How to light a fire

Finding a site, and other safety issues There are two ways that a campfire may burn out of control and turn into a wildfire: pieces of fuel falling out of the fire, and flying embers[?] (or their smaller kin, sparks[?]). Embers may simply fall off of burning logs and be borne away by the air, or they may be ejected at high speed by exploding pockets of sap. Some locales prohibit all open fires, particularly during times of the year particularly prone to wildfires.

No fire should be lit close to trees, tents or other fire hazards. This includes overhanging branches; be particularly cautious of those with dead, dry material that can ignite from a single airborne ember. In addition, a fire may harm tree roots, so stay away from any roots you may see above the surface. Be aware that because coniferous trees lack taproots[?], their roots tend to run closer to the surface than those of broadleaf[?] trees.

Ideally, every fire should be lit in a fire ring. If a fire ring is not available, you can make a temporary fire site. Gather enough sand or other soil relatively free of organic material to cover an area of ground large enough to safely contain the fire and any pieces of burning wood that may fall out of it, to a depth of an inch or two. Sand piles must be scattered after the fire has been put out and properly doused with water. Whether you are using a fire ring or a pile of sand, remove all decaying leaves and other litter around the fire. This material must also be replaced once the fire is out.

Whenever you light a fire, make sure to have sand and water on hand to smother and douse it if it gets out of hand. You also should not have to go out of your way to find these materials when the time comes to extinguish the fire. Do not light fires on ordinary soil, because it tends to contain tinder-like material that may light accidentally. Do not light fires on bare rock, because the fire will leave a black stain.

Types of fuel There are, by conventional classification, three types of material involved in building a fire without manufactured fuels.

1. Tinder is anything that can be lit with a match. The best tinder is dead, dry pine needles[?] and grass. If you are not particular about using only natural material, wadded-up paper, toilet paper, or paper towels[?] also make excellent tinder. Cotton swabs and tampons[?] are superb. Unraveled ends of a rope made from natural (plant) fiber also burn very well. If those are not available, use leaves, or very small twigs. Gather at least enough tinder so that if you cup your hands together, you may fill them to the top.
2. Kindling is an arbitrary classification including anything bigger than tinder but smaller than fuelwood. In fact, there are gradations of kindling, from sticks thinner than a finger to those as thick as a wrist. Gather two or three times as much kindling as you have tinder, and make sure to get a variety of thicknesses.
3. Fuelwood ranges from small logs two or three inches across to larger logs that can burn for hours. It is typically impossible to gather without a hatchet[?] or other cutting tool, so count on using commercially-sold fuelwood.

The gathering of fuel in natural areas is often restricted. Cutting of living trees is almost always forbidden - but neither is it very useful, because sap-filled wood does not burn well. Squaw wood (dead parts of standing trees) may also be prohibited. Wood lying on the ground is usually permitted.

Building the fire Once you have found a suitable site and gathered materials, you have a variety of fire-builds to choose from. A good design is very important in the early stages of a fire. Note that none of them make any mention of fuelwood - fuelwood is never placed on a fire until the kindling is burning strongly.

• The tipi fire-build is perhaps the best, but it is takes some patience to construct. Pile up the tinder in a compact heap. Arrange the smaller kindling around it, like the poles of a tipi. You may wish to lash three of them into a tripod, like an actual tipi is supposed to be built, but even if you know how to do this, you may find the small sticks too difficult. Then arrange the larger kindling above the smaller kindling, taking care not to collapse the tipi. You may wish to make a separate tipi as a shell around the first one.
• A lean-to fire-build starts with the same pile of tinder as the tipi fire-build. Once you have the pile, take a long, thick piece of kindling and drive it into the ground at an angle so that it overhangs the tinder pile. Lean the smaller pieces of kindling against the big stick so that the tinder is enclosed between them.
• To make a log cabin fire-build, make a tinder pile just like for the other two. Then stack the kindling around it as though you were making a log cabin. Place the smallest kindling over the top of the assembly. Of all the fire-builds, the log cabin is the least vulnerable to premature collapse, but it is also inefficient, because it makes the worst use of convection to ignite progressively larger pieces of fuel.
• A variation on the log cabin starts with two pieces of fuelwood with a pile of tinder between them, and small kindling laid over the tops of the logs, above the tinder. Light the tinder, and wait for the kindling to catch fire. When it is burning briskly, break it and push it down into the consumed tinder, and place larger kindling over the top of the logs. When that is burning well, push it down. Eventually, you should wind up with a fairly small kindling fire between two pieces of fuelwood. The logs will eventually catch fire as well.
• A fourth method, called the funeral pyre method because it is the method used for building funeral pyres. The method is to lay layers of equal sized kindling laid horizontally. Each subsequent layer is laid horizontally but at 90 degrees to the previous layer. Most importantly, the space between the kindling pieces must be at least as much as the width of the kindling in that layer. As the layers build larger kindling is used. This type of fire build collapses in a controlled manner without restricting the air flow.
• The traditional Finnish rakovalkea (literally "slit bonfire") is constructed by placing two large logs or treetrunks atop each other and bolstering them in place with four sturdy posts driven into the ground. Kindling and tinder is placed between the logs in sufficient quantity that daylight shines between the logs and there is space enough to provide flue. The rakovalkea has two excellent features to recommend it. Firstly it burns slowly but steadily when lit; and doesn't require ardous maintenance, but burns for a very long time. Secondly it can be easily scaled to larger sizes, limited only by the length of available treetrunks.

Lighting the fire Once you have completed building the fire, strike a match and light the tinder. A reasonably skillful fire-builder using reasonably good material will not need to use any more matches. The tinder will burn brightly, but be reduced to glowing embers within half a minute. If the kindling does not catch fire, you must gather more tinder, determine what went wrong and try to fix it.

You most likely have one of four problems: wet wood, too little tinder, too much wind, or a lack of oxygen. Metal fire rings generally do a good job of keeping out wind, but some of them are so high as to impede the circulation of oxygen in a small fire. To make matters worse, these tall fire rings also make it very difficult to blow on the fire properly. Steady, forceful blowing may be in order for a small fire in an enclosed space that has mysteriously slowed down, but blowing may extinguish a fire if it is done abruptly or when it is not needed. Large fires easily create their own circulation, even in unfavorable conditions, but the variant log-cabin fire-build suffers from a chronic lack of air so long as the initial structure is maintained.

Once the large kindling is burning, put all of the kindling on the fire, save for one piece at least a foot long. You will need this later to push pieces of fuelwood where you need them. Once all of the kindling is burning, place the fuelwood on top of it. For best results, take two or more pieces of fuelwood and lean them against each other, as in the tipi fire-build.

If you don't have a match There are several ways to light a fire without a match. All of them work with only the thinnest and most flammable tinder, such as toilet paper or tampons.

• If it's a sunny day, use a magnifying glass[?] to focus the light onto the tinder. If you don't have a magnifying glass, another lens may do e.g. the lens from a pair of glasses.
• Find a thin rope or flexible vine, and a sturdy stick about two feet long. Tie the rope to one end of the stick, and make another knot on the other end of the stick, with the rope between the ends not quite taut. Find another straight stick and wrap the center of the rope around it, with the two sticks at right angles to each other. Place the end of the latter stick on a piece of bark in the middle of the tinder. Move the first stick back and forth rapidly to rotate the second stick and create heat and friction on the bark. It works best if you have a second person feeding the tinder to the hot spot.
• Hit a large rock placed immediately next to the tinder with a smaller, hard rock. With practice, sparks may ignite the tinder. However this method is harder than it sounds.

Extinguishing the fire Do not leave a fire burning unattended! Any number of accidents might occur in your absence, leading to property damage, personal injury or possibly a wildfire. Ash is a very good insulator, so a fire left overnight will only lose a fraction of its heat.

Large amounts of water are indispensable for extinguishing a fire. Pour water on all the embers, including places that are not glowing red. The water will boil violently and carry ash in the air with it. This ash will get you dirty, but isn't hazardous. Continue pouring until the hissing noises stop. Then take the stick that you kept on hand when you lit the kindling, and stir the ashes to make sure that the water has reached all the layers.

If water is scarce, you may use sand (make sure that it has nothing flammable in it!) first. The sand will deprive the fire of oxygen, but it is much less effective at absorbing heat. Once the fire has been covered thoroughly with sand, pour as much water as you can spare, and stir thoroughly with the stick.

Finally, replace anything you moved while preparing the fire site, and scatter anything you gathered, so that it looks as natural as possible.