Comments on: Week24: The Paleo What?

By: TrackHousingScout

TrackHousingScout — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 05:06:06 +0000

Please try to combine #4 (Take LOTS of pictures) with #9 (Fire Pennys pots). Carry on.

By: rix

rix — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 17:29:38 +0000

Rix, you could try posting a flyer at your local hunting store to the effect of “Looking for deer hides and parts”. Some hunters may be looking to get rid of that stuff.

Good point, Sass. Thanks!

By: sassmouth

sassmouth — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 14:06:25 +0000

ishi sticks are great. They make it a lot easier to get long flakes. That way you don’t end up with icicles instead of arrowheads. Personally I think it is easier to start with glass or obsidian than to go right to a harder material like flint. Obsidian or glass are going to be way easier to learn on. If you can afford it, order some of that to learn on.

Rix, you could try posting a flyer at your local hunting store to the effect of “Looking for deer hides and parts”. Some hunters may be looking to get rid of that stuff.

By: rix

rix — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 02:04:33 +0000

Any advice on how to gather flint? I’ve found that kind of information difficult to find so far, and frankly, I don’t know if I could really distinguish flint from other rocks very well.

I think flint and chert both tend to form in or with limestone. So any streams and rivers that flow through cave territory could provide a flint forage.

By: rix

rix — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 00:29:28 +0000

I just use antlers to pressure flake. I know a guy with a box full of them, I can maybe mail you one.

I would love that! I owe you some promised Jewel Juice, anyway. Email me the address you want me to ship to.

I need to make friends with some rednecks here to get in with the hunting crowd and get access to the deer parts they don’t give a shit about (i.e., non-muscle, lousy trophy head) that I could use for billets and pressure flakers. But the hunter crowd here seems as foreign to me as the football fans. It’s another fanatical sport to them.

By: wyrdbrew

wyrdbrew — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 21:08:46 +0000

You might try Jasper.

http://www.explorepahistory.com/hmarker.php?markerId=734

By: PennyScout

PennyScout — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 15:47:07 +0000

Jason- I know in Northwest PA chert was the type of flint we had. Locally it is dull gray in color, sometimes weathered on the outside, with a smooth glassy texture when broken, but still opaque. I’ve never found any pieces large enough to knap though I heard there might be some in the banks of the reservoir. I also heard there were large pits in Ohio where the natives collected it, and I’ve read that the Mowhawks were known as “keepers of the flint” among the Iroquois suggesting perhaps that they had the best source and traded it with the others. In summary it might be difficult to find a good piece without travel or trade, luckily for us bottle bottoms, glass insulators, and broken toilets will be in abundance post-collapse. You might also see if anyone uses quartz to make blades, being that it’s similarly silica based and I’ve found some pretty good sized pebbles in our Allegheny Plateau conglomerate.

By: Beyond Body Ecology?: My Shit Talking Debut « Penny Scout: Adventures in Feral Failure

Tue, 18 Sep 2007 15:05:10 +0000

[…] Uh huh. Right. And how does this apply to those of us (I’m looking at a certain someone in the room) who crave corn chips (a contracting food) under stress? […]

By: boygasm

boygasm — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 12:33:13 +0000

Actually, dont cut any of your good shorts. My advice is to take one of your shorts, fold it to the seam to show one side of the sleeve, get a parchment paper. Trace around the seams including the crotch area. Then draw an extra inch for seam allowances. THen put the pattern on your leather, sew around it! Rip off the pattern, and voila.

By: Jason Godesky

Jason Godesky — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 02:01:43 +0000

Any advice on how to gather flint? I’ve found that kind of information difficult to find so far, and frankly, I don’t know if I could really distinguish flint from other rocks very well.

By: Urban Scout

Urban Scout — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 21:10:03 +0000

I just use antlers to pressure flake. I know a guy with a box full of them, I can maybe mail you one.

By: rix

rix — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 20:45:47 +0000

I feel anxious to make a knife for myself as well.

Do you already have pressure flakers? The guys I saw knapping bottle glass used “Ishi sticks” the long pressure flakers that fit one end under your armpit so that you can leverage more pressure to get the really long flakes that go all the way across the face.

I have started making myself a pressure flaker and gathering supplies for making some copper billets.