Homemade bark fire starters: make onions, rolls, and bundles
Homemade fire starters are easy to make from the dried bark of deciduous trees. You can shape the strips into onions, rolls, and bundles that are perfect for lighting your fireplace at home or at the cottage.
Homemade fire starters: materials
- Rowan or another broadleaf tree
- Pruning shears, knife, and scissors
- Natural twine and clothespins
- Work gloves
How to make homemade fire starters
1. Break off branches from newly felled trees. Begin removing the bark at the base. Use a knife to loosen the bark, then peel it off in large strips. Allow the bark to dry for a couple of days in a well-ventilated area.
2. Arrange evenly sized bark strips in a crosswise. Gather the ends of the strips so that the inner side of the bark faces outward. As they dry, the strips take on a lovely brownish hue.
3. Bend the tips upward and tie the bark into a bundle with twine. Press the finished bundle against a table to form an onion shape.
You can remove bark from a tree most easily in late spring or early summer.
4. Make rolls of various sizes and secure them with clothespins until they dry. Remove the clothespins and thread the dried rolls onto a wire ring.
5. Use some of the dried rolls to make fire-starter packages. Wrap more bark around each roll in the opposite direction, then secure the finished bundles with twine bows.
6. Collect your onion-shaped fire starters in a basket, and thread the rolls onto string or a wire frame.
