Wild marjoram

I went out for a walk recently and came across a great little herb, wild marjoram.
Not always easy to find but when you do find it then it can be quite abundant..



Should have picked a lot of it and dried it out for cooking.. might just have to go back thete for another walk.

Spinning time

Its at that time of year again when my thoughts turn to spinning for small game fish like perch and trout..they are now well used to feeding on this year's fry so spinning is a good way to target them.so out came the spinner making box



And within an hour I had 15 gorgeous little lures made thst will do serious damage to the trout population!



Looking forward to the next couple of months !

Simple knife control challenge

Knife control is incredibly important, a knifes primary function is to cut not chop. Simple small controlled movements are necessary for good knife handling and this is a fun technique we do with kids when showing them how to handle and use a knife properly.. give them an apple and ask them to peel it with their knife and the person with the longest peel is the winner..
Give it a try!



See if you can beat this one at 33 inches!!!

New woodlore clone knife

I recently bought a new woodlore clone blade blank because, well, er, I convinced myself that I needed it..



The said blank taped up and ready



And with it's new clothes of tan linen micarta



And next to my usual well used user..

Early purple orchid

Ever see something that stops you in your tracks and takes your breath away..early purple orchids do that to me and they are out in force at the moment.. how can you see such beauty and not wonder about the mysteries of nature.

Shanes Castle 2017

We were very fortunate to be asked to attend this year's game fair at Shanes Castle, apparently after considering a number of other bushcraft schools we were the ones that came most highly recommended so we thank everyone concerned for that.

So we had to get there the day before to get set up and this gave us the excuse to bring out the big tent, it's 30x20 feet and 14 feet tall..this thing is a beast and only gets used when we have large events or really big groups. We also had Tipi's, Icelandics and Bell tents set up in the woodland behind

After we got everything organised we had a well earned rest and got ready for a busy weekend.

Lots of items out for display and to encourage conversation, and boy was there lots of it !I think some of the folks we met on the Saturday enjoyed it so much that they came back on the sunday and spent 3 or 4 hours talking to us!!

We had a really busy few days with 30,000 people through the gates so we were kept on our toes the whole time

It was tricky to get pictures as we were constantly talking or demonstrating but nonetheless we did get a few

We made loads of new contacts and set ourselves up for an interesting year ahead, we are going to be so busy!

Another day at the forge.

We managed to get the rest of the guys their chance at the forge last weekend. They'd all been looking forward to this for a while and this time it was decided to make Viking knives.



The weather was so good this time that we brought the anvils and forges outside



Didn't take long for everyone to get there forging heads on and start to focus on the steel.



There was great craic as everyone worked diligently and encouraged the friendly rivalry that was going on



Didn't take long for the knives to take shape



And after a couple of hours there were some great finished pieces on show