Tinder (Do you carry it?)

Practicing skills is a great way to pass time in the woods...Knowledge is one thing, but experience is something else entirely. I have gone into the woods with LOTS of people that said they had watched every video on the fire-bow, only to fail when the time came, after 6 hours of trying... As I have experience doing it, I show them, and in 15 minutes we have a fire. They often know FAR more theory about the firebow than I do, but I still got it going. I see all kind of arm chair survivalists in my line of work (guiding, among many other things)

When I am packing, I always start with the BARE BONES SURVIVAL... and add items one at a time, to enhance comfort and minimize energy expenditure, while constantly aware of the weight. I take great pleasure out of using and carrying less. Going into the woods with absolutely nothing but the clothes on my back, and coming out a week later with a fire kit, a cutting tool, a container, cordage, and shelter is incredibly liberating.

Once I know how to do something, like using a firebow, I feel much better about packing a zippo in my bag. Once I know how to build shelter, I have no problem bringing a tarp or even a tent. Knowing how to make rope, I feel better bringing 100' of paracord... I feel that for every piece of kit you have, you should know how to get its functional equivalent (key concept) from nature. To me, that is a great way to build your kit. Start from the ground up, not the sky down.
 
Wow, Kinda the opposite end of the spectrum from some of you here, but I do carry at least two pack-in tinder types (the legendary PJCB, and jute) with me on my all-too-seldom forays into the woods. I'm not opposed to natural tinders at all, and always use some sort of picked-up tinder in a fire (it's just how I Learned). I just can't get over the effectiveness of PJCB's. The first time I tried one, I simply couldn't believe how potent an energy source it was. My thought is that fire is just too big a necessity to not have a backup plan for.
 
Watch out carrying zippos. in my experience if you leave it in your gear bag without refueling constantly, it will not light when you need it.
 
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Andrews and ScruffuK, great posts fellas.

I never carry tinder, honestly though, I live and play in the deserts so a shortage of prime tinder is always underfoot. Now with reading through these posts I am starting to get that a little chunk of fatwood on a keychain to go along with my mini bic and other firemakers isn't a bad idea.
 
WJC01 said:
I have PJ cotton balls in my RAT firesteel. Sometimes I take a piece of fatwood.
Click to expand...

I do the exact same thing, and it works great. And for $5 you can get enough cotton balls and PJ to start fires for the rest of your life :)
 
I don't carry firemaking materials on my person day-in and day out (I work in an office barely 5 miles from home,) but I did pick up a couple Nanostrikers for when I go into the great outdoors. Then I tried to start a fire with one. Now, I have a couple of BICs, 3 Nanostrikers and an LMF, and 3 aluminum canisters and a tube vault of PJ-CBs mixed with (cotton) dryer lint 000 steel wool. They're in my GHB, my EDC pouch, and each of my outdoor jackets.
 
Sometimes I do and sometimes I don't. In saying that if you really study every item on your person it is very hard to say you have no tinder.....what about that tissue in ya pocket, how about the fuzz from ya socks, is that some inner tube on ya knife sheath...you get the idea !!!

I think it's also important to assess the where you are going, what time of the year it is and how far are you going etc.

In summer I'll only really carry tinder for the hell of it and maybe to post on here, in Winter when everything is soaked through and maybe under several feet of snow it's a different ball game, I'd be a fool not to carry some emergency tinder then.
 
Am i really the only one here who carry's a water bottle full of gasoline???:eek:

I carry a pocketfull/baggyfull, etc of white birch bark anywhere in the woods.
Best tinder ive ever found. It lights when wet, can be found nearly anywhere in the Northeast where i live, and provides a tall hot flame for a minute or so and the best part...
Its absolutely free:D.
 
I carry a mag bar w/ my firesteel - and I always seem to have an ample supply of lint backed neatly in my belly button (I never put it there either - just kinda appears... I think it's magic lint )
 
I did a recent post and video where I showed how I have a PJB Duct taped to the back of my knife sheath as emergency tinder. Just rip it off when needed, no messing about having to open up your PSK in the rain and risk wetting all the other contents just to get enough tinder to light a fire !

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By pitdog2010 at 2011-08-03
 
Adding the steel wool makes a big difference in the PJCB tinders. Like Zeke, it's not really all that difficult for me to find natural tinder where I live. But I like making and bringing my own. Of course, I too carry a Trixane bar for an emergency use such as falling into a cold river and needing to make a fire fast.
 
Every one of my FB's has a mini kit and my day to day keychain has a separate mag bar and fire steel, along with a bright orange Fox 40 whistle. That's more than enough for me. I've taken a spare fire steel out in various conditions including after a two day rain. I used natural materials around me to start a fire. I eventually got a fire going out of old grass and the remains of an old hornet nest, soggy thistle down etc. after the two day rain. Now that was a bugger, but I learned from it. My materials were semi wet\damp. And by forming a dome over my hands I dried the material out enough for ignition. I raked that fire steel incessantly, zip, zip, zip, zip over and over minute after minute and I actually felt heat inside my little dome, enough eventually to dry up my hornet nest and maybe some grass. I had numerous semi burns and one second flame ups with that wet material but after about 10 minutes she popped up nicely. The day was dank and dismal with the moisture hanging visibly over everything. I will likely never be more than lightly skilled and there are people here that have forgotten more than I know in this regard. That's fine with me and I still learn from many of you. I have been out in enough varied conditions to have a level of self confidence were I'm comfortable. But I don't know it all and will try to keep an open mind. So, to the original question. My FB's have starting materials. Otherwise I practice now and then with what's in my outdoor environment. I still find it ironic that we southerners go through all this. When a northern Indian would stop his snowmobile. Take off the chain saw and spare gas can. Buzz up some wood then pour on some gas, light some ass wipe or whatever, and toss it on. Whoosh, virtually an instant fire.
 
I think many people carry tinder without realizing it. Do you have Neosporin or something similar in your first aid kit? How about a gauze pad? Guess what. You've got tinder. Neosporin is just petrolium jelly with some extra ingredients. How about a small bottle of hand sanitizer (they make them so small that they fit on a keychain these days), this is jellified alcohol... it'll burn.

If you don't have tinder, maybe the first thing you need to do is improve your first aid kit!
 
Call me crazy, but I like keeping warm, cooking meat, and having clean water. Fire is a must. I carry PJ cotton balls for when it's damp and dryer lent for when it's dry.
 
Trioxane tabs. Always carry a couple when hiking, more if I know I want fire. Bought a box of them, and have plenty. I still just use half of one to start a fire, usually, and wrap the other half up for next time. As rare as my fires are, they'll never get used up.
Got a pack of WetFires to check out, but haven't tried them, yet.
 
I have a network of trails behind my house and have strategically placed fatwood at various spots along the way. Last night a buddy and I started a fire using some of that stash. That particular spot has 2 fatwood stumps(lifetime supply) under a rock overhang by the creek. I hit these trails 2 or 3 times a week for PT.
 
I carry a small kit like this in all my packs. Pine fatwood, dryer lint, newspaper, matches, bic lighter and fire steel.
firekit.jpg
 
I enjoy collecting natural tinder and even the challenge of finding tinder under difficult conditions. However, I treat those exercises as personal challenges and pretty much always have something tucked away as an in-case. In-case I can't find any tinder. In-case I'm too lazy to search harder than I want to. Hey, even the Ice-man kept some chaga in his kit and when you visit an environment enough and get used to the bang and bust economy of available resources that occur and constantly change it becomes a no-brainer that one should take advantage of resources when they are available and try to store a little extra for when times are difficult.

So, yeah I always carry something with me that is usually directed specifically as firestarter aid. As Pitdog pointed out, we often have multi-use pieces of kit that can serve as well. Still, I reserve (and have used) in the past a Coghlan's firestick or a piece of fatwood. Only makes sense when you know you are going to make fire for reasons outside of just the expressed purpose to make fire that you will have the tools to do so in poor conditions that you might encounter. I liked B. Andrews post quite a bit.
 
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