How to Build a Primitive Bow

This year I made a bow that I really liked and I thought, "Hey, wouldn't it be great if anyone could have the information on how to make a bow like this?"  So I set out to show my entire process on how to make a primitive bow.  In the smallest amount of time the process of making a bow will take at least a month.  I took over 6 months on this one but the vast majority of that time is just letting the wood cure.

I first had to film harvesting the wood which I like to do in the summer time and it's too hot during the summer to be out working on a bow.... Although, I did make one bow over the Summer.  I couldn't help myself.  When the weather cooled down I got working on the bow and it turned out to be a little trickier than I had expected.  There was some deflex and reflex I hadn't expected that will mess with your mind while you're tillering.

It took about two months to film the whole thing and get it edited out.  I thought that was pretty fast and I actually got it all done ahead of schedule (the random time in my head that I wanted to finish it by).

The bow came out pretty good and I'm very happy with it.  It's only the second time I've ever used hickory and I really like hickory.  I think there's a reason the natives in the area used it a lot.  I've been making a lot of  "bendy" bows so I think I'm ready to change it up and maybe try some styles from Europe.  After all, I am of European descent and only have a dash of native American.  I hope these videos are useful to you and you enjoy them!  Thanks for reading and watching :)

The Hunt

Recently I've been hunting locally.  I love hunting locally as it's so convenient and you've got all your hunting gear and materials on hand.  The closest WMA (Wildlife Managment Area) to where I live had a two week small game season that was pretty much unregulated as there was no one ever at the check station.  Basically you came and went as you pleased.  Unfortunately I was unsuccessful at harvesting anything but I got really close and I learned a lot.

Basically during small game season you can shoot anything except for deer and turkeys.  I was going to shoot anything that would be worth cleaning and eating.  For me that means anything the size of a squirrel or larger.  I really wanted to get a pig as they are invasive but anything to eat would be fine.  Now I was of course hunting with a primitive bow and arrow that I had made with my own two hands.

It was so satisfying just being in the woods with my own primitive bow that I had made, sneaking around playing the wind and being quiet.  I would find a hidden spot near a well used game trail with the wind blowing from where I expected my quarry to come from.  After that I would let my instinct kick in.  I'd either wait or move on toward an area that might be better.  The level of focus and alertness I was able to achieve was something that I had never experienced before.  The desire for success overcame discomfort or boredom.  Paying so close attention to the slightest noise in the leaf litter and faintest wisp of a half-hearted breeze across my face became the most important thing in life for those few hours spent hunting.  A change in wind direction could spook the only prey in the area and cause me to go hungry for another day.  These natural factors were everything!

By the end of the season I got close to a pig, a few deer, some turkeys, and several squirrels.  Squirrels ended up being the only thing I shot at as they didn't seem too wise about me being a predator.  The first squirrel I shot at was in a stand of young pine trees as it made its way to an oak tree.  I was tracking it with my arrow waiting for it to pause so I could take a shot.  It paused and my vision tunneled on it and I released my arrow.  The arrow flew an inch high and sailed off into oblivion.  That's why I don't knap arrowheads for small game arrows.  The second squirrel climbed down an oak tree that was about 20 feet or so from me and sat chewing on something.  I slipped my broadhead arrow back into my quiver and slowly slid out my small game arrow.  In slow motion I nocked my arrow and brought my bow up with full confidence.  There were a few smilax vines in the way but I took the shot anyway and I thought I nailed the squirrel but it limped up the tree a little ways then ran across a branch and made a leap to the next tree as if nothing had happened.  I was glad it ran off okay.

I think it's safe to say that I'm hooked on primitive bow hunting and I can't wait to make my first successful kill as that is the next step in recreating my ancestors' means of survival.

Being the Best

Whenever I make a video I look around to see what's already out there.  My goal is to always make the best video of its kind.  So, I was filming a how to on making glass arrowheads and it just didn't measure up to some of the stuff out there.  I didn't take the time to get the shots. I wanted to make it the best.  I had all this footage and I didn't want it to go to waste so as I sat there with a half edited video that was getting close to 13 minutes I decided to make it a summary of how this sort of thing goes.  I cut it down to less than half the original time and cut out every moment of blah footage.  I was ruthless!  I ended up with the below video so you can kind of get an idea of where to get the material, what the tools look like, and the different stages of making the point.  Anyway, I liked how it turned out and of course I will make a more in depth video on this process that will be the best!  Thanks for watching folks!

A Recent "Click"

The way I learn has clicks involved.  It's weird and it's always been this way.  What I mean by click is a moment in time when I spontaneously understand something and become proficient and comfortable doing it.  This recent click was with flint knapping.

This is stone age stuff.  Making weapons with sticks and stones and bones.  Clicks usually are caused by something minor but important happening.  In this case it was the way I was flaking.  Basically I wasn't putting in the time to build a platform by abrading before I tried to take a flake off.  Once I did this I greatly improved.  At that moment I realized the results were immensely improved.  So here are a few points and a few blurbs about them.

This is a novaculite point.  The red and gray isn't all that typical and I attribute that to why I went so slow and careful with this one.  This was also one of the first times I had notched a point like this.

I took this little piece of obsidian and worked with it some and this made a right sharp little point.  It's a little stout but the rock it came from wouldn't allow for a longer point.

This is a spear or atlatl point that I made.  It is by far the biggest point I've ever made and the only reason I attempted it was because I figured if I broke it there would be enough material to make an arrowhead left.

This is a small obsidian point.  I broke ears off a couple times accidentally but that's fine. It just has a nice long base for mounting to an arrow.  I gave this one to my cousin cause she thought it was pretty.

I visited an old nemesis with this point.  Glass bottle bottoms make beautiful points but before I had such a hard time dealing with the curve of the glass.  On this one it was like I had been doing this for years.  It just came naturally to me and I made this point to go on an arrow for a friend.

I was so happy with the previous bottle bottom that I grabbed a larger bottle and made another point to make sure it wasn't a fluke.  I guess it wasn't.  I made this one this morning and I tried to go a little quicker and it still took over an hour but I ended up with this point which I am pleased with.  I'll give this away as I don't plan to mount it to a hunting arrow.

Hunting

Having a successful primitive hunt is what I'm after.  The bows and arrows I've made are capable of taking game and they're made with natural materials.  The same materials our primitive ancestors had access to.  You'll realize quick how smart and athletic primitive man was as they only answered to the law of nature.  They were tough as nails and if they weren't they died.  Life was on the line every single day for these people.

Last week I went up to Georgia to learn to hunt.  The idea was just to get out in the woods and practice some ground hunting techniques and see how it went.  Hunting didn't go that well to be honest.  I got some squirrels in to about 5 yards but I was after pigs.  I saw one pig and several deer but the moment I saw them they saw me as well and that doesn't really do me any good.  I learned a lot about the nature of hunting though and that is important.  I came away with a lot of questions too and I have a good friend who hunts like this so I berated him with questions.  It's good to have good friends.

Between the morning and evening hunts I worked on some archery stuff and had a pretty good time with that.  Make sure to check out the next blog to hear a little more about that.

Instincts

I think there are two kind of instincts.  The kind we're born with and the kind that must be built.  An example natural instinct would be to avoid something that smells bad and built instinct would be that of an athlete that can't help but chase after a ball.  Instinct also couples well with an understanding of whatever it is you're using your instinct on.  

The oaks in the yard are dropping acorns like crazy.  I went out and gathered some with the goal being to leach the tannin out and use it as a stain.  Well, then I figured I might as well process the acorns and get the calories out of them.  This is something I had never done before but it seemed simple enough.  I'd read a little bit about it but nothing too extensive.  I went for it.  I boiled the acorns until the water was just real dark and milky brown then I transferred the acorns into clean boiling water until that water turned the same color as before.  At this point a lot of water had boiled out of the both pots so I poured the second pot into the first pot and refilled the second pot and got that water boiling again.  Anyway, I boiled the acorns three times in clean water until the water was really dark and milky.  This was all loosely based off of some stuff I had read.  

The next part is where instinct kicked in.  This was natural instinct and it came in when I had to shell all the acorns.  I'd never really shelled many acorns but just started going at them like a squirrel does.  Split it with your teeth then tear it open to reveal the nutty core.  It was funny how the method just developed on it's own naturally and how I go so proficient at it.  I sat by an open fire and shelled away until they were all done.  Maybe the fire helped keep me focused.  After you finish shelling them then you mash them all together and it's ready to bake.

Now when I figure out the primitive method of all of this I'd definitely make a video on it as it is of great interest to me to follow in our ancestors' footsteps and retrace to see and feel what their lives were like.



Late night stream of consciousness....

The Good Stuff (stream of consciousness)

It's all around us.  Sometimes it smacks us in the face but more often than not the good stuff is very subtle and we hardly notice it unless we pick up on the subtlety and focus on it.  It's different for all of us and for me it almost always pertains to nature in some way.  Today I was burning off an old wood pile and it was mostly oak but there was some cedar in there and when I threw it on the fire that sweet smoke wafted here and there thrown by the wind and I got a big whiff of it in my face.  Memories came back to me of the last time I burnt cedar.  It was way the heck in the middle of nowhere last Summer back in the woods with a good friend.  That trip into the woods was pretty miserable but it was also a ton of fun.  After a night sleeping in the woods you start to get a wilderness high.  That's when friendships are formed and I made a good friend on that trip.  It's a blessing how an odor can bring back such good memories.  The mind is an amazing thing!

Season Finale on AnimalBytesTV

Well, this last Friday was the season finale of Primitive Tim on AnimalBytesTV.  It's kind of nice to have the first season done with and I can take a minute to focus on other projects that I've been neglecting.  Anyway, so I talked to Brian (the dude that heads up ABTV) the other day and he said some interesting things that I'm really excited about.  Basically most of the hosts now do pretty similar things in their shows; presenting animals and telling a little bit about them.  So for this next season it's going to be more of a backwoods nature show where I take y'all along on some adventures into the backwoods of the southeast.  There will likely still be some animal presenting and handling but what I really want to focus on is giving the viewers an idea of how to go on extended excursions into the wilderness.  For the most part these will be multi-day excursions and most of them will be done solo.  I'll show what kind of stuff is important to bring and how to pack light and still be fairly comfortable.  

I'm starting to plan trips and think through all the details of the trips and it's getting really exciting.  I'm planning to do some really big routes through the middle of nowhere, mostly via kayak.

Anyway, I hope y'all enjoyed my season finale so until next time find a new way to appreciate nature!

South Florida (SoFlo?) Road TRIP!!!!

South Florida... This is a place that has a ton of exotic animals running around.  Fortunately most of them stay in developed areas so they pose no more threat to native wildlife than man does.  In some cases they are just an additional food source for some of our natives.  My friend Alex and I went down there specifically to find some of these wild animals from all around the world.  We found species from SE Asia, Madagascar, Yemen, the Caribbean, central America, and Africa!  I have to admit it was pretty exciting finding all these wild animals out there.  Now, not every species we found is super common, in fact many are very localized and are pretty difficult to find.  If you're interested finding stuff, I'd say shining is best for lizards and road cruising is best for snakes.  You can certainly find some snakes while shining though and I prefer to shine up nocturnal snakes that way.  

We made a weekend trip out of it and searched night and day.  Both of us were on a bit of a budget and I don't like spending money anyway when I don't have to... right?  Besides, we were spending so much time looking for animals that we would only be sleeping a few hours at night and few hours in the heat of the day.  Basically we would pick a location that we felt safe and sleep for a few hours in the early morning until the sun came up, then we'd go look for some animals and when it got too hot in the day we would head to a park and go full hobo and sleep in the park for a few hours.  We got some stares but we would just repeat a common phrase of the trip to each other, "We're freaks baby!  We don't care!"  Sleep deprivation got us a little delirious and there was no filter on what we would say.  It was a little bit hysterical. 

It turns out all the hard work was worth it cause we found a lot of cool animal and we found them all in the wild.  So until next time find a new way to appreciate nature!

Cuban Treefrogs

Today's episode was about the highly invasive Cuban Treefrog.  Ugh, this is an issue that pains me.  They're cool frogs but like all animals they do their best to thrive.  Unfortunately they're thriving better than our native treefrogs.  Now, I'm not sure if we'll ever be able to get rid of them in Florida but we can definitely cut down the competition for our native species.  Basically Floridians need to learn to identify Cuban Treefrogs and take them out of the wild.  I'm not against euthanizing them so long as it's done quick and humanely I can't get real upset about it.  It just seems like a waste of energy but these frogs are the least of our worries when it comes to wasting energy.  Of course the best option would be to capture them and keep them in captivity for the remainder of their life.  However, not everyone has the means or the desire to do that.  However, I do hope that the vast majority has the desire to help out our native treefrogs!  So until next time, find a new way to appreciate nature!

Wilderness Junkie

Hahaha, so that was the title that Brian gave to the episode below.  To me it sounds like it's referring to someone that does drugs in the woods.  I guess that title is more catchy than like, nature man or something like that.  Anyway, this episode was about more than just animals.  I threw in some old finds but I wanted to introduce some things that I like to do when I go into the woods.  There is so much more than animals in nature and we're all dependent on those other things.  Ok, I guess we're not cause we can cut down forests, grow corn, and feed it to livestock so they'll fatten quick.  But that pretty much sounds awful to me.  I also wanted to show the potential that nature holds in primitive archery.  To me the ability manipulate wood so that it will shoot a projectile fast enough to kill large game is amazing!  I'm not even a pro so my future bows will likely improve and that is exciting to me!  Anyway, I hope this gets you interested in the wilderness a little more and until next time find a new way to appreciate nature!

Alligators!

I like alligators!  I especially like the little babies and the really big ones.  The little ones are so cute with their big eyes and stubby noses and the big ones are just awe inspiring.  Those big alligators challenge my spot at the top of the food chain and I think it's good to be challenged.  In this video there were some shots that I really wanted to get that they (gators) wouldn't let me get.  I wanted to get some underwater shots.  This meant that I had to be in clear water, which is pretty uncommon in Florida and I would have to get close in the water.  So I went to give it a try.  I was at Silver River and just sitting in some shade feeding fish.  All the fish activity drew the attention of an alligator that was basking on some weeds down the river a little ways.  It was a 5-6 footer so I slipped out of my kayak and got the camera rolling.  I just let the river push me toward the alligator and that alligator turned right around and swam straight back to its basking spot in the weeds.  When I was in the kayak it was fine approaching but as soon as I got in the water it did not like that at all.  It was not comfortable being in the water with me.  I was able to get a quick glimpse of it while it was swimming away from me but it just didn't work out with the alligators.  However, I was able to get some really awesome footage with big and small alligators alike.  I hope y'all enjoy the video and find a new way to appreciate nature!

How to Find Snakes

My latest two videos are to encourage people to go out and look for wildlife on their own.  I think it's really important that people get off the couch and get into all natural places.  In recent history I feel like a ton of people are just getting really disconnected from nature.  We were once living in nature and everyday we experienced it.  It seems we've now outsmarted nature and have made things easy.  I almost went on a rabbit trail there but I'm bringing it back to the main topic.  There is some interest in finding snakes and it's not an easy thing to do so I wanted to give people a few ideas on what to look for and notice in nature when they're looking for wildlife.  I also wanted to give the lazy people (sometimes me) an option as this is generally a more productive method and it's easy, road cruising.  Yeah basically when you notice good conditions you just drive down back roads in the middle of nowhere.  It can actually be really relaxing and somewhat therapeutic.  These two episodes were shot over the summer so there was a decent amount of road cruising done and I wanted to show a variety of species.  Anyway, I hope it gave y'all some things to think about and I hope y'all find some really awesome wildlife!

Southeast Road Trip!

This was an awesome trip!  If you want to read more about it you can go back to the original post about the trip here.  I really like going to new areas and exploring.  This was the first time I had been to Tennessee on my own and I definitely need spend more time up in the hills.  It's so beautiful up there!  I hope y'all enjoy the video :)

Gopher Tortoises!

As a kid I grew up alongside gopher tortoises and they were just always cool to see.  I knew nothing about their protection so I would always pick them up and check if they were male or female by looking under them, checking for the indention that would signify its masculinity.  Even as a kid I got to watch two males fighting over territory and I ran in and separated them.  I was always taught that you shouldn't fight so my childish mind thought the tortoises shouldn't fight either.  When filming this episode some of the footage actually came from the land that I grew up on and possibly some of the same individuals that I played with as a kid.

Lizard Island

This was a cool episode and it was actually the first episode I ever filmed... like a year ago.  When I heard about AnimalBytesTV I emailed Brian Barczyk and told him what kind of show I was interested in doing and he told me to go film something for him.  So, I went out to "Lizard Island" and just started filming lizards.  I stayed out there for hours and just filmed every little thing.  Then I threw it together and sent it to him.  He liked me and my content but there were a few issues so he told me he was interested in having me but I needed to resolve these issues first.  That's when I invested in new camera equipment and really hit the filming hard.  I actually ended up completely re-doing this episode because it just wasn't as good as I wanted.  So this was the episode that got me in with AnimalBytesTV!

South Florida Road Trip

Generally he sole purpose of any road trip for me is to find animals that I can't find in my area.  South Florida has basically all the same species of reptiles up here as down south with a few exceptions.  However, in the past couple decades many species of exotic reptiles, amphibians, fish, and birds have been introduced to this sub-tropical environment.

I don't like that any of these animals are here but in many cases they are here to stay and it would be extremely difficult/impossible to remove them.  Nonetheless, they are awesome animals and some friends and I went down to find some of the exotic reptiles that live down there.  So, here's what we found!

These were the two biggest finds of the trip!  Both were found outside of Everglades Nat'l Park.  These two guys were found about 15 minutes apart and that burmese python was fresh out of the egg.  The adult female chameleon was one of 4 chameleons found on that trip.  The python was the only one we found but we know several other people found pythons in ENP over during the time we were there.

All in all it was an awesome trip with these two highlights but we did find a lot of other exotics including iguanas, anoles, and basilisks.

Birds of Prey

Okay, so this was a fun and extensive episode to film.  I spent more time on this one than any of the others.  Most of the time was spent with the falconer and his hawk.  Yes, you do falconry with hawks as well as falcons or any bird of prey for that matter.  I went on a lot of hunts with this falconer and I was only able to film two successful ones.  I guess that's the way it is with hunting.  One hunt wasn't successful until it started getting dark so most of that footage wasn't any good but I actually got the shot of the hawk catching the squirrel.  The first one caught the squirrel out of sight but I was able to run over and film everything after the kill.  So I just threw the two kill scenes together into one thing.

My favorite scene was the vulture scene.  I had been thinking about how I would do this and one day it was just served to me on a silver platter.  I was going down a country road and saw a freshly killed snapping turtle.  She was real big too.  I hate seeing turtles dead on the road but I hate seeing scavengers dead next to them even more.  I pulled off and tossed the turtle in the back of my truck and brought it to the cow pasture near my house.  I set it out and waited.  After about half an hour the black vultures started coming down.  The turkey vultures stayed in the air.  I think they're a lot more shy of humans and once the black vultures are on a carcass the turkey vultures kind of get bullied a lot.  They can be aggressive.  Once one hit the ground several others came down too and it was just a squabbling mess.  Anyway, here's the video and you can see how all that went down

Until next time, find a new way to appreciate nature!

I Like Turtles

I do like turtles but I never really developed much of an affinity for them until I jumped in the water with them.  When you get in the water with an aquatic animal you realize they live in a much different world than you and I.  I did a lot of free diving with these animals and it was so much fun!  Some of them are curious, some ignore you, and others try to get as far away from you as possible.  I had to change my tactics for each species in order to get footage of them.

One thing in particular that I noticed was their behavior difference in and out of the water.  I have encountered many snapping turtles when they were crossing land from one body of water to another and every time they have acted very offended to have my help in getting them across the road or over a fence.  This is because land is not their domain.  Turtles are very slow and clumsy on land.  For the snapping turtle this means it has to put on a ferocious show when it feels threatened because land is where it is most vulnerable.  Now, when I went underwater with these guys they were calm and allowed me to approach much closer than the ones I found on land.  In fact, they seemed to hardly care that I was even there.  They would just sit and sway to the flow of the river.

Turtles are awesome animals that deserve our respect and maintain a very important role in nature.

Monkeys in Florida!

For this episode I went down to Silver River.  This place is awesome! and easily one of my favorite places in the state.  This is a slow moving crystal clear river that goes through a forest of ancient trees.  The river is teaming with life from every type of fish to wading birds and there's hardly a log without a basking turtle.  Everywhere you look there is some kind of animal and the diversity is amazing!  As you paddle up the river looking at all the animals, all of a sudden something in the trees will catch your eye and you'll second guess what you're seeing.  You quickly realize that there are many of what caught your eye.  An entire troop of rhesus macaques is foraging along the river.  They're not real skittish as they're used to being fed by boaters.  This location is pretty easily accessed so if you want to go you can do it!  You can hire guided tours or just rent or bring your own kayak, or any kind of boat for that matter.  Anyway, check out the video below and learn all about these monkeys!

Spiders!!! Hide yo children!!!

Spiders... everybody hates spiders!  What's not to hate?  They're erratic and dart in random directions, most have venom, a small handful are seriously venomous, and they're just all around creepy.  The fact of the matter is that so long as you're not harassing the spider it has no incentive to bite you.  Many are perfectly content to crawl across your arm or run away when you attempt to coerce them into your hand.  So if they're not aggressive and out to get us then why in the world are we still afraid of them?  Well, we're simply ignorant of a spider's intentions.  So if the spider doesn't want to envenomate us then their venom is not a concern so it doesn't matter if it crawls on us, therefore causing us no harm.  Yet, we're still afraid of them.  It's too bad that so many people are afraid of spiders because they are something we come across a lot.  They're in houses and all over the outdoors, living in most yards.  Whenever we fear something, we are giving it power over us.  Don't give a silly little spider over you.  It doesn't have the mental capacity to harbor mal-intent toward you.  Trust me they just exist to help balance a diverse ecosystem of amazing creatures.  And in my opinion spiders themselves are amazing creatures so until next time, find a way to appreciate nature!

Pygmy Rattlesnakes! :)

I love these little snakes!  I think it's fascinating that they're so small yet they can pack a punch so heavy that it will usually force a grown man into the hospital.  This happened to a friend of mine and while he made a full recovery it was still several thousand in hospital bills.  He got bit attempting to catch it... that's a big no no.  Anyway, the goal here was to show pygmy rattlesnakes in a positive way.  These snakes get killed in the thousands by cars and snake haters and most everyone despises them.  I wanted to show people that given respect this snake is willing to get a long peacefully with mankind.  I did this by getting up close and personal and showing what these guys do on a daily basis.  They hide, bask, and wait for prey to come by.  They do NOT try to get in your house and kill all your pets and children as some believe.  They're under appreciated little animals that have a beautiful pattern highlighted by vivid orange down the length and they have some sweet eyes that are half gold and half gray.  So until next time, try to find a new way to appreciate nature!

My First AnimalBytesTV Episode!

My first episode is on some common non-venomous snakes in Florida.  Basically the purpose of this episode was to show the nature of snakes.  I did get bit a few times in the show but that was purely because I deserved it.  Whenever another creature picks up a snake in nature it's because it wants to eat the snake so naturally the snake will do whatever it can to escape, including biting.  There were other snakes that I held that just tried to squirm away because they don't have much of a bite, like the rough green snake and ringneck.  If people can understand the nature of snakes I think it will make them much less fearful of them so venturing out into nature will be far less stressful.  There is a broad hatred of snakes in cultures all over the world and in such a modern world that I live in I think it's crazy that people are still so ignorant of the nature of snakes.  That nature is to survive so if they can they will slither away but if they're cornered they will defend themselves by hissing or biting.  This is why it is far safer to leave any snake alone if you don't want to get bit.

SHARKS!!!

Recently I went on a scalloping trip with some friends and wanted to film some sharks while we were there.  I knew there were sharks in the area so all I had to do was draw them in and it would be simple, right?  Not so much.  I got some fish and started chumming.  Pretty quickly a bunch of little fish swarmed around the chum bag.  I figured this was a good sign as it might draw in the predators I was hoping to find.  I waited a while and a few remoras showed up.  That was a good sign as they often hang out with larger sea creatures.  A little while longer and I thought I saw my first shark!  Nope, it was a cobia.  Too bad I was filming and not fishing.  I left the bag for a while and came back and still nothing was around.  My friend was on the boat fishing and I look up to see him fighting a fish.  So I swam over to see what he had on his line.  It was a shark!  I've been chumming for an hour and no sharks came by but he threw out one piece of chunk bait and the shark finds that.  I concluded that the sharks were just really shy and filmed the shark my friend had caught as he released it.  It wasn't what I had hoped for but I did get a really neat shot as the shark swam away over the grass flats.

Night Shining for Critters

Many outdoors men are aware that many animals have reflective eyes, like deer, gators, raccons, opossums, and felines.  However, most aren't aware that there are a plethora of invertebrates, snakes, and amphibians to be found.  Many of these creatures are rare or absent during the day so you get to see a whole new variety of animals at night.

One of my favorite creatures to shine is the rough green snake.  It likes to coil up and sleep in dense foliage anywhere above around five feet.  Personally, I've seen them sleep thirty feet up but I'm sure on a calm night they wouldn't have any problem with sleeping higher than that.  The reason shining them works so well is because they reflect light.  The reason they reflect light is because the dew falls on them and beads up on their scales.  It's like a thousand little round mirrors all over the body of the snake.  This doesn't happen on most plants because the surface of the leaf is different.  This same thing happens with green anoles and other arboreal lizards.  Pretty much all you do is shine your light in areas you think a snake might like to sleep and you cover as much suitable habitat as possible.

When shining expect to find thousands of spiders.  Yes, out in the country you will see them everywhere.  Most have several eyes so you can pretty much pick up an eye shine regardless of how they are positioned. I shined up some frogs and toads as well.  One thing I didn't expect was a roosting butterfly covered in dew.

All in all it's a fun thing to do and you'll always find something to take a closer look at.  So grab your light and head out into the nature to check out the nocturnal world!

A Two-nighter Survival Trip with a Friend

There aren't many primitive archery folks in the state of Florida.  We're a fairly scattered bunch, so when we meet someone within a couple hours we like to meet up and share ideas and methods.  Being into all this primitive stuff it's hard to avoid poking your nose into wilderness survival. 

I met up with a friend over on the other side of Florida and we kayaked to a really neat area that he knew about.  So we get to this spot and there's supposed to be a spring back in the woods.  We find it but the water is cloudy and there's no flow coming out.  It was obvious that historically there was plenty of flow out of the spring into the main river.  This was a dead spring.  So we scouted around it and after like ten minutes we had gotten away from the spring into some thick woods.  When we decided to go back we realized the spring was not where we thought it was.  Yeah, we got all turned around and lost.  This has never happened to either of us.  We're experienced woodsman and we don't just get lost like that.  So after wandering around for a while we decided we were really lost and to keep moving might mean we were getting more lost.  My instincts were telling me that the river was to our right.  Keep in mind the sun was directly above us.  So I decided we should go that direction through the thick woods until we came across something.  Looking at the tree tops ahead of me it appeared that there was a clearing just ahead.  We kept going toward it for a while but it seemed to keep moving away from us as we approached it.  At last it started to get closer and I got up on a small ridge and through the brush I caught a glimpse of the brown flowing water!  I tell my friend that I think I see the river and after a short pause of silence he replies and says, "look!  There's our kayaks right there!" Haha, we had gone right back to where we entered the woods and didn't even know it!  The rest of the first day was used to build a shelter and fire.  Both of which I'm pretty proud of accomplishing even though it was my friend who did most of the fire making.  It seems the ticket was the bow drill method with cedar spindle and cedar hearth. 

                       Life vests were used as pillows and seat cushions... not to save lives. lol

 

We got the fire going just in time so we moved it under the shelter and let the rain come down.  We then found some gathered rain water and dipped some up and boiled it.  If the water is on the ground we always boil it.  Earlier I had smelled up some mint so I harvested some and threw it in the boiled water to flavor it and possibly add some nutritional value.  It was some minty mint tea for sure.  

 

 As it got dark I dreaded the inevitable onslaught of mosquitoes that I was sure would invade our open shelter.  To my surprise and delight very few mosquitoes showed themselves.  There were a lot of beauty berry bushes around our shelter and we were burning cedar so those two things could have been factors.  This is very good to know.

Day two consisted of boiling more water, some foraging, and looking for meat.  My friend spooked a couple pigs but we were unprepared to make such a big kill.  Getting protein was what we struggled with most.  I admit that I personally slacked in that area.  I learned a lot about what goes on in my head.  I knew I was leaving the next day back to a land of plentiful food.  I started on a fish trap and it was actually looking pretty good but as evening came I lost the drive to finish it as I knew the next morning I would be able to get easy food.  In this area I learned a lot and I was glad to learn it.  We did end up gathering fresh water mussels (asian clams) and boiled them up.  My friend didn't like them so I ate most of them.  The trick is to swallow them whole so you don't bite on the gritty inside. After some research I will likely never eat them again as there are some risks associated with the species we ate.  Hopefully I got lucky this time.  We hopped in the river and found some rock suitable for making spear heads and the like.  My friend brought his knapping tools so he cranked out a crude but sharp spear point and mounted it.

We boiled more water and fed the fire as the sun went down.  I got more sleep the second night and woke up maybe six times or so to get the fire going again.  I kept my feet by the fire as they actually got a little bit cold at night.  I have found that the best way to sleep is straight on your back and if you're not used to sleeping like this you should get used to it at home.  Most other sleeping positions will result in limbs falling asleep and other discomforts. 

The next morning we were pretty well ready to get out of there.  We were up with the sun and started actually moving about an hour after light.  We anticipate revisiting this area so we left all of our primitive stuff in the shelter plus a pot for boiling water.  So if you come across a hut in the woods with a bow and two fishing arrows, a spear, and a pot then you have found our place and you are welcome to stay so long as you maintain the hut and are respectful of the wilderness around you.

Primitive Progression

Some say making arrows is up there with making bows in difficulty.  I don't agree with that but there is a lot of work and understanding involved in making a good arrow.  You have three main components to an arrow; arrowhead, shaft, and fletching.  Attaching the point and straightening the shaft are pretty straight forward but the fletching determines most of the flight of the arrow.  If you fletch it wrong your arrow will fly real wonky but if everything is symmetrical it will fly true and straight.

The eastern two fletch is the style that natives in eastern North America used and this was something that I wanted replicate.  I had tried many times before to fletch arrows like this but I always ran into issues when I tried the methods that were shown online.  These methods often involved splitting the feather and grinding it down evenly.  Sure that's easy if you have a belt sander but I'm not interested in using electricity to make something from the stone age.  That doesn't make sense to me.  Anyway, I knew natives were doing this a thousand years ago but I didn't have an exact replica in front of me so I had to figure it out on my own. 

I left the eastern two fletch alone for a while and experimented with other types of two fletch for a while then came back to it after a friend encouraged me to do so.  I tried different things with where I attached the sinew in the front but it wasn't turning out how I wanted it to.  It finally clicked though.  Why grind the vane down and make it flimsy?  Just leave the feather almost whole and flatten the vane where it attaches to the shaft in the front.  This was so simple!  I've never seen anyone else do this and when I figured it out I was baffled that I didn't figure this out earlier.  Anyway, above is the how-to video in case you're interested in making your own eastern two fletch arrows.

Gator Surveyin'

Riding around on an air boat at night shining for alligators isn't really my cup of tea.  It sounds straight up redneck to me.  On top of that I kind of hate air boats.  I'm convinced more of the energy produced from the engine goes into noise.  However, in the name of science I was willing to head out into the vast wetlands of the St. Johns to help conduct an alligator survey.

The main purpose of the survey was to determine how many alligator tags would be handed out for the alligator hunting season.  The survey was fun, but not all fun.  Most of the time I was inputting the data that I was constantly being given by the biologist that I was with.  Also there was a constant stream of bugs hitting us all over.  It was like bug snow rising out of the water.  It definitely gave me a better understanding of ecology and the importance of water.

On to the fun part though!  We got to catch alligators!  Apparently catching alligators is illegal but if it's for science it's okay.  We caught two and measured them to make sure we were accurately estimating their size.  These alligators were small enough to grab with one hand, around 3 feet.  I will add that the alligator I caught was the bigger of the two.

It was a good trip and we counted 513 total alligators from Lake Harney north to mullet lake park.  Although it wasn't all alligator wrangling I still had a blast and look forward to volunteering and building a positive relationship with the FWC in the future.

Primitive Tim | Busted by the Man

First off, I'm guilty.  I committed a crime and was sent before the judge and he dealt justly with me.  In fact, he was pretty cool.  I like Judge McGlashan, although I would hate to have his job.

After I got my new (to me) truck I procrastinated getting it registered.  Of course I had planned to do it but I just hadn't gotten around to it.  It was the next weekend after I bought it that I got pulled over.  I was pretty much oblivious as to why I was getting pulled over.  I had the tag on that I had planned to register it with so unless a cop really looked at the tag then I would blend in with everyone else... except the registration had expired from my last truck.  Up to this point I understand that I was just being neglectful and I was doing illegal things that I am guilty of.  I will be paying closer attention to this kind of stuff from now on :)

This is where I thought things got a little out of hand.  After showing the title and proof that I own that truck I am asked to get out of the vehicle.  Keep in mind I'm calm and respectful this whole time.  I just wanted them to hurry up and write my tickets so I could be on my way.  Yeah, that didn't happen.  There were two cops, the one that pulled me over and his sergeant who came later.  Once the sergeant got there he kind of took over everything.  Anyway, he asks me a few questions like why was I driving an unregistered vehicle with that tag on it and blah blah blah.  I explained it and he wasn't impressed and that's fine.  I just  wanted him to write me my tickets so I could get out of there.  That's when things escelated.

 He asks if I have cannabis with me.  I tell him I don't... because I have never ever been in possession of any illegal drug ever!  Drugs don't interest me.  He asks if he can search my truck.  I tell him I'd rather not.  So then he says he's going to have to pat me down.  I'm like okay fine I don't care.  After an intimate pat down he tells me to put my hands behind my back.  I'm like, "WHAT???" and I turn to look at him cause I'm realizing that he's about to cuff me.  He responds by saying, "If you move It will be considered resisting arrest." Why in the world would I need to be restrained.  I was perfectly compliant to everything.  So yeah, he cuffs me and then goes and searches my truck.  I was standing there on the side of the road cuffed for a good twenty minutes while he searched my truck and wrote out my tickets.  At this point I have no idea what's going on.  Am I under arrest?  Am I going down to the police station and put in jail?  Like what the heck!

The sergeant is done doing his thing  so he starts to leave and he's going to leave everything else up to the cop that initially pulled me over.  I still have the sergeants cuffs on and right before he gets in his care the other cop says, "Hey, don't you want to get your cuffs back?"  He forgot I was cuffed!?  So, he takes his cuffs off of me and leaves.  The other cop fingerprints me on the hood of his squad car, hands me my three tickets, and explains to me that I'll be getting a court summons in the mail.  He then tells me that since I had such good behavior they're going to release me there.  That seems great right?  It would have been but while I was cuffed he had called a tow truck to come impound my truck!  I'm stuck and hour away in Volusia county without my truck and left right there on the side of the road.  I'm not offered a ride to anywhere but left stranded.  Granted, they did give me my wallet and cell phone.

I as two miles from blue springs where I was going to do some freediving that day so me and my friend walked down to the springs and did what we had intended to do in the first place.  I called another friend to come pick us up when we were done.  I'm blessed with good friends.

Fast forward a few weeks.  I get my court summons.  Court starts at like 8:15AM and I figured while I'm in the beautiful county of Volusia I may as well go to the one place that makes it worth stepping foot in that county, blue springs.  Another friend comes with me to court and we planned to go freediving afterwards.  I go before the judge, show my registration, tell him I have insurance, and he drops all charges.  The government made no money off of this, just the towing company where my truck was impounded.  The whole thing was ridiculous.  We were out of court a little after nine so we headed down to the springs and enjoyed what only nature can provide.

So there it is, I tried to write this with as little bias as possible to portray and accurate representation of my experience in Volusia county.  I've concluded that their law enforcement sucks and their judicial system makes up for it.  I am now a free man with little to no trust of cops now.

Here's a picture of me freediving at Blue springs

Please pardon any typos or grammatical errors.

Freeze Frame

One thing I really enjoy about filming is that it captures everything.  I'm shooting at 60 frames per second so whenever something happens I can grab a frame out of that footage and the results are sometimes hilarious.

So I'm editing footage from my recent road trip of the southeast and I come across a segment where a snake is going wild.  Often times there are things going on that happen too fast for the naked eye to register.  I paused the segment to switch windows and grab another piece of footage but when I paused it the segment happened to land on the below frame.  I had just watched this segment and never realized I made this face.  Not only was I making an exceptional expression but the snake was at full strike with its mouth wide open.  I grabbed the frame and saved it.  I thought it was humorous and it gives anyone interested in my videos a preview of what's to come.

Southeast Road Trip: N. Florida, Tennessee and Georgia

This trip had three basic parts.  Everything went according to plan for the most part.  The plan was to go to Apalachicola and meet up with all the Southeast folks of NAFHA and look for reptiles and amphibians, then head up to Tennessee where the 17th annual primitive archery classic was being held then go back down through Georgia and visit family and hunt hogs on some family land.

Apalachicola was fun!  We found a lot of cool stuff.  If you want to see lots of pictures check out my facebook page.  I was able to stay with my brother and his family and meet up with some other folks that were there for the event.  All in all during that event over fifty species of reptile and amphibians were found.  That's a lot for just one weekend.  Here's a shot of one of my favorite finds:

Next stop was Tennessee but I spent the night at my aunt's in Atlanta, where I also got a flat tire.  That was a fiasco.  My bank thought it was suspicious to buy a tire in another state, because that's the first thing that an identity thief would do???  After I got that taken care of I headed to the Tennessee Classic.  The primitive archery folks there were awesome!  It was also cool to be recognized by a few people from my videos.  I had several good trades as well.  My goal was to talk to folks that had hunted with stone points and had experience with the primitive hunt.  I certainly learned a lot and met some really cool folks.  Pappy is the man that runs this event and I was honored to put an arrow on his arrow rack among other arrows that had been given to him.  Mine is the one with the green fletching on the right

Now on to Georgia for the hunt.  Well, the hunts were unsuccessful.  This wasn't terribly unexpected.  I wanted to spot and stalk some pigs.  I had gotten some advice on this at the classic but this is something that must be practiced a lot before you can even think about success.  The first two days I was able to see some pigs and get fairly close.  I never got close enough for a comfortable shot though.  I never want to wound an animal, even if it is an invasive and is causing damage to farms and the local ecosystem.  I did have a good time being out in the woods and checking out some cool plants that are unfamiliar to me.  This being one of my favorite finds:

This trip also coincided with my cousin's graduation so it was a lot of fun to be able to be there for that.  She's a sweetheart

All in all it was great trip and even though I had some curve balls and failures I was able to learn from those experiences.  Now it's back to work editing footage from the trip.

The Smart Phone: A Sign from the Heavens

Just a few weeks ago I was guiding a kayak tour and a freak storm comes out of nowhere and hit us.  Naturally I had my stone age flip phone that cost me all of $15 in case of an emergency I would be able to call 911. This storms sweeps through and most everyone was on an island except for a couple boats.  So I head back out into the storm to help out another guide with rescuing an elderly man that had flipped and got separated from his kayak.  Anyway, during that whole process my phone got drenched.

I put the soggy phone in rice and waited a while.  After a few days I realized it wasn't worth waiting the few days so that it might work and being phoneless also meant work couldn't ask me to work.  I took this wicked storm as a sign and went on to purchase a smart phone.

Life will never be the same....  :)

Selfies???  Not sure if I did that right... but go follow me on instagram where I will NOT be posting selfies and twitter.  I'll be keeping things updated as I go along via my new smart phone. :)

Been Taking a lot of "knaps"

Flint knapping is the process of creating a sharp edge on any knappable stone.  For the most part I make stone arrowheads and knives by flint knapping.  Obsidian is probably the most well known knappable rock as it is the sharpest edge known to man.

I've been working on some hunting points so I made a variety of them to show to some of the pros to see which ones they liked the most.  The points are shown below.

I use only bone and antler to work these points just like our ancestors would have used.  It's been a fun challenge and I've learned a ton!  I'm still not so good at identifying the different types of materials but it doesn't really matter so long as I can make an arrowhead with it.  The favorite from the pros that I asked was number 10.  They liked that style the most for hunting.  For now I'll keep aiming for ones like that.  I may be doing some hunting soon so I need to get my equipment up to par!

St. Johns Expedition

This week a friend and I did a three day kayaking trip down the St. Johns River from 520 to 46.  I don't know exactly how long the trip is but I estimated it at about 35 miles long and all the navigation was done by nothing but keen animal instinct.  This was an amazing trip full of unexpected adventure.

DAY 1: Day one was fun.  We set out at around 9:30 or so that morning.  The river was quiet and nice.  We saw a large hill out on the floodplain so we stopped there for lunch.  From that hill we saw another kayaker.  Not a lot folks kayak this river but as this guy got closer we could tell he was out kayaking for the long haul.  His name is Jim so we started chatting with him and decided to paddle together, the three of us.  As we got to know him he told us he was paddling to Jacksonville and out into the ocean.  That made our journey seem kind of wussy.  We all reached the catfish hotel around 4 PM.  Jim took a break and continued on solo.  This catfish hotel is the most rickety little shack.  I slept in it that night and I'm really surprised it didn't blow over that night.  The wall to my right was bending in from the gusts.  It was an adventure!

DAY 2:  This was my favorite day!  It started out cool and windy so that was a bummer but the events later that day made up for it.  We set out paddling and came across some free roaming horses out on the flood plain.  Down the river we caught up with Jim again so it was good to see him.  We all had a rough night with the cold front that had come through.  The sun finally came out and we were dodging air boats left and right.  Out on the middle of the floodplain was a lone cypress tree and I noticed a clump of something on a limb.  It looked furry but surely no woodland mammal would be so dumb as to sit up in a tree out in the open.  I did the only natural thing and climbed the tree to get a closer look.  Sure enough, it was two young raccoons snuggled together out on a limb sleeping the day away.  Coincidentally, I found a good sized yellow rat snake shed in the tree too.  In the backdrop to this scene of coons in the tree was a blazing wildfire.  Fires are natural part of the floodplains  but this was up wind and approaching the opposite bank fairly quickly.  We got to paddle right past it as it hissed and sent dark plumes of smoke up into the air.  At the end of the day we had seen 100 alligators and actually found our next camping area, which was in the most remote parts of the river.  I ate, drank, strung up my hammock and dozed off as the sun went down.  I was exhausted!

DAY 3:  This was another chilly night but better than the last one.  It was overcast and still when I got up that morning.  With the cool morning air, I wasn't inclined to get out of my sleeping bag so I dreaded it for a while and got out a little before nine.  I knew it was the last day and I was ready to get back and have this trip complete.  I had hoped to see Jim again but I think at this point we were a fair bit ahead.  As we headed north we hit puzzle lake which isn't really a lake but a river that goes through a series of small lakes. I had hoped there were a few short cuts but each time I ended up going the long way.  Navigation was difficult but the good ol' animal instincts got me home at the end of the day.

I apologize for the lack of pictures but we were on a mission to cover the distance.  All in all it was a great trip and I look forward to guiding some folks through this stretch in a couple weeks.

Coconuts: Survival in Paradise

Recently I took a trip down to south Florida.  While down there I seized the opportunity to collect some coconuts.  I climbed the palm like a chimp and twisted off five medium sized coconuts and let them fall.  I do enjoy hearing them thud on the ground as my forearm begins to tell me I need to get down before it lets gravity help me down.

Coconuts are absolutely key to survival on isolated islands, especially in the Pacific Ocean.  The coconut palm provides food, water, shelter, cordage, fuel (fire), and shade.  Now if I were to explain how one utilizes the coconut palm in the afore mentioned ways this would turn into an essay so if you have a question just leave a comment and I'd be glad to answer.

Coconut water is an amazing thing!  It hydrates the body and is always healthy and sterile out of the shell.  However, if you solely drink coconut water for an extended period it will act as diuretic which will cause you to lose a lot of that hydration so it is important to get some freshwater.  Luckily rain is pretty consistent throughout the range of the coconut palm.  The next thing that blows my mind about coconut water is that it can be transfused into human blood.  Yeah, you can hook up an IV of coconut water.  So if someone is ill you can put that stuff straight into their blood and it will hydrate them.

So when I visit areas and see coconut palms I know I should be able to last a little while and it's so important for me on my various adventures to be able to process them efficiently and confidently.

Check out the below videos on the process.  Until next time, go eat some coconuts!