Volunteering Photo Albums

I've been organizing and upgrading my Imgur account for presenting my volunteer work after an earlier mishap. I had to reupload all of the Butser Ancient Farm photos again which took a long time, but I've actually been a bit less selective so there are quite a lot of new photos that weren't included the first time.

I mentioned I was going to attend Queen Elizabeth Country Park sessions over the summer. I've been to two sessions, one on the 17th June and the other on the 22nd. So far it's been quite nice. On the first sessions I did litter picking, monitoring flowers, dismantling kids' shelters (hazard), helping make some make-shift xylophones from hazel and went on a long tour of the Park. The second session was devoted to Butterfly and Adder monitoring.

You can see these and my older volunteering photos here now:

QUEEN ELIZABETH COUNTRY PARK:

https://imgur.com/a/Dfgql#0

BUTSER ANCIENT FARM:

https://imgur.com/a/CwcYs#0

YELLOWCRAIG COUNTRYSIDE RANGER SERVICE:

https://imgur.com/a/xSALK#0

BCUK Member's Leatherworking Kit Gift

I was lucky enough to be contacted by a member of the Bushcraft UK forum and he's supplied me with everything I need to get started in leather crafts.

- Taylor 

13th June Update: Crafts, Volunteering and College

Another archive video recording what I've been doing over the past few weeks and what I'll be doing in the future.

Thanks for watching.

Queen Elizabeth Country Park Volunteering

I've just been for a chat with one of the rangers at Queen Elizabeth Country Park and was shown around the facilities. Previous voluntary experience certainly pays off. It helps to have a fair amount of experience as things become more familiar and one better understands the processes of certain groups and the work that takes place. It used to be a case of having to label myself a novice from the outset, but as time goes by one certainly feels more accustomed to certain circles in which one's interested. In other words, it went quite well and I'll be volunteering at the Park over the summer as a precursor to Sparsholt to keep me from going rusty.

All this is to say that I would thoroughly recommend volunteering to anyone. If you have no experience whatsoever, well, that's what volunteering is for. You can show up on site and you're guaranteed to learn valuable skills and meet new people.

I'd be interested in hearing others' experiences in volunteer groups, mainly from a countryside perspective. It's something that fills my life now and without volunteering opportunities such as East Lothian Countryside Ranger Service and Butser Ancient Farm, I wouldn't have had access to such knowledge people. My acquisition of practical skills and knowledge largely revolves around volunteering so I couldn't do without it. It's a big part of my livelihood. This new volunteer group will be another chapter in my volunteering life, I suppose you could say.

For people with the right mindset, money means nothing. Working for free is valuable and you should try it.

Thanks.




Taylor.

First Wooden Cup/"Kuksa"

Hello, readers. I'm very proud to present my first wooden cup or "kuksa". I'd like to thank Jon from http://www.jonsbushcraft.com/ for providing a great tutorial on how to carve it. I followed his tutorial but chose a different handle style and made the triangular point at the back my own.

This is a tooled finish project all around, except for the inner bowl, which is sanded, as I found it a bit difficult to neaten it up with the spoon knife. I think this hybrid style looks and feels quite unique actually. I'm very happy with how this came out for my first ever cup and it looks rather nice, I think. 

I hope you like it.

Thanks.

Taylor. 

Hollybank Woods Overnight & Cup Carving

Hello, everyone. Here's a video for my latest overnight trip out with my brother. The main event planned was my next woodcarving project, a drinking cup. It was a pleasant experience carving in the woods and the attempt went rather well and I got more of it carved than I'd hoped. This cup is the most substantial thing I've yet carved. The only downside is the edge of my axe blade has quite a few nicks now, but it still cuts alright. It mustn't have been sharpened very well in the end, however I remember when I sharpened it the edge wasn't too bad. It must have lost the edge quickly upon use. Strange.

I'm still getting the hang of camp cooking, but bigger logs mean less trampling about for more fuel and a more sustainable fire, that I now know. It all went quite smoothly and we left no trace, of course. These videos are always tricky to make as I need to condense quite a lot of footage down to a few minutes, so I hope you enjoy watching it.

Thank you.