Kids and Fire

for the next week or so i'll be a volunteer at a local nature center.the schools are bringing out bus loads of grade school students to take part in a Voyageurs and Trappers program.
there are four parts and each kids takes part in all of them.
a snowshoe hike,a vist to "trader jims" which is a wonderful collection of trade goods items that a local reenactor has put together.then meeting the voyageurs for a trip from Quebec to the Grand Portage in Minnesota.the canoe is an outline on the meeting room floor and the staff in compleat outfits tells the story and the kids take up little paddles and sing and get to try out carrying a bundle with a tump line..OK--as i don't have a story all worked out and i just got into this without any kind of reenactors outfit i got the task of the "fire keeper" at the trappers camp which had all the items you would expect.while the staff went thru what it was like to winter over i kept a pot of wild rice warm for everyone to have a taste of..



so now the point of this post...here and at other site we have all read of how kids these days don't get to do the same sort of things as we did--like make fires and handle knives--
well here they did.after trying out flint and steel and have a demo of a fire bow the kids got into groups of three and made a fire--tinder and birch bark were provided and they got down to it with just minor adult supervision.



this group was just about leaping up and down--"we did it! we made a fire"--wood kitchen matches were handed out,one each and they all had a go at it. i would say the future is in good hands--

Other than the dreaded white stuff it looks like a hoot!!!

So, how does making a fire on the snow directly work? Does the fire sink gradually, or stay "afloat?"

That looks like time well spent. The white tent reminds me of the old civil war era tents I've seen at reinactments. The kids are lucky to have your help.

Thanks for the information and the photos. It is great to see kids being able to learn and practice some valuable skills that one day may help save their lives.

Absolutely bloody awesome. Well done, brother.

You could actually wind up putting the fire out with the melting snow. One of our scouts had issues with that when trying to start a fire in a snowed over fire pit.

Canoedogs: Fantastic! That's time well spent.



Sinks and will eventually self-extinguish as Mike_H noted. If you're staying put (in a camp, for instance) it is always worth the effort to dig down to the ground to build your fire...if you end up moving snow all night, well then you end up moving snow all night. (You do have a snow shovel, right?) If you need a fire right NOW, slap a piece of aluminum foil on the ground and start your fire on that. Move it to your prepared firebed when ready.

i see Doug beat me too it..the little voyageurs had the same question and i told them that they would lay out a bed of logs and make the fire on top of that--no foil in the 1700's..

Be careful building your nice warm fire under a snow covered tree, or both you and your fire might get wet...

Good job. I wish someone had taught me how to make a fire without matches when I was a kid. I'm still a little intimidatd by that. Other than that piece, though, I guess I had a pretty good early introduction to making and tending fires, which has always served me well.

Fire can be dangerous but more often it can be a big help. I would encourage parents to expose their children to it early and train them properly. At the same time, you have to recognize the "fire bug" phenomenon (or psych disorder, I guess) that seems to happen to a certain small % of children when they first learn how to make a fire. Monitor them back in civilization to be sure they aren't getting carried away, and if you ever smell smoke on them investigate it thoroughly.

Suprisingly, as I found out watching the scouts, they had no problem making fire using the BSA Hot Spark. What they had a problem with was MAINTAINING the fire. They could get a piece of tinder lit with the spark very easily... What they did with that is another story.

Many complained and wanted to use matches. I calmly replied that they had no problem lighting a fire, they just weren't laying out their kindling properly or were using the wrong kind.

The 2nd attempt, after a debriefing, went much much better.

Jack London wrote a little story about this that stays with me to this day. At least I didn't have to learn it the hard way.

I will second the notion that it is building the fire lay that is the hard part (for impatient fire builders, young and old). Getting the fire lit is relatively easy, even without matches. Proper preparation is the key. A good lay and plenty of wood to use once the fire is going...