregion Strategies / Re: Rewilding you calendar: Full Moon Names
« on: February 10, 2008, 08:55:39 AM »there are, ahem, 13 moons in a solar year.
with an average 29.5 day cycle from one full moon to the next, the lunar year and the solar year don't correlate exactly with each other, just like the solar year doesn't exactly consist of 365 days.
you only end up getting 13 moons in a year (let's measure it from one winter solstice to the next, for argument's sake) if the first full moon of the year happens closely enough after the solstice.
we can account for that extra moon by calling it the Blue Moon (as the folklore moon-naming system does now) or come up with whatever system we like to account for the 13th moon.
i described the two most common modern ways of accounting for full moon names and blue moons on my blog (granted, i condensed and dumbed it down for convenience) thusly:
Quote
Basically, two primary methods exist. The easiest one to wrap your brain around involves assigning a moon’s name based on what month it occurs in. For the sake of simplicity, let’s call this the monthly method. In this method, if you want to talk about the full moon in January, you would call it the Wolf Moon. For the full moon in June, you would call it the Strawberry Moon. If you happen to have two moons in the same month, you would call the second one a Blue Moon. The monthly method works in a really straightforward way, but it has its limitations in terms of rewilding, as we will see later.
The second method — we’ll call this one the seasonal method — divides the year up into seasons (like we already do, based on the equinoxes and solstices) and gives the names to the moons based on whether they come first, second or last in the season. In this method the Snow Moon, for instance, would apply to the second full moon in winter, regardless of whether it happened to fall in the month of February or January. The seasonal method also has its own way of dealing with Blue Moons. If you have four full moons in the same season, then you call the third one a Blue Moon — so that the order of first, second and last still apply to the other moons in the season.
13
Rewilding Mind & Heart / Re: not sure if i'll ever rewild.
« on: February 05, 2008, 01:16:14 PM »
Yes, yes, yes, Willem!
Folks have said it before on these boards: we can't undo and revert to a pre-civilized state. But we can move forward into something new. And whatever helps us move forward benefits us and our future.
When i think about the term "rewild," i appreciate that it doesn't mean the same thing as "uncivilize". To me, it doesn't mean "go back to the old wild" it means "go forward into the new wild". Our history will come with us into the new wild, for better and for worse. So embrace the new in any way that you can.
Folks have said it before on these boards: we can't undo and revert to a pre-civilized state. But we can move forward into something new. And whatever helps us move forward benefits us and our future.
When i think about the term "rewild," i appreciate that it doesn't mean the same thing as "uncivilize". To me, it doesn't mean "go back to the old wild" it means "go forward into the new wild". Our history will come with us into the new wild, for better and for worse. So embrace the new in any way that you can.
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Seasonal & Bioregion Strategies / Re: Rewilding you calendar: Full Moon Names
« on: February 05, 2008, 11:35:25 AM »I read a book a few years ago called "Tales of Murasaki" by Liza Dalby. It describes a Chinese calendar which gives a name for each two week period based on what happens in nature at that time.
http://www.lizadalby.com/visual%20journal%20.html
Starfish, I love that link you shared. That offers a lot of ideas and jumping off points for figuring out something for your own bioregion.
Oh thanks wilderix! That site u mentioned really got some good ideas flowing through my head. Im thinking that it makes it easier to understand *where* and *when* i am right now. Like a name the denotes time AND place. I really like integrating all these broken parts into a whole that i can understand by relating it to my experience. I hope this all makes sense.
Exactly! Time + Place. You nailed it, timeLESS.
Imagine there is no "Sunday through Saturday" or "January through December". You see a relative that you haven't seen for a few years and she has a young child now. You ask how old her child is and she says,
"She was born when we were picking the high country huckleberries up on Bear mountain the year before last."
That pretty well narrows the time frame down to a period of a couple of weeks. Could be described as the huckleberry moon.
Beautiful, Billy!
It reminds me of Crocodile Dundee. He asked the village elders when he was born, and they said "summer". But your example takes it to the next level. And to rewild your concept of the year, it makes sense to put it in terms of the natural occurrences.
When my son came into the world two years ago, I noted that it happened during the first waxing slivers of the new Worm Moon (late February of 2006). I worked the idea into a lullaby I sing to him, and let it (ala the doctrine of signatures) color the way I interpret his personality: "Well, you squirmy little baby. You really were born in the Worm Moon, weren't you?"
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REWILD FORUM / Re: Technical Difficulties
« on: February 04, 2008, 06:16:48 PM »
hmm, so you're getting these:
but not getting the text box or browse button for attaching images?
Quote
Notify me of replies. Lock this topic.
Return to this topic. Sticky this topic.
Don't use smileys. Move this topic.
but not getting the text box or browse button for attaching images?