Using Human Hair to Light a Fire
I have brushed my in front of the fire for over twenty years now, and each time I clean the hairbrush I throw the hair into the flames.
Other than the sizzle and the unmistakable smell, I started to notice something else... 'how' it burns. As a keen fire starter I saw how it could be used as a tinder-extender.
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Having plentiful supplies of 'flash tinder' living in the countryside and surrounded by cattail and thistle seed downs, but not always having dried matter to 'carry' the flame from the flash tinder to the next size up fuel... I noticed that hair catches easily off the flash tinder but 'holds' the flame long enough (at least four times as long as the flash tinder actually) to pass it to other fuels in my fireplace.
Hair is something I always have on me. I'm not saying I'd be willing to cut a chunk off each day for my daily fire, but the clumps in a hairbrush have served me a few times as emergency fire starter where no paper or dry grass was easily available.
Another thing I discovered living off-grid was the 'rubbish' fire brick. Basically a tightly packed cereal box. Cram packed full of other rubbish to act like a log. There is more on this in another blog post HERE including how long you can expect a rubbish fire brick to burn.
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