Fire starting material

I put a plastic grocery bag by the dryer and on in the bathroom. Wife puts dryer lint I the bag by the dryer and empty TP rolls in the bag in the bathroom. I poke the lint into the TP polls and store them in sandwich bags. Best fire starter I found. One roll gets the camp fire or tent stove fire going.
 
I keep a fire kit with a lighter, ferro rod, flint and steel, cotton balls and Vaseline, dryer lint, wet tinder, fatwood, 0000 steel wool, char cloth and a char tin.
 
I carry a tin of Pyro putty and a box lighter wrapped in duck tape in all my packs. I used to do the cotton balls and vasoline but the pyro putty is just more convenient and burns hot for a long time. Fortunately I've never had to use it in a survival situation
 
Mix old rifle powder with acetone and roll into balls that fit into your chosen tin, wrap in cotton for protection. I've carried these in my pack and on my pickup survival kit for years.
 
What do most people use for emergency fire starter material? I have modified the cotton ball method a little bit. Go to a beauty shop and they have cotton in long strands. Smart that full of Vaseline and you can wrap around sticks seems to work pretty good.



Go out and find sapwood and pitch wood on trees....

As you peruse mark trees with ribbon and scar them with a Hatchett


Next year you will have tons of sapwood!!!

Store in zip lock bag

I prefer white pine, yellow pine and hemlock
 
WetFire, hands down.

I've taught survival and navigation for a local Sheriffs dept Search and Rescue team here in Western Oregon.
WetFire has outperformed everything we've tested. It's usually wet here during our busiest season so whatever we promote needs to work when the element are at their worst
This stuff is light, durable and can be ignited with a single spark.
As a recurring demo , I used to light a small pile of bark shavings on a snow bank in windy conditions with near frozen hands.


Nothing like starting a fire while 40deg raining with a 30mph wind almost hypothermia setting in off the rogue, Umpqua or Coquille!!!!
 
I'm another that uses wax and sawdust with a small bit of wick, poured into a paper ketchup cup that was borrowed from Burger King. A few of these in a ziplock and I'm set.
 
What do most people use for emergency fire starter material? I have modified the cotton ball method a little bit. Go to a beauty shop and they have cotton in long strands. Smart that full of Vaseline and you can wrap around sticks seems to work pretty good.

I always kept a log of Fat lighter around back of the house. Can leave it outside and stuff last forever.
axe and a hand full of it works great On most any fire that's hard to start. But maybe I'm just old And chemicals works better.
 
The true "emergency firestarter" material is only what you can find around you. Learn to start a fire in any condition the size of a shot-glass and then keep it going and you're pretty much GTG.
As far as "hard core", I cheat. When out camping, I always carry three (redundancy is good) airtight/waterproof containers full of "strike anywhere" matches. Four to eight match sticks can be useful starter, and I have done that in wet conditions.
That aside, it gets much harder the more days it's been raining.
On the PNW coast, you can always find canopy to deflect the rain. For materials, there is moss (fast burning and hot), twigs (feeder) and sap. People think pine and fir needles, but if they're high moisture, they will absorb all the heat from your fire and put it out before they ignite.
In the Oregon, Cali and Nevada high desert, dry grass (a lot of it), bark from the sage brush and add twigs as you can.
As your fire builds heat, add bigger material. In the desert, trees and larger material can be hard to find. One spot, could only find enough to burn for 3 hours.
I'm not a fan of big fires, but if you manage your log placement and tend it regularly, you can achieve the "luminous flame" that projects more heat from the fire, making a small fire warm you as much as a big fire.

Edit to add: if you have some fatwood, you're living in luxury. That stuff is gold.
 
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