Bush Tucker Men

This weekend saw me helping out Wildcrafts School in Essex. Apart from introducing new people to the world of Bushcraft, it seemed as though Bush Tucker was high on the agenda for the weekend.

A few nice crayfish came up from the lake and these were dispatched and cooked up with some garlic.

This was closely followed by sweet potatoes cooked up by Scrivy with maple syrup, rum and a couple more ingredients I’ve forgotten (but I’ll edit the post once I know).

We had a go at tapping birch again and the tree generously gave up some refreshing liquid. We also tapped Hornbeam which is a first for me. The sap came out just as fast but I noticed it wasn’t quite as sweet as birch sap but just as refreshing.

We learnt our lesson from last time and didn’t spit roast the Roe deer (brought along by Adam from the National Trust). Instead, Scrivy butchered the carcass and placed it on a green stick framework for a green-stick BBQ. The result was a wonderfully tender venison that was cooked in a third of the time.

Still on the subject of cooking, we tested out three very different types of stove. Firstly, Andy’s bushcooker with a stainless meths burner. This is a very similar set up to my bushbuddy and trangia burner set up. The bushcooker looks equally efficient as the bushbuddy (and cheaper) but on this occasion we were testing it out in meths mode. 1/2 litre of water took 17 minutes to boil.

Next came Simon’s excellent MSR multi-fuel Simmer lite. This took just 4 mins for the water to reach a rolling boil. I’m quite impressed by these multi fuel cookers and have never really considered them before. I think they deserve a closer look.

Finally, I tried out my Crusader cooker with hexy blocks. The water took 13 minutes to boil.

I think this confirms what we all knew already, and at the end of the day the water boiled! But the choice of stove very much depends on what you are going to cook up and where.

Back to the bushcraft course and the lads on the course were doing extremely well with fire lighting and food prep. The squirrel got a mixed reaction. But as Les pointed out, the squirrel taste will vary depending on it’s diet and autumn may be a better time to eat them.

Les led the way around the wood pointing out edible food pushing their way through the woodland floor and more pertinently, what wasn’t edible. The leaves and petals of this Primrose are edible.

The tracking session went very well as we picked up a couple of fresh Fallow tracks right from the start and followed them for a 100 yards or so. We also found good evidence of feeding signs.

A break though moment came when, still following the Fallow trail, we were ageing a series of Fallow deer scat. As we walked through the woods the scat got more recent until at best guess we decided the still sticky and shiny Fallow scat was about 10 – 15 minutes old. Low and behold, we saw the shapes of some deer through the thick brambles. Unfortunately, they didn’t hang around.

A study of one narrow trail revealed a multitude of mammal movement including Fallow, Muntjac, and Badger.

 

A lot of time is spend on shelter building as the subject is so important, and quite rightly, the lads were proud of their efforts. Here’s the pics as promised.

Thanks to everyone for a great weekend.

Bush Tucker Men

This weekend saw me helping out Wildcrafts School in Essex. Apart from introducing new people to the world of Bushcraft, it seemed as though Bush Tucker was high on the agenda for the weekend.

A few nice crayfish came up from the lake and these were dispatched and cooked up with some garlic.

This was closely followed by sweet potatoes cooked up by Scrivy with maple syrup, rum and a couple more ingredients I’ve forgotten (but I’ll edit the post once I know).

We had a go at tapping birch again and the tree generously gave up some refreshing liquid. We also tapped Hornbeam which is a first for me. The sap came out just as fast but I noticed it wasn’t quite as sweet as birch sap but just as refreshing.

We learnt our lesson from last time and didn’t spit roast the Roe deer (brought along by Adam from the National Trust). Instead, Scrivy butchered the carcass and placed it on a green stick framework for a green-stick BBQ. The result was a wonderfully tender venison that was cooked in a third of the time.

Still on the subject of cooking, we tested out three very different types of stove. Firstly, Andy’s bushcooker with a stainless meths burner. This is a very similar set up to my bushbuddy and trangia burner set up. The bushcooker looks equally efficient as the bushbuddy (and cheaper) but on this occasion we were testing it out in meths mode. 1/2 litre of water took 17 minutes to boil.

Next came Simon’s excellent MSR multi-fuel Simmer lite. This took just 4 mins for the water to reach a rolling boil. I’m quite impressed by these multi fuel cookers and have never really considered them before. I think they deserve a closer look.

Finally, I tried out my Crusader cooker with hexy blocks. The water took 13 minutes to boil.

I think this confirms what we all knew already, and at the end of the day the water boiled! But the choice of stove very much depends on what you are going to cook up and where.

Back to the bushcraft course and the lads on the course were doing extremely well with fire lighting and food prep. The squirrel got a mixed reaction. But as Les pointed out, the squirrel taste will vary depending on it’s diet and autumn may be a better time to eat them.

Les led the way around the wood pointing out edible food pushing their way through the woodland floor and more pertinently, what wasn’t edible. The leaves and petals of this Primrose are edible.

The tracking session went very well as we picked up a couple of fresh Fallow tracks right from the start and followed them for a 100 yards or so. We also found good evidence of feeding signs.

A break though moment came when, still following the Fallow trail, we were ageing a series of Fallow deer scat. As we walked through the woods the scat got more recent until at best guess we decided the still sticky and shiny Fallow scat was about 10 – 15 minutes old. Low and behold, we saw the shapes of some deer through the thick brambles. Unfortunately, they didn’t hang around.

A study of one narrow trail revealed a multitude of mammal movement including Fallow, Muntjac, and Badger.

 

A lot of time is spend on shelter building as the subject is so important, and quite rightly, the lads were proud of their efforts. Here’s the pics as promised.

Thanks to everyone for a great weekend.

Spring has Sprung!

 

My post of 10th March bemoaned the fact that there was very little sign of spring in the UK woodlands.  However, I can now report that these signs have arrived and furthermore I can declare winter over and spring has now sprung (despite what others define as the official date for the first day of spring). 

I can base this reasoning on several facts. Firstly, bluebells are pushing their way through the woodland floor and catkins are becoming visible on the trees. This last week has been quite warm with temperatures in the teens, culminating in a glorious early spring day, yesterday, with bright sunshine. I recorded the temperature at 3pm as 15 degrees C. My humble calculations suggest that spring in the UK has arrived this year about 3 weeks later that last year.

On Sunday morning I went ‘bird-catching’ (as I call it) with Big Dave and Ken who is an official bird-ringer for this part of Essex. While I was there they ringed 2 Great tits, a Dunnock, a tree-creeper, a chiff-chaff and a couple of blackbirds. I’ll describe the process and a little bit more about bird-ringing in a separate post.

The second spring fact is that there is much more bird activity which may be an obvious sign of spring but there are also a couple of facts that you couldn’t tell unless you were involved in bird-ringing.

 

The first is that a number of birds caught (particularly Dunnocks) have been recorded during the winter in gardens. Now the warmer weather has arrived with the additional availability of food, they have now moved to the more natural woodland areas. I think that fact speaks for itself .

Also, the female birds caught have now begun to show a brood patch. This is where the feathers have thinned out on the female bird’s underside which will shortly be engorged with blood vessels. This will assist in incubating the eggs by providing additional warmth.

The second part of Sunday was spent in Lowt’s wood. Apart from bird activity, it was quite quiet. I almost stumbled on a single fallow doe and and later a muntjac but that was about it. There was quite a lot of squirrel activity as they chased each other around the tree trunks.

The final reason I know spring is here is by my own reaction to spring in the the UK woodlands. After lunch I fell soundly asleep on the woodland floor!

Thanks for the visit.

Spring has Sprung!

 

My post of 10th March bemoaned the fact that there was very little sign of spring in the UK woodlands.  However, I can now report that these signs have arrived and furthermore I can declare winter over and spring has now sprung (despite what others define as the official date for the first day of spring). 

I can base this reasoning on several facts. Firstly, bluebells are pushing their way through the woodland floor and catkins are becoming visible on the trees. This last week has been quite warm with temperatures in the teens, culminating in a glorious early spring day, yesterday, with bright sunshine. I recorded the temperature at 3pm as 15 degrees C. My humble calculations suggest that spring in the UK has arrived this year about 3 weeks later that last year.

On Sunday morning I went ‘bird-catching’ (as I call it) with Big Dave and Ken who is an official bird-ringer for this part of Essex. While I was there they ringed 2 Great tits, a Dunnock, a tree-creeper, a chiff-chaff and a couple of blackbirds. I’ll describe the process and a little bit more about bird-ringing in a separate post.

The second spring fact is that there is much more bird activity which may be an obvious sign of spring but there are also a couple of facts that you couldn’t tell unless you were involved in bird-ringing.

 

The first is that a number of birds caught (particularly Dunnocks) have been recorded during the winter in gardens. Now the warmer weather has arrived with the additional availability of food, they have now moved to the more natural woodland areas. I think that fact speaks for itself .

Also, the female birds caught have now begun to show a brood patch. This is where the feathers have thinned out on the female bird’s underside which will shortly be engorged with blood vessels. This will assist in incubating the eggs by providing additional warmth.

The second part of Sunday was spent in Lowt’s wood. Apart from bird activity, it was quite quiet. I almost stumbled on a single fallow doe and and later a muntjac but that was about it. There was quite a lot of squirrel activity as they chased each other around the tree trunks.

The final reason I know spring is here is by my own reaction to spring in the the UK woodlands. After lunch I fell soundly asleep on the woodland floor!

Thanks for the visit.

MaxP’d to the Max - Falcon II Review

In the past, I’ve been a bit unkind to Maxpedition. To be fair, there have produced some good utility items like the roll up pouches (roly-poly pouches), roll up back packs (reviewed here) and other small, utility pouches. But I’ve never been too keen on the Gear-Slinger bags with one strap or side-carry type bags. They might be a good idea in theory but in practice, they just didn’t work too well for me. I do know other people who swear by them though.

I was, however, impressed with the build quality and the style of the bag. So, as always in pursuit of the perfect day bag, I approached Lakelandbushcraft to seek advise. The advise came back in the form of a similar style bag to the Sitka, but a larger capacity and, fundamentally, traditional shoulder straps instead of a single shoulder strap.

The bag in question is called the Falcon II and here are the specs (from Maxpedition site):

• Main Compartment: 18"(H) x 9.5"(W) x 4.75"(D)
• Secondary Compartment: 16"(H) x 8"(W) x 3"(D)
• Upper Front Pouch: 4"(H) x 7"(W) x 2.5"(D)
• Lower Front Pouch: 10"(H) x 7"(W) x 2.5"(D)
• Capacity: 1520 cu. in. / 25 liters
• Hydration: Up to 100oz (3 liter) Bladder
• Support: 1" Sternum Strap, 1.5" Waist Belt (min 9" strap alone / max 42" strap alone; min 19" loop / max 52" loop)

The first thing that impressed me is the internal capacity. I have packed a whole overnight kit inside this bag.  That means food, water, cooker, billy, tarp and hammock and poncho . There are two main zipped, front loading compartments which are expandable and hold quite a bit of gear. The Thermarest and sleeping bag don’t fit in the bag (and only the smallest sleeping bag would) but they can both be strapped to the outside by the many external straps and fixings.

Internally, there a few handy meshed pockets and on this occasion, I’ve loaded these with essentials like fire lighting kit, hygiene gel, cordage and a spork. I’ll be keeping them there instead of using up space with my usual drop-bag.

The front loading system allows you to pack everything exactly where you want it and you can compress the bag by the ideally placed compression straps so that the 2 zipped compartments and outer pouches squeeze together very nicely. This keeps all the kit in the same position as when you packed them.

The water bladder pocket  has a gusset on the inside so it can accommodate a 3 litre camelbak quite comfortably.

You still have to be a little careful how you pack the sack. In fact, my 14 cm billy was causing a few problems with it’s awkward shape when everything else was loaded in. I also missed the lack of side pockets. So after a bit of thunking, I decided to Max-out the MaxP Falcon!

Firstly, I decided to use two Roly poly pouches that I had previously bought and fixed them to each side of the Falcon. I used one of their Silkclips and a Tac-Tie to do this.

 

Instantly, I had two high capacity side pouches to put in awkward and odd shaped items like the billy and stove or my other favourite day sack item, a flask of coffee. The pouches can be rolled up when not in use.

As you can see from the picture above, I didn’t stop there. The next addition was a little pouch that I attached the front of the Falcon’s smallest front pouch.

This is called a Volta case and is intended to house a plastic holder full of spare batteries. I bought it for my phone but find it’s more suited to my GPS .

Attached to the top of the case is a Janus extension pouch. This little pouch is an excellent alternative to a leather possibles pouch. It has a main compartment, two smaller internal side compartments and some internal elastic straps to hold small items like a fire-steel. The outside of the pouch has some handy elastic cordage as well.

I actually took this pouch to Namibia with me and had it attached to my belt at all times containing essential survival items. Here I’ve attached it to the bag to save it hanging off my trouser belt.

You can see that I can still get to the Falcon’s top pouch where I keep some tracking kit.

At the front of the bag on one of the straps, I’ve attached a Cocoon pouch. This pouch is ideal for stashing small items to save you keep taking off the bag.

The Falcon II is very comfortable to wear, even when fully loaded. It’s narrow enough to keep close to the spine and the bag compresses enough not to become too saggy with kit at the bottom of the bag or at the sides that you get with traditional top loading bags.

Everything is designed to be in the right place for a day trip or overnighter where quick walking  from one place to another (like when tracking) is essential.

Even without the added accessories, this is superb bag.  Obviously it’s a modern, tactical-type carrying system, and doesn’t pretend to be anything else. If you’re a traditionalist, don’t even bother to look at this. If you want a good, strong day bag for a tactical purpose, this is the bag to look at. Don’t look too closely if you haven’t a lot of money to spare, but Lakelandbushcraft will always give you a good price on any MaxP kit.

Maxpedition – Perhaps not Hardly Useful Kit after all.

MaxP’d to the Max - Falcon II Review

In the past, I’ve been a bit unkind to Maxpedition. To be fair, there have produced some good utility items like the roll up pouches (roly-poly pouches), roll up back packs (reviewed here) and other small, utility pouches. But I’ve never been too keen on the Gear-Slinger bags with one strap or side-carry type bags. They might be a good idea in theory but in practice, they just didn’t work too well for me. I do know other people who swear by them though.

I was, however, impressed with the build quality and the style of the bag. So, as always in pursuit of the perfect day bag, I approached Lakelandbushcraft to seek advise. The advise came back in the form of a similar style bag to the Sitka, but a larger capacity and, fundamentally, traditional shoulder straps instead of a single shoulder strap.

The bag in question is called the Falcon II and here are the specs (from Maxpedition site):

• Main Compartment: 18"(H) x 9.5"(W) x 4.75"(D)
• Secondary Compartment: 16"(H) x 8"(W) x 3"(D)
• Upper Front Pouch: 4"(H) x 7"(W) x 2.5"(D)
• Lower Front Pouch: 10"(H) x 7"(W) x 2.5"(D)
• Capacity: 1520 cu. in. / 25 liters
• Hydration: Up to 100oz (3 liter) Bladder
• Support: 1" Sternum Strap, 1.5" Waist Belt (min 9" strap alone / max 42" strap alone; min 19" loop / max 52" loop)

The first thing that impressed me is the internal capacity. I have packed a whole overnight kit inside this bag.  That means food, water, cooker, billy, tarp and hammock and poncho . There are two main zipped, front loading compartments which are expandable and hold quite a bit of gear. The Thermarest and sleeping bag don’t fit in the bag (and only the smallest sleeping bag would) but they can both be strapped to the outside by the many external straps and fixings.

Internally, there a few handy meshed pockets and on this occasion, I’ve loaded these with essentials like fire lighting kit, hygiene gel, cordage and a spork. I’ll be keeping them there instead of using up space with my usual drop-bag.

The front loading system allows you to pack everything exactly where you want it and you can compress the bag by the ideally placed compression straps so that the 2 zipped compartments and outer pouches squeeze together very nicely. This keeps all the kit in the same position as when you packed them.

The water bladder pocket  has a gusset on the inside so it can accommodate a 3 litre camelbak quite comfortably.

You still have to be a little careful how you pack the sack. In fact, my 14 cm billy was causing a few problems with it’s awkward shape when everything else was loaded in. I also missed the lack of side pockets. So after a bit of thunking, I decided to Max-out the MaxP Falcon!

Firstly, I decided to use two Roly poly pouches that I had previously bought and fixed them to each side of the Falcon. I used one of their Silkclips and a Tac-Tie to do this.

 

Instantly, I had two high capacity side pouches to put in awkward and odd shaped items like the billy and stove or my other favourite day sack item, a flask of coffee. The pouches can be rolled up when not in use.

As you can see from the picture above, I didn’t stop there. The next addition was a little pouch that I attached the front of the Falcon’s smallest front pouch.

This is called a Volta case and is intended to house a plastic holder full of spare batteries. I bought it for my phone but find it’s more suited to my GPS .

Attached to the top of the case is a Janus extension pouch. This little pouch is an excellent alternative to a leather possibles pouch. It has a main compartment, two smaller internal side compartments and some internal elastic straps to hold small items like a fire-steel. The outside of the pouch has some handy elastic cordage as well.

I actually took this pouch to Namibia with me and had it attached to my belt at all times containing essential survival items. Here I’ve attached it to the bag to save it hanging off my trouser belt.

You can see that I can still get to the Falcon’s top pouch where I keep some tracking kit.

At the front of the bag on one of the straps, I’ve attached a Cocoon pouch. This pouch is ideal for stashing small items to save you keep taking off the bag.

The Falcon II is very comfortable to wear, even when fully loaded. It’s narrow enough to keep close to the spine and the bag compresses enough not to become too saggy with kit at the bottom of the bag or at the sides that you get with traditional top loading bags.

Everything is designed to be in the right place for a day trip or overnighter where quick walking  from one place to another (like when tracking) is essential.

Even without the added accessories, this is superb bag.  Obviously it’s a modern, tactical-type carrying system, and doesn’t pretend to be anything else. If you’re a traditionalist, don’t even bother to look at this. If you want a good, strong day bag for a tactical purpose, this is the bag to look at. Don’t look too closely if you haven’t a lot of money to spare, but Lakelandbushcraft will always give you a good price on any MaxP kit.

Maxpedition – Perhaps not Hardly Useful Kit after all.