In my limited wet weather tinder hunts, the best stuff I found was in piles of wind-drifted leaves. After a poke and stir with my hiking staff to be sure no reptiles contested the neighborhood, digging down into the piles led to some dry stuff that I could rub and crumble into dry fiberous tinder.

The best kindling was dry dead stuff still on trees under their needle or leaf canopy and off the ground. Smashing some of it into wooden shards provided an intermediate size of readily burnable stuff.

The best firewood was split and dried around / on the fire. Pitch-laden pines and pinecones got a fairly fast start but oak, madrone, manzanita, or other relatively hard woods lasted longer and created lasting coals. Often dead-falls and wood on the ground was all that could be found of this wood. [We were not in places cutting anything but dead wood was appropriate.]

Sacramento area? I believe you guys live in tinder, or are at least surrounded by it. Reading about the leaves puts things in perspective as to how dry it can be out there. Here, leaves get wet and stay wet most of the time.

Please come by during the fog and rain of winter to enjoy Tinder Fest.

think speed also--that's what the survival kit we are carrying is all about--kit??remember those??--matches,fire starter,candy bar--
i would think that in a real survival situation that looking around for some exotic fire tinder in a wet world,you would not need tinder in a dry one,that hypothermia would catch up with you before you found enough mouse nest and plant fuzz to get a big fire going.but having said that knowing what to look for and giving it a try before had will save time and you will need ever minute.

Ancient pine tree stumps generally catch alight quite easily when whittled down as demonstrated by Ray Mears.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDAtrYTWKAM

Up here in the Pacific Northwet, we use the dead branches off fir and other coniferous trees. These are all dead as fir trees are self pruning and this has been referred to as squaw wood- easily broken off with a quick snap. If it is rubbery, you know it is wet and less than useful. Heavy concentrations of pitch on the trunks of these trees are also useful as this can be scraped off and used with both squaw wood or birch bark, or cattail heads to make something you can start with a ferro rod.

Well at least you shouldn't have trouble finding water then! Here our dry season is just in the summer, not the fall. That you guys have such a long dry season triggered a little light bulb in my head as to one of the reasons why the wildfires are generally much more of a problem there than here.

Hair works. It doesn't light as quickly or burn as long as other things, and there is the smell, but hair is pretty much always with you.

"...hair is pretty much always with you."

Even if you're bald, you can use your knife to shave your legs!

Sue

Anybody ever tried hair as tinder?