A couple of weeks ago I was in the North of Scotland working at the Balvenie distillery, turning some quaichs at the launch of some very special whisky. Whilst there we took the time to visit some very special places. On the way up we just had to drive through Glen Quaich. I’ve been turning quaichs for over ten years…
We are progressing nicely with our birch bark canoe build, we have collected spruce root for the stitching and processed a lot of it. Now it was time to collect the big pieces of bark for the canoe. Here’s April and Jarrod Stone Dahl heading off into the woods. April makes the ash splint pack baskets and this one is…
These are pictures from my recent walking holiday in north of Majorca. As an ex forester I was blown away by the shear number of ancient trees. These first few were tiny compared to the really ancient ones I saw later on. They look dead but they are not. nice to see these old trees are valued, roads, gardens, buildings…
WG Hoskins wrote “The English landscape itself, to those who know how to read it aright, is the richest historical record we possess.” (p14, ‘The Making of the English Landscape’, 1955). Few people know how to read landscape but it is a wonderful thing with layer upon layer upon layer of history. I was recently sent this picture as part…
I love ash trees, in particular weeping ash is one of my all time favourites though rarely planted today. Ash timber is incredibly versatile, strong and springy, over the years it has been used for all manner of things including the felloes (rims) of wooden wheels, axe and hammer handles, all manner of sports goods from hocky sticks to…
It’s important to get the best wood for spoon carving. When starting out I recomend willow (Salix sp), poplar (Populus sp), alder (Alnus) and lime (Tilia sp) lime in the UK is basswood in the US. These are the softest of the hardwoods. These woods carve really easily when freshly cut or green and make excellent cooking and serving spoons.…
Hatfield forest is an incredible survival of a landscape little changed from medieval times. Here under the flightpath of Stansted airport there are hundreds of trees that were growing during Shakespeare’s lifetime, coppice woodland, pollard trees, flower rich meadows, marsh and a history of land management little changed for 1000 years. Hatfield has a special meaning to me, I lived…
This is Professor Oliver Rackham talking in the Cressing Temple Barley barn (built c 1205-1235) Prof Rackham is an acknowledged expert on woodland history and he talked us through the timbers of this great barn, 600 individual timbers which he calculated came from 480 mostly quite small oak trees. In the UK today we have lost the connection between woodworkers,…
Friday was sourcing wood day for me, I bought a tree which will make many hundreds of bowls and keep me busy for a few months. The importance of getting the right tree can create or save hundreds of hours work over that time and will also affect the character of the bowls available for sale on the website over…
I have had little time for blogging recently but have been making good progress on my green oak bridge at Bradfield. This post showed the start of the work on the stone abutments. The next step was finding a suitable tree for the main timbers. I have been looking for this tree for many months. It needed to be and…
