Jon's Exmoor Bushcraft Blog

Long time no see!

2011-03-15T15:39:00.004+00:00

Well I have been busy - what can I say!

This is one of the things I have been busy with ...

Short sighted owl?

2010-06-20T21:44:00.002+01:00

Last night we saw a Tawny Owl on one of the power lines. It had been there quite a few minutes before it flew off. This in itself is not unusual I hear you say. And quite right too.

What was unusual was this. It flew across the garden just as a bat flew in front of it and the owl actually hit a power cable! I have no idea whether the ultrasonics from the bat confused it because owls have incredibly sensitive hearing, or if it was a young bird or possibly even sick and weakened. It did fly off into a tree so I'm hoping it was OK in the long term.

Close encounters

2010-06-20T21:14:00.003+01:00

On Thursday and Friday just gone I was running a private course for a chap called Chris. He was keen on learning about tracking and was up for an intensive 2 days of solid learning and experiences.

Well we certainly managed some fantastic wildlife experiences. The first one was whilst squatted down in the middle of a track talking about camouflage. A little earlier we had heard a rabbit screaming, having been caught by a predator - most likely a fox. After a short while the screaming stopped but then started up again a little further along a field edge. This happened about 3 times and I speculated that it was a vixen teaching her cub(s) how to kill.

Anyway, whilst talking to Chris I caught a movement out of the corner of my eye and told Chris to be quiet and not move. It was a fox cub coming round the corner! How cool was that. What was even cooler was that it kept on coming towards us and eventually came up and sniffed us both before heading off into the undergrowth. So where cub goes - mum goes!

I thought she couldn't be too far away so we decided to stalk down the track and see if we could see her coming up. Well we did indeed meet her just on the corner but the interesting thing was she didn't actually see us but she did smell us and then legged it at high velocity. We were only about 10 feet from her before she ran. An absolutely brilliant experience!

The next day we were walking up another track and I heard a noise down near the stream. So we stopped, waited and a few minutes later a young male Red Deer appeared - then another three turned up. Interestingly they decided that they weren't going to hang around but the first one was slowly working its way up towards us.

To cut a long story short - this youngster made its way right up to us and leaped onto the track about 10 feet from us. It stood there for a few moments and then saw us and bolted. It then stopped and didn't really know what to do because it just stood there before bolting again. It did this a couple more times before heading off up a bank and disappearing into the woods. We then had a fun half an hour or so tracking it on hard ground and marvelling at how high it could jump in one leap.

Needless to say it was a great couple of days with some fantastic close encounters. It just goes to show the power of the zone in.

Happy tracking.

Tip of the Day - 7

2010-05-12T17:54:00.002+01:00

If you want to collect rain water from the trunk of a tree or a stem of a plant, tie a cord or some cloth around it and use that as a drip line! Direct the drips into a receptacle and there you have it. Remember that you may still have to purify the water.

Foxtastic

2010-04-21T10:24:00.003+01:00

I was out with the dog last night and the little darling decided to leg it and chase a herd of deer! I wasn't too impressed with this behaviour but it did give me the chance to see some other behaviour!

Whilst waiting for the mutt I was watching a fox, about 100 yards away, meandering through the woods. He was blissfully unaware of me despite my many attempts at calling the dog! Anyway, as I watched him saunter up a slope I was little surprised to see him jump up onto a fallen log and walk along it seemingly just for the hell of it. I've never seen that before so I found it quite cool!

Then the dog decided to join me and so Mr Fox decided it was time to move on ... rapidly!

The Outdoor Show

2010-03-25T15:38:00.002+00:00

I'm off to the Outdoor Show tomorrow for 3 days at the NEC.

I'm going to be on the Bushcraft and Survival Skills Magazine stall and will be giving a little talk and demo on each day. It means a nice early start for me tomorrow so wish me luck and hopefully I may see some of you there!

Have fun.

Tip of the Day - 6

2010-03-14T22:15:00.001+00:00

Always make sure the lid is on properly before shaking a bottle!

Don't ask.

Tip of the Day - 5

2010-01-29T18:14:00.003+00:00

I strongly recommend that you do not try to strop a Scandi grind knife with a belt - unless the belt is laid flat on a hard surface.

In many bushcraft books it is suggested that you can use a belt to strop a knife by attaching the belt to a tree, for example, and then holding the belt under tension. This does work to an extent and is perfect for a convex grind knife NOT a scandi. This is because you can't get enough tension in the belt to stop it from rolling round the edge of the knife as you strop. So with a scandi this would eventually turn it into a convex (in an extreme case) - in practice it means that you will be blunting the edge a little by this method.

That's why I say that a belt is ok on a flat surface - that way you do not get the leather curving round the edge in the same way as you would if it was under tension.

Give it a go and see if you get a better edge doing it this way!

Tip of the Day - 4

2010-01-22T21:49:00.002+00:00

If you own a pair of waterproof trousers that don't have zips on the legs and you always find that you have to take your boots off to get them on without covering the legs in mud - then try this tip.

Put plastic bags over your boots and then put on the trousers! This way you don't get mud on the inside of the trousers and the plastic bags also make the boots slide in nicely.

Tip of the Day - 3

2010-01-18T16:54:00.002+00:00

Remember to look up occasionally when out tracking - it's always embarrassing to walk straight past someone or something when engrossed!

Tip of the Day - 2

2010-01-14T22:20:00.001+00:00

Don't start construction work just before the winter! You have been warned.

Tip of the Day - 1

2010-01-13T16:10:00.001+00:00

My very first tip of the day is:

Don't rely on my Tip of the Day to be daily!

Alone in the wild

2009-09-23T15:53:00.003+01:00

Ed Wardle, pictured above, whom was featured in the Channel 4 programme "Alone in the wild" has come in for a lot of stick in the press. This seems to be mainly because he went out to a 'remote' area in the Yukon to survive for 12 weeks but had to give up after 7 weeks.

He was not fairing very well - had lost lots of weight and was basically starving - so, rightly so, he called it off for his own safety.

Many people have criticised him and Channel 4 for sending him out there very unprepared ie little or no survival training. The premise seems to be that he was chosen because he is a good cameraman/producer and had done some 'wild' filming before such as Everest. This clearly did not prepare him for a survival situation and understandably so. It is one thing to be out in the wilds with support and an entirely different kettle of fish to be in the wilds with no support.

Anyway, despite all that I think the guy has a lot to offer us in terms of knowledge. What he put himself through was probably as close to reality as is possible and gives a really good idea as to how a real person may cope if they were suddenly put into that situation. Personally I would love to interview him and find out how it went wrong for him, the psychology he went through and a whole gamut of other things about his physical deterioration etc. This would give me valuable knowledge that I could pass onto others when I teach them survival skills.

So all in all I say 'fair play' to the bloke and we should recognise that he managed 7 weeks before pulling the plug which could be more than a lot of people could manage.

ed wardle

Funny fox!

2009-09-21T14:44:00.002+01:00

This made me smile!

Keela ESP clothing system

2009-08-23T14:08:00.002+01:00

Just the other day I had a press release from Keela about some new clothing technology that they are to release. It sounds very interesting so here it is:

"Imagine a garment with healing properties, a garment that improves balance, a garment that can ease some of the suffering experienced by those with Parkinson’s disease and other similar ailments, imagine a garment that stimulates muscle tone….
Science Fiction???

Welcome to Keela’s E.S.P. Clothing System
The World Has Just Changed

August 2009, Keela uses E.S.P. Complex to manufacture a new range of outdoor wear. The new range is called ESP, Equilibrium Stabilisation Principle. The idea was exciting and the research surrounding this science is progressive. What Keela has done with this technology is to incorporate the system into a unique membrane and develop key clothing items around it. Tests have proven that E.S.P. textiles actively help to improve blood circulation and sense of balance, as well as reducing muscle spasms.

The garments have been tested with various age groups but primarily with the over 50’s specifically those with particular ailments such as Parkinson’s disease. Keela stresses that ESP system is not a cure for any medical/health issues but can produce improvements in balance and a reduction of muscle spasms.

E.S.P. is a natural substance, made from a combination of different minerals. This mixture is fused at a temperature of 1600 °C - the end product of this process is the E.S.P. material, capable of reflecting infra-red radiation (heat). The human body normally emits infra-red radiation (including long distance infra-red radiation - FIR). E.S.P textiles are able to absorb this radiation and use it within your body, thus providing additional energy for regenerative processes.

Research indicates that the E.S.P fibres in these garments act like a multitude of tiny heat reservoirs that the body can use as needed.

Advantages
• Sense of balance is increased
• Muscle spasms are minimised
• Helps to repair muscle trauma
• Improved toxin removal - natural energy and vitality
• Cell exchanges are facilitated and provide an improved oxygen supply
• Blood circulation is activated
• Antibacterial, eliminates bad smells
Unique
• improvement in performance - the capillary vascular enlarge and improve blood circulation and metabolism. The permeability of cellular membranes for water, oxygen and metabolism decomposition products is higher.

Keela is extremely proud to adopt this technology in their ESP range and looks forward to more innovation in the future."

I'm walking backwards for Christmas!

2009-07-30T14:57:00.002+01:00

The title will make some sense if you are a Goons fan! If not then it is imperative that you remedy the situation immediately.

Anyway, the other day when I was out for a walk I was thinking about the fact the we humans are real creatures of habit. We find comfort in the familiar and we often don't like change. By maintaining the status quo we are probably just being a bit lazy because we don't have to think about what we are doing. The reason I was thinking all this was because I noticed that the last 3 or 4 times I had done that particular walk I had used the exact same route.

So next time round I reversed the route and went backwards (in a manner of speaking) and it was incredible the different perspective it gave me. For a start I saw a number of things that I just couldn't see when walking the other way - such as a tree that had been barked by a deer and some mushrooms hidden behind a bush.

I think all I'm getting at with this post is to say that it is important to keep a bit of variety going in your daily routines, look behind occasionally and just keep your eyes open for all the sights that are out there.

British backpacker found alive in outback

2009-07-15T14:14:00.003+01:00

This is one lucky hombre!

Jamie Neale, a British backpacker has been found alive and remarkably well, after being lost for 12 days in the Australian Blue Mountains. This is the longest that anyone has survived in that area before.

He got lost whilst on a trek to Mt Solitary. He survived by eating berries and weeds and sleeping under logs. He had seen rescue helicopters pass overhead, but had not been able to flag them down.

Eventually, two bushwalkers stumbled upon him off the southern end of the Narrowneck Plateau, several kilometres from the Ruined Castle rock formation where he was last seen. His rescue has been hailed as a "miracle" by police, who had grave fears for his safety during the freezing nights and bitterly cold days of the past two weeks.

I like a good survival story.

jamie neale, survival

Raven' mad?

2009-07-04T16:46:00.004+01:00

Over the last few days we have had at least one raven fly over the house each day. So I thought I would look into the 'meaning' of raven.

In the native American tradition, raven, throughout time, has carried the medicine of magic. Raven magic can give you the courage to enter the darkness of the void, the Great Mystery. Raven is the messenger of the void. If Raven appears to you it means you are about to experience a change in consciousness. This portends "You have earned the right to see and experience a little more of life's magic". Black can mean many things in Native teachings from the seeking of answers, the void or the road to spiritual or nonphysical.

Raven represents that something special is about to happen. The deeper mystery is how will you respond to the synchronicity of the moment when it happens.

In European folklore ravens are portents or omens that auger both good and ill. It was widely believed that a raven seen at the start of important activities such as hunting or fishing was a good omen. Unfortunately many of the superstitions are negative. An Andalusian belief is that it will be an unlucky day if a raven croaks over a house and there will be a death if it croaks three times. In parts of Germany it was thought that ravens contained the souls of the dead.

Of course an alleged centuries old tradition surrounds the ravens at the Tower of London. It is said that if they leave the Tower, Britain's downfall will soon follow. It has been shown recently that it is probably a Victorian invention. During World War II all the birds were killed during air raids and were not replaced until 1946 when the Tower reopened.

Ravens have also been messengers in many legends. In Tibet they were believed to act on behalf of a supreme being, in China it was believed they caused a storm through the forest to warn people that the gods were about to pass. The Vikings revered raven as it was the symbol of their chief god, Odin. It features in some native world creation myths and in some European traditions is believed to possess magic stones that can perform various functions such as healing and invisibility.

All in all, ravens are steeped in myth and legend. I for one love to see and hear them flying over the moor and I'm going to go with the idea that they are a good omen and something magical is about to happen!

raven, mythology

Bowdrill experiments

2009-06-28T16:51:00.003+01:00

Whoa, ho, ho, ho - sinister Peter Cushing-type laugh. Time for a little experiment. Enough of this nonsense.

I had some bits and pieces of wood lying around drying out that were just begging to be abused. So I dug out a pine hearth, a hazel drill, a holly drill and my trusty teak bearing block (salvaged from an old table leg). I decided to go against the grain and have a little experiment with drill shape. I fly in the face of convention, ha!

In one of Ray Mears' books he says that the rounded end of the drill should go in the hearth because of greater friction and the pointy end should go in the block because of less friction. Seems logical but I was bit bored and decided to have a go with my rather eclectic mix of kit. My thinking was this, if the pointy end was in the hearth then due to its smaller circumference you would achieve faster rotations relative to the amount of effort put in. You would also be able to apply proportionately greater pressure for the same amount of force due to its smaller surface area. Elementary physics something to do with woman in high heels, elephants and who you would prefer to be stood on by! I believe that there are specialist websites for that sort of thing. I'm not sure what happens if the elephant is wearing heels though?

By contrast having the rounded end in the block means that it generates less heat due to slower rotation speeds even though it is presenting a larger surface area. Of course my physics could be completely cr*p!

Either way I went for it. I managed smoke very easily and after a couple of passable attempts at recreating the bouncing bomb effect with flying drills I got a really good ember. This worked for both the hazel and holly drills and didn't take much effort. The reverse configuration seemed to work well though the penalty was greater wear on the pointy end.

An interesting way to spend an hour on a sunny Saturday afternoon. The question is - has anyone else flown in the face of wisdom and tried doing it differently (the bowdrill that is)?

bowdrill,fire by friction, bushcraft

Ramblers in the mist!

2009-06-28T16:26:00.003+01:00

Dianne Fossey I'm not. Anyway, a couple of days ago I went for a walk on Dunkery Beacon with my dog, well puppy really, Barney. Nothing particularly special about that really except we were engulfed in a rather thick mist.

I decided I fancied having a little walk out in the mist mainly because I hadn't done it for so long. It was pretty hairy driving up there because visibility was about 20 feet. Needless to say there were no other cars parked up there when we arrived. Perhaps no one else was stupid enough to deliberately go for a walk in really thick mist. Well, it's an easy path and it wasn't as if I was going to get lost, was it?

So, the two great explorers headed out into the whiteness. It was great fun and I loved it! The mist was like a blanket of silence wrapped round you. There was total and utter silence and it was marvellous. As we made our way up to the beacon itself, I did indeed hear something in the distance. Voices. They were very faint to start with but were growing louder by the second. It was interesting hearing the conversation revolve around characters from the Pirates of the Caribbean series of movies. Eventually 6 young lads came marching out of the mist - clearly they were Duke of Edinburgh scheme judging by their poor equipment and overburdened rucksacks. Only one of them returned my jaunty greeting (perhaps too jaunty considering the weather). Hey ho!

We did reach the beacon in good time. Initially I did think we were alone until I saw a behatted individual huddled with his or her back up against a stone, seemingly engrossed in a book. They didn't look up which I thought strange but they may well have thought I was a nutter as only a nutter would walk up the beacon in a very, very thick mist. They may have been missing a point there.

We headed back to the vehicle after a few more minutes. No one lese joined us on the return trip and it was nice to savour the silence for a few more minutes. Ah, bliss!

Snow, ice and wolves - Part 5

2009-06-23T09:46:00.008+01:00

Wild wolf tracks!!!! (Jump up and down and get all excited)

Well this is what we came for and finally we have found some wolf tracks made by a real live wolf and one that is not in captivity. Very, very cool. It has literally been a long slog to find these beauties but we did get there. This time round we were in a different park. We started off on the main track, split the group into three and each group started cutting for sign at different points.

Within 200 yards of our drop off we found day old wolf tracks. The other groups also found wolf tracks of differing ages and some even had urine associated with them. We even found scat in the middle of the track. Needless to say we were all a bit excited by now.

Next part of the plan was to move away from the track and see if we could cut across the wolves trail further on. Well we all slogged off in our different groups and covered quite a distance between us but none of us had any luck in finding more wolf.

We did find lots of other things. We saw a wild boar family unit in the distance, one of which had a very bad limp.

We later cut across their trail and saw them at close quarters and saw that there was puss and blood in the tracks of the wounded boar. It would be lucky if it survived the night. Evening was drawing on so we headed to an observation tower to see if the wolves were going to howl but despite our best efforts at imitating the calls, we had no luck in hearing the real thing!

Back at our digs we entertained the locals by testing out our gear at -18C who clearly thought we were totally crazy.

Of course they are completely right!

Tomorrow being our last day we plotted and planned as to possible routes to take, how many teams to use and the such in order to thrash the area and find more wolf tracks. The anticipation was hard to contain but we managed somehow.

tracking,wolf, Poland

Snow, ice and wolves - part 4

2009-05-23T19:38:00.014+01:00

Basically, this our fourth full day, was to be a travel day, as we moved areas in order to try our luck in a totally different part of the country.

Our first stop was by a river where we hoped to find sign of beaver. And beaver we found! There was plenty of evidence of beaver gnawing through trees and we found a couple of slides where the trees had been dragged down to the river.

You can see the teeth marks on this stump! (above)

One of the things about European beaver is that they don't build dams. Their lodges are built into the banks and are, in effect, underground. One of the guys managed to find the lodge - by putting his foot through the roof! Luckily beaver are used to repairing damage to their homes. We didn't see beaver in the flesh but we did see where there feet had been :)

We did also find plenty of mink tracks as well as the anal secretion from our beaver friends. I don't think I'll post a picture of that though!

Time to move onto a wildlife sanctuary run by a conservationist who is very keen on reintroducing the lynx back into the wild in Poland. It was a slightly strange place with lots of different enclosure for things like elk, deer, wolves and grouse - an eclectic mix of species to say the least. We entered the park through one enclosure which housed some very friendly elk. So friendly they would give you a good barging if you had the audacity to ignore them! Lovely creatures that could make a very plaintiff and quiet noise but could also do you a lot of damage if they wanted to.

We then moved onto the wolf enclosure and had very good views of the wolf pack and its behaviour - from the aggression of the alpha to the apparent 'aggression' of the omega wolf who would bare its teeth as if it was being aggressive but was, in reality, just reaffirming its place in the pack. Fascinating to watch.

Needless to say we spent quite a bit of time watching the wolves interact with each other and with us!

This is when it started to get a bit surreal. The owner said that he takes a rehabilitated Lynx out for a walk and would show us except that he had left his lead at home. Well being trackers and bushcrafters we soon knocked up a lead. He disappeared off and we were hanging around to see him walk his Lynx on the lead. Well, we were wrong on that score - the first thing we saw was a very high speed Lynx go shooting past us followed a minute later by the owner with his dog on the lead! Not only that but he also had a young deer with him too. It turns out that the deer and the Lynx were best of friends and played together all the time.

Like I said - a bit surreal but a brilliant thing to watch them play and chase with each other. Awesome!

lynx,tracking, wolf, Poland

Twitter

2009-05-18T14:58:00.003+01:00

Well, I'm on Twitter now (god help me!). I thought it might be a useful way to keep people up to date in a quick format.

www.twitter.com/tracks4life

take a look and subscribe if you like.

Twitter

Snow, ice and wolves - Part 3

2009-05-09T19:43:00.008+01:00

Our third full day - it makes it sound a bit like Big Brother, doesn't it? Anyway, today's plan was for another route march - this time about 15km. Again this doesn't sound like much but it is when its -18C and you are slogging through knee high snow! Dammed good fun though!

This time the route was going to be mainly through woodland with a little bit of open 'meadow' (not marsh this time).

To start with we had the usual suspects - elk, fox, brown hare and the like and we seemed to have a lot of urine this time too! As we moved further into the woods we came across some beautiful bird impressions in the snow. They were so good you could tell a whole story around them. This, of course, is the ultimate aim for a tracker.

The story was being able to see where the bird landed, had hopped a few steps, where it had fed and then flew off. You can clearly see where the tail has pressed into the ground as the bird took off again. Then about 50 yards further down we found where it had landed again and had another feed. Very cool.

One of the guys decided to follow a set of fox tracks and see where they led. Eventually he followed it to a kill site - a very interesting kill site.

Mr Fox had killed this shrew, dumped the body and pee'd on it! Quite extraordinary. Well, we trudged on and had a final bonus for the day. Pine Marten. Absolutely brilliant - a great find and fantastic to see where it had been and what it had got up to.

It was a long hard day but well worth it. The next day was to be a travel day but that one ended up being a very different day indeed.

Poland, tracking wolves

Snow, ice and wolves - Part two

2009-05-03T11:19:00.010+01:00

This, our second full day, was, in effect, a bit of a route march! We needed to cover a lot of ground - through forest and over frozen marsh. It promised to be a hard day.

We split into 2 groups with a view to meeting up in the middle and then going our separate ways again and thus covering more distance. Anyway, the guide we were with was a very tall chap with really long legs who seemed to be walking slowly until you actually tried to keep up with him! After 20 minutes we were sweating buckets which is not a good thing when the temperatures are so low. We stopped for a quick zone in and managed to get him to slow down - phew.

The first part of the route was forest where we saw plenty of tracks of elk, fox, red deer and roe deer. After our little stop we headed out onto the marsh which was even colder due mainly to windchill. It was here that a most amazing thing happened. Three of us stopped for a moment to look at something when a vole popped up out of nowhere and tried to climb up Ros' gaiter! It had a really good try for a minute or two before it decided to head off into one of its tunnels again. Fantastic stuff.

As we moved out onto higher ground we started finding more tracks again - this time, weasel, stoat, more vole and bird.

With the weasel tracks is some fresh urine. Though it is hard to see in this photo.

After a quick lunch stop we headed off again to cut across more marsh when we came across a wild boar lie up, less than 100m from where we had lunch - and it was fresh, still warm and had fresh scat. We had probably disturbed it when we stopped for a snack!

The next leg was going to be a long slog across the marsh which was very hard work and had the constant risk of falling through the ice. In many ways, not a lot of fun but a great experience nonetheless. Anyway at one point we went through a small bit of woodland and found fresh boar tracks - four of them in fact. We trailed them for quite some distance until we actually ended up coming up behind them where they were foraging. They knew we were there so ambled off after a few minutes but they did circle us for a while to maintain the wind advantage.

The boar track is a little indistinct in this photo but you can still see the shape and the dew claws (on the left).

What looks like an attack by a bulldozer is the result of a bit of wild boar action!

After that excitement we had quite a few clicks left to do through the marshy wastes. In terms of spoor it was a bit disappointing but again it was a nice sense of achievement to complete and survive! Overall we covered about 10km. That may not seem like a huge distance but through that kind of terrain and through knee-high snow in places, I can assure you, it was long enough.

Poland, tracking wolves