Cordage

Watched another McPherson DVD last night. This time it was "Primitive Fire & Cordage." (By the way, these hotlinks offer streaming video trailers which had a great deal to do with my decision to buy.)

This time John and Geri showed three methods of starting a fire by "rubbing two sticks together" and made cordage from plant and animal materials. The backstrap sinew bow string was especially impressive to watch.

Once again I found myself running off in search of something to turn into cordage. Paracord is readily available in my house so I grabbed a couple of chunks to practice the cording technique and the splicing technique. Once I got the hang of the twist and wrap the process went quickly. Before I knew it I had a hank of double-thickness paracord about 20' long. This included one splice which I had to do twice as the first time it didn't hold when I tugged on the cord.

These videos are so dense with theory and background that you don't want to miss a minute. If you do, like I did, you'll need to go back for the finer points.

I'll play around with making some cordage this weekend when I get out in the woods and I'll post my results here with pictures if I can get some.

Thanks for reading,

B