Butser Ancient Farm Imgur Album

Just a reminder that I update my Butser album on Imgur every week. They are just quick snapshots of the type of work we're doing at the farm.

http://dorthonion.imgur.com/all/

Elder Whistle

Hello. I've just spent this very sunny afternoon making my first whistle made from Elder. I managed to find a piece of dead standing wood with a suitable pith, so no trees were harmed in the making of this doodad. 

Here's a collage of progress and final product photos. 

It looked pretty scruffy at first, but sanding really made it look quite neat. 

It's a fairly simple craft project, but very fun. You can see from the photos that I hollowed out the pith, cut a notch into the wood, inserted a stick with a flattened surface to create the air passage in the mouth end, and then plugged the other end with another bit of wood so that it's air tight. It probably doesn't need explaining, but when you blow through the mouth end the air is vented through the small passage and having no where to go but up comes out of the notch and thus a high pitched sound is produced.

It works surprisingly well for a first attempt:

http://vocaroo.com/i/s1Ki3sKQSGNO