86 NATURAL HISTORY OF THE FARM 



Study 11. Fuel-woods of the Farm 



The work of this study should be conducted in the wood-lot 

 or in a bit of native forest, where there is a great variety of 

 woody plants, big and little, living and dead. There should 

 be found a few trees fallen and rotting; a few, broken by 

 storms or shattered by lightning; some, diseased by fungi or 

 eaten by beetles or ants; dead snags, tunneled by wood- 

 peckers; old boles tattooed by sapsuckers; sprouting 

 stumps; and scattered weaklings smothered by lustier com- 

 petitors in short, the usual wildwood mixture of sorts and 

 conditions. 



The tools needed will be a pocket knife and a hatchet or a 

 brick-hammer to split and splinter with. The modern con- 

 venience of matches will be allowed to all. A few axes and 

 cross-cut saws may be taken for common use. To save the 

 axes from certain abuse, chopping blocks should be provided 

 in advance. 



The program of work will consist of: (i) a gathering of 

 fuel stuffs from the wood-lot; and (2) a testing of them in 

 fire-making. 



i . The wood-lot should first be explored for fire-making 

 materials. Quick-kindling stuff will be wanted chiefly for 

 this brief exercise. These are of several categories: (a) "dead 

 and down" stuffs in the woods, the result of nature's pruning 

 and thinning. Nature has placed good fire-making materials 

 handy. As you collect, observe what kinds of trees hold their 

 dead branches longest and preserve them most free from 

 decay. If there are shattered trunks within reach, knock off 

 the shattered ends and try them for kindling. Compare 

 splintering with chopping as a means of preparing kindling- 

 stuff from dry softwood. 



(b) Resinous stuffs, such as the "curl" of the outer bark of 

 the yellow birch, the bark strips from hemlock and other 

 conifers, pine knots from rotted logs, etc. These will be the 



