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- Feb 28, 2006
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G'day Baldtaco-II
No.1 is simple commercial reality.
Unless they consider their knife making to be a charity exercise, how many custom makers would be able to continue if they couldn't at least cover their cost by being able to sell enough of what they make :thumbup:
No.2 addresses a much more involved issue.
When we talk about bushcraft, are we talking about what the term has traditionally meant (especially in countries where the term was originally coined, for example Australia), or are we talking about what the term seems to have become commonly defined as, ie working wood with an edged tool?
I agree that the common use of the word "Bushcraft" has become a marketing tool. Just look at most outdoor oriented forums/subforums on the internet and the perception of what constitutes Bushcraft (although I do admit there are a few individuals who are exceptions to the rule :thumbup. It appears that "Bushcraft" only equates to working wood with edged tools (primarily knives, but occasionally you will see some mention of hatchets/axes and their uses). Having the "right knife" in the "right steel" from the "right maker" seems to have become more important than the skills to use the knife
Whilst I do acknowlede there is merits in appropriate tool selection, this is only a small part of what the term "Bushcraft" was orignally intended to describe. To back up what I say, let's look at just one other component of what I consider to be true Bushcraft and that is "edible & medicinal plants". Have a look at how posts on just one part of Bushcraft go down like a fart in an Elevator (on internet forums that relate to either "Wilderness & Survival skills" or "Outdoor Survival forums"). They quickly disapear into the ether due to lack of real interest
I read a lot, and remember all of what I read (sometimes I think this is a curse). IMO, the best description of what "Bushcraft" is meant to be is described by Richard Harry Greaves when he wrote:
""Bushcraft" describes the activity of how to make use of natural materials found locally in any area. It includes many of the skills used by primitive man, and to these are added "white man" skills necessary for survival, such as time and direction, and the provision of modern "white man" comforts. The practice of bushcraft develops in an individual a remarkable ability to adapt quickly to a changing environment." (Note: this quote has come from the dust cover to his "10 Bushcraft books", which BTW was available long before Korchanski was supposed to have "coined the term Bushcraft" and can be found here: http://tions.net/CA256EA900408BD5/vwWWW/outdoor~03~000
I enjoyed reading your quoted passage from Lloyd. It seems to me like he is writting from the perspective of someone who lives in the UK (please correct me if I'm wrong).
From the perspective of someone who lives in Australia and spends time in the wilderness, I must point out there is a difference over here.
Since most people have no idea what outdoor life here in Australia is like, I've included two maps ( I sourced from the internet), that claim to give an indication of the relative size of Australia compared to both Europe & USA.
Bear in mind our population is a little over 20 million people and that close to 60% of them live in the greater metropolitan area of 3 cities (ie Brisbane, Sydney & Melbourne). You'll soon get an idea of just how much sparsely (if not uninhabited) area is available to those who live outside the major cities.
True Bushcraft and all it encompasses is still very important over here to those who venture to the remote & uninhabited areas that lie outside of our cities :thumbup:
Rant off.....
To the OP.
Does it really matter how thick a blade is, as long as it gets the job done without significant additional effort?
Years ago I tried Moras on some of our seasoned hardwoods. I got sick & tired of removing chips & rolls from the supplied edges. I no longer own any Moras for Bushcraft.
Obviously, others milage may vary :thumbup:
Kind regards
Mick
Mick, hey
I think there is probably a considerable amount of overlap in how we perceive this. When I conceive of bushcraft and its genesis I automatically think of Australia. When I conceive of where the term the bush comes from I also think of Australia. When I ponder what is a traditional bushcraft knife I think of something like the below, the kind of knife that was being shipped on storm by Nowill since the 1700s to Australia as a fundamental tool for the settlers.
To my mind that bush knife was nothing more than a general utility knife, or in the case of that pic a rabbiters knife, that would be found on the belt of many an individual for dealing with common tasks in what was a relatively hostile environment. Drawing from Lloyd's piece I'd say something like a combination of Camp Craft and Wood Craft, and in crisis survival. It would be as ubiquitous round the farm as it would be to blokes off hunting. Those with a bit of savvy, bushmen, would press it into service in conjunction with their skills to extend their capabilities off the beaten path and in the bush / the outback. [ I wonder how long it will be before marketing and cultural vandalism rapes the phrase The Outback to sell something very different Going Walkabout Karambit]. In short, the bushcraft knife goes in hand with bushman knowledge and may be used to help implement that from getting a feed, gathering stuff for a poultice, or mending the hoof of your horse to simply cutting a bit of rope on the farm. And so on. Picking two random members here that are different I think a lot of what Bryan Breeden and Doc Canada put up here would come under my rubric of what true bushcraft is about although they are very different from each other. This modern over emphasis on a knife that must have a saber grind to effectively whittle twigs and make fuzz sticks thing is so estranged from that I habitually use Neo-Bushcraft to describe it. I think a much better insight to real world bushcraft could be gained from following a farmer, a botanist, a doctor of medicine, a cook and a guy that's just adept at improvising stuff in a shed than can be gained from over emphasizing the knife and what may be marginally better for making a clothes peg. In fact, most real doers I've met don't pay that much attention to knives at all, let alone marginal superiority at making fuzz sticks.
At the moment I'm going with Lloyd being Canadian in Canada because that's what he's declared. I don't know enough about him to confirm that. After all I can change my address and I think this machine is still rigged to identify me as a Google bot with German as my first language. Blah blah. Still, I get what you are saying about the size of Australia. I have many relatives in Australia the closest to me being near the Wombat Forest. They get out and about a whole bunch and we exchange notes. [Myal evokes a lot of ideas of what the modern bushman is all about in me. Sadly he is missing from here again].
Back to the knives thing so we don't drag the thread off completely. I hold two sides to that -
I do think there's an over emphasis on knives rather than actually doing something useful with them. A lot of knife stuff seems more geared to an excuse to use a knife rather than I was doing this and I needed a knife. To be expected 'cos I'm on a knife forum even if this little subset it meant to be more skills based, but I hear ya.
As for a particular knife being not so important as skills to some extent I agree. I commented in the Myke Hawke thread to the effect that the knife he has put forward is more a testament to the ability of a trained user to press any old POS into service than it was an indicator of how good his knife design is. I feel the same about the plethora of good cooks that produce fantastic food yet make it using crap cutting tools. Dwell too much on the knife and you may well miss the Chef's class entirely and learn nothing. On the other hand I have a bunch of first hand experience encountering people that do have skill but used badly designed knives whose faces have positively lit up when they've been given a go on something much better fitting. In sum, ideally the two aspects of skill and appropriate tool complement each other. In reality they often seem to skew way off one way or the other.
That brings me neatly back to where we started blade thickness. I'm certain Gene knows this because he wrote its really not in the thickness of the spine anyway....its in the grind. - on that we can draw out that it is a combination of thickness and geometry. I will completely agree that the geometry of the grind plays a massive role in determining how two blades of equivalent thickness cut. What I do find irksome is when some extract of the it's all in the geometry is regurgitated over and over without qualification. It's like a freshman running off half cocked with an idea and espousing it to all their friends in way a DPhil student probably wouldn't. It's half knowledge. It is fairly obvious that of two knives ground with a similar geometry the thinner one will offer less drag. We could demonstrate that with wedges and a wind tunnel or something.
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