Feather Sticks Materials To make a feather stick we need: In this document we’ll have a look at the The most important part of making a feather stick or fuzz stick. feather stick is getting the right materials. 1. A soft wood (willow, spruce, hazel, etc.) 2. Dry wood 3. 1 foot long pieces of wood 4. NO KNOTS ! it won’t work if you have knots where you want to make shavings. Feather Stick Safety Why Feather sticks Check list: This is the end of a dead stick that has been split into 4 pieces. The inside of are useful this stick will be dry provided it was not lying on the ground (that is if it was 1, First Aid kit ‘standing dead wood’). When the weather is wet and 2. Trained First Aider cold getting dry wood can be 3. Leader can see everyone Shave the Ridges very difficult. (scouts work in a semi-circle) Before 1st Cut After 1st Cut 4. Water, fire extinguisher and When we make our Feather sticks (or fuzz sticks) are fire blanket shavings we always Ridges made when you make lots of 5. Use a ground sheet to catch cut along the ridges (cut here) wood shavings and leave them chips on the timber, not attached to the stick they were 6. Remember the ‘Blood Circle’. on the flat part. This Split wood cut from. 7. 1/2 barrel or other safe makes our feathers fireplace smaller (better for fire Make your first This means that air can get 8. Leader must go through safe lighting) and they are shaving on the Next cuts on the two between the shavings so the carving practices and get scouts much easier to carve. top ridge. ridges you created with wood burns much better. to demonstrate they know them the first cut, and so on. every time. Standing Method Kneeling Method This is by far the easiest method of making We use this method with older/stronger a feather stick for scouts but you need a scouts or when we can’t find a wooden This method is just like the ‘pull solid wooden base to work onto. surface to work onto. cut’ from last months ‘knife The key point in this method work’ document. is that you lock your arm out straight and you lean forward Lock the wrist of the knife hand at the hip. into you knee. Now bring the wood up underneath the knife and pull the wood back and across your body. This should give good control and power without straining your arm. Keeping your arm locked out straight means you aren’t relying on arm Ferro Rods strength. When you have made five or six We lean forward at the hip; this feather sticks you should have Ridge means we use our body weight, our enough skill to make extremely stomach muscles and back muscles to thin feathers that can be started make the cut. using a ferro rod (but this is not a Again we always make our requirement). cuts along a ridge, look at Do not use stone or concrete to lean You use a ferro rod by pulling the the picture above to see the wood against, if the knife slips rod back and keeping the scraper what I mean. it will hit the stone and damage the still. You need heavy scrapes to edge of the knife. be effective and you can use your thumb to help apply pressure. Curls to the Left General Tips and the Right Some things that will help with making feather sticks. Mark Your Beginning and End Scouts love making very short little shavings that are much less useful than longer ones. To help with this take a marker and mark where they should start and end their shavings. If we raise the tip of the knife Dropping the tip of the knife Here the blue line is the start as we make a curl we will make down makes our curls spiral and the red line is the end of the curl spiral away from our toward our hand. the shavings. hand. This allows us to make a really dense ball of shavings to help us make our fire. Make the marks about half a foot apart. You will need five or six good feather sticks to get a fire going in damp or cold weather. Get a feel for the timber Before you start to make shaving sit the knife flat against the wood. Next slide the knife down the surface of the wood; you should be able to feel the way the timber flows. Now sit the knife so that it barely bites into the wood and repeat the action. You should find that you can make very long fine shavings when you have familiarised yourself with the timber you are working with..