Doc Canada's Sunday Meet Up

[kgd]

Doc Canada had invited a few primitive skills folks out to a little get together at one of his buddy’s houses this past Sunday. I was invited because I don't really have many skills and they all took a bet on how much steel I'd bring. Hopefully I didn't disappoint

All in all it was a fun day of just showcasing different stuff, learning some skills and hanging around with folks from all walks of life and finding commonalities in our interests. Louis was the host and an expert flint knapper. Before Doc came buy, as he never gets up before 10:30 am, Louis was showing us how to use a sling to whip rocks into the pond. Wow, that is a tonne of fun. Doc Canada also made a bunch of slings to which he gifted one to me. I have already been whipping stones in my backyard and just generally pissing off the neighbours. I just love that thing and will try to do a little thread on it later.

Here is Louis demonstrating his technique along a bike path. Unfortunately, there weren’t any human prey to test the David vs. Golioth hypothesis!

One of the attendees, Kim, had a large collection of primitive tool replicas as well as a tonne of gear he brings out to various Rendevous in the area. I might be wrong, but I thought Kim had indicated he has some Iroquois heritage in him.

Kim made this war club out of a piece of burl he found – very cool and rather terrifying!

Some points that Louis had knapped previously

More coming

 

[kgd]

If I recall correctly, the piece below is an authentic stone axe head

More replicas

Doc Canada dipping into his bag’o’tricks

Doc’s thing is to adapt primitive to modern, blending his neo-primitive fusion net pouches:

Hmm, that looks like a nice little OD-green izula hanging off of Doc’s neck!

Some of Doc’s fletching skills

He uses this nifty little triangle to position the feathers onto the shaft.

This arrow he made had one of Luis’ points attached to it.

We also got to see Doc’s turtle trap

more coming....

 

[kgd]

Doc provided some netmaking and crocheting tutorials. The big red string hanging across his neck is one of the slings that Louis had made and gave to him.

He was also trying to unveil his – 103 uses of a pencil workship.....but admittedly we were fast sinking into the Irish whiskey by that time

Louis was showing some of the basics of knapping.

Finally, Karen gave us a demo of ‘how to clean your chicken’ with a live specimen. Been a while since I cleaned a bird myself, so the tutorial was very welcome. Lucky Louis ended up with a bird for his pot in the end also!

 

[kgd]

All in all it was a great day. It would have been even more fun in the bush, but still we all had a great time of it. There was some discussion about getting together at a farm owned by one of the members next year and slaughtering a pig as part of the deal. That will be really cool if it comes to fruition.

Thanks for organizing the “Meet up” Doc, it was a heck of a lot of a fun and a great way to spend a Sunday!

 

[mneedham]

KGD,

Looks like a great time. Doc is a guy I would really like to meet sometime. I had plans to hook up with him this summer on my way Algonquin, but it didn't happen (complications here)..

 

[Sparljo]

pure awesome

 

[Joezilla]

Great posts! Any techniques for speed stripping that yard clucker?

 

[dipbait]

That war club is neat.

 

[KuRUpTD]

Great thread Ken , love the primitive tools :thumbup:
What kind of tool is Louis using to do the knapping ?

 

[kgd]

Great posts! Any techniques for speed stripping that yard clucker?

She just dipped it in boiling water and the feathers came off fast enough. She said she has a chicken plucker at home which spins the bird and takes the feathers right off somehow. Apparently the chicken plucker doesn't work with ducks so the soak in boil water is the way to go for them.

Great thread Ken , love the primitive tools :thumbup:
What kind of tool is Louis using to do the knapping ?

He was using a piece of copper embedded into bone. Apparently the copper is not too hard and just soft enough to knap well. He was also using various grinding stones and hammer stones and bone tools for breaking up chunks. It is really amazing to see how he can look over a rock and its fault lines and predict how a break will occur.

 

[pitdog]

Great stuff buddy, wish I coulda been there as I'd love to learn how to do Knapping one on one !!!!

 

[DOC-CANADA]

Wow, Ken, you got some great pictures. I've got a few I'll post shortly.

BTW, in the following picture, if you look closely you will see the shaft is finished on each end but not in the centre, where it still has the bark on. This is to demonstrate how an arrow is made from a shoot, in this case, Viburnum lantana (Wayfaring Tree), the same bush Otzi, the Iceman, made his arrows from.

And the beautiful little Izula was gifted to me by an overly generous forum member, tonym, who coincidentally has a birthday today. Happy Birthday, again, GS. I just wanted you to see that it wasn't living in a drawer. :thumbup:

And the orange handle you see sticking out of my shirt pocket is a little Bryan Breeden beauty that I managed to thieve away from KGD. Boy is he going to be sorry when he realizes what happened. I love this little knife.

Pitdog: Great stuff buddy, wish I coulda been there as I'd love to learn how to do Knapping one on one !!!!

If you ever get down to Ontario, and Luis is still around, I'll arrange it. Luis is the master, personally, I suck.

mneedham: Looks like a great time. Doc is a guy I would really like to meet sometime. I had plans to hook up with him this summer on my way Algonquin, but it didn't happen (complications here)..

There's always next year.




Doc (GP).

 

[Diomedes Industries]

Hey KGD,

Did you have all your money in your wallet after meeting Doc? I hear he is a shyster!



Man, I would have loved to be there - Doc, when are you coming to Houston next?


TF

 

[DOC-CANADA]

Here's a few more pictures-

This is Phil, procuring the second course

(Imagine somebody silly enough to bring a snake out to a gathering of primitive skills people)

My buddy Luis, practising a bit of net making.

"Hey, it's net so hard, after all".

Luis explaining some of the finer 'points' of flint knapping.

Speaking of finer points, here are some Luis made for me - the red one with the tip down, had the point break off, as seen here - Luis was going to repair it before I left but he and I forgot. The picture doesn't do it justice.

Shown here with a bottle cap to give some size reference.

Our buddy Kim, whose first love is reenacting.

Our buddy, Ken, who is trying to take a 'knap'

And finally, the beautiful little Breeden knife that I thieved off Ken, well almost, I waited until he had a few Irish whiskies and beers, before I negotiated. Even came with a beautiful kydex from On Scene Tactical.

Doc

 

[DOC-CANADA]

Hey KGD,

Did you have all your money in your wallet after meeting Doc? I hear he is a shyster!



Man, I would have loved to be there - Doc, when are you coming to Houston next?

TF

Watch the sky, if you see pigs flying.....................

Doc

 

[Diomedes Industries]

Where is my Trebuchet?

TF

 

[DOC-CANADA]

Almost forgot - for Talfuchre -

kgd also makes it look easy.

of course, he's using an Egyptian bow drill, which we all know is cheating.

Doc

 

[C Bryant]

Thanks for sharing gentlemen! Fantastic post.

 

[Fonly]

awesome pictures guys, If I make it back east, Im stopping in for a visit on the way!

 

[mtnfolk mike]

man.. great pics guys...:thumbup: that definitely looks like a blast.... thanks for sharing...