A brief look at some Split ash baskets.
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- Опубликовано: 3 фев 2024
- A quick look at some of the traditional baskets used by Iroquoian and eastern Algonquian peoples.
I couldn't find any public domain images of them, but you could do a google image search for "Iroquois strawberry basket" if you want to see some really neat weaving.
Backpacks in the period frequently used a larger one of these attached to a wooden L-frame.
Link to patreon if you are so inclined.
www.patreon.com/user?u=3998481
growing up in the great lakes region in the 2000s, i remember playing with the seeds of the ash trees in my backyard and in parks. the abruptness with which the trees were cut down as the emerald ash borer entered the area gave me my first real glimpse of what ecological damage looks like in real time and the impact of invasive species
In Finland backpacks, shoes, knife seaths and war horns were made from birchbark.
Now I want a split ash basket.
You can propably order one from the people who make them, and support the craft.
you give me a link to one under 30 bucks and i will buy it in 3 seconds
(i'm lazy)@@juhonieminen4219
Most are a hundred or so. The wood is endangered and the skill is rare.
I am very useless at it but weaving is such a universal human technology, I always wonder what came first: our love for weaving or our love for patterns. Many patterns look like they have an origin in weaving. It’s one of these questions that is hard to answer(for the most part it doesn’t last in the archeological record) but fun to think about.
Quite beautiful. So much better than plastic which just shatters or splits
Fascinating. Cool stuff
Yay more Malcolm videos, and this one about basketweaving!! :D
Amazing! Woven hardwood
Thats classic Anishinabe handicraft❤
Thanks for the info Malcom, great vid :3
As a wisconsinite all my homies hate invasive species like ash bore or zebra muscles
With the freshly made one the smell must be pretty good too.
I don't really like the smell of ashwood.
Very cool! I love this stuff.
Damn ash borers (I'm from Ontario). You peaked my interest with this video, I'm going to have to do some research on this. Would love a video about the process and maybe you/your families knowlage/experiences on it. If you have the time/want too of course 😅
A Townsends video mentioned infected ash and how they became bushes, aka the teenagers tree may return as a coppice looking a lot like a bush, and it might take up to 15 years after that snack to where you have usable poles off of it. Not sure if such becomes large enough to harvest for weaving
ruclips.net/video/06-nL-voENg/видео.htmlsi=bu-qXh57fYOYRgiA Stephen Jerome has plenty of videos on the entire process and is a very accessible person to reach out to and learn from.
Beautiful. I need to get one for picking mushrooms.
Impressive craftsmanship. Sad to think of this skill being lost .
Great baskets! Great video! Sad to hear the ash borers are causing a problem for production tho. Do you know if there is any evidence of using a simmilar split ash weave in sheilds or armour?
No evidence. I don't think the layers are thick enough for armour. It might work for a shield if you covered it with leather, but I don't know that it would be optimal.
nice work, thanks
i would love if you could do a video on Kandiaronk and how he is understood by people in the northeastern woodlands today.
He is not understood by the people in the northeastern woodlands today. Apart from those people who have read "the dawn of everything," only historians and a handful of philosophers know he existed.
@@MalcolmPL thank you for the reply! i also guess it's obvious what book i read haha.
do you think that "dawn of everything" gives a fair account of the peoples at that time?
@@redoktopus3047 I haven't read it yet.
I've got the opposite problem where I only became aware of the book because it's supposed to mention him.
Have you heard of any crafts made of eastern leatherwood? It is a shrub with extremely flexible branches. I have heard it was used by native Americans for crafts, but I have never found any real evidence of such.
Ash trees in Connecticut are all but gone. Most left now are standing dead. As a woodworker with a mill I am trying to salvage the dead Ash. It is very nice to work with in carpentry and wood turning. Occasionally a dead ash will stump sprout which gives me hope that the ash will not be wiped out like the Elm, Chestnut, etc. There is still hope. Before this video I had not seen Ash baskets. I am wondering if fish traps could be or were made from Ash as well though Ash does not usually have longevity in wet environments.
Thanks for showing these! Do you happen to have any information on the technique to make such even, tidy splits using stone / bone / wooden tools?
I'm afraid I don't.
@@MalcolmPL I think I found something: ruclips.net/video/r2IZYeEZuKg/видео.html
He's using modern tools, but there's no reason why this should not work with traditional materials. I'll have to try this sometime.
Cool. How much do they weigh and what is the weight capacity?
Also, with the ash borer doesn't it turn the tree into a bush that can be used as a coppice for walking sticks and even rattle fencing?
Are trees of a particular size necessary for processing into the slats for baskets, or can smaller spots be used if at least day 2"-4" circumference?
Dunno, dunno, and dunno.
@@MalcolmPL thanks! Dunnos are useful units of measurement 🙃
But more seriously, if it gets you thinking about some of things and maybe testing it out that could be a topic for a later video. I find the dunnos to be very useful in that regard. Sometimes they inspire me to do Internet searches for the answers (and in the case of baskets led me to more dunnos unless you are talking bushel baskets, which are well defined and calculable) or, if I have such, pulling out the kitchen scale and setting. Only basket I had available was a wicker clothes hamper so I used that and added cans of soup, my hatchet, and many other items from my kitchen until it started groaning and disappearing under the weight. Trying to remember if I posted the results, when, and where.
do you know if coppicing is a regional practice? i have a stand of ash trees that we had to cut down because of the ash borer. a five year cycle for coppicing should keep the tree alive and productive through beetle damage. we just cut this year so i will have to wait to get back with word of how well it works.
Ashes are generally good for coppicing. I've had a couple that I cut which suckered well.
I'm curious as to how you split wood into long thin strips like this. Seems like a tricky task to me.
There's a trick to it, which I haven't learned.
There's a little course on the Smithsonian website, somewhere, that talks about the Akwesasne and some of the fight to conserve black ash
The tree is pounded with a hammer to separate the fibers
One of those many things from human creation that make me wonder "who figured that out the first time"
Ash is getting expensive and difficult to find in the PNW because of the Emerald Ash Borer. What would you recommend as an alternative material?
I've heard of some people using red oak, but I don't know how good a substitute that is.
Thank you! @@MalcolmPL
I have a pack basket made of ash splints, called an Adirondack Pack. I never really thought about it, but it's pretty obvious now that these packs were made by Europeans copying techniques perfected by the people living in that area at the time.
Are there any ash alternatives that would be suitable for this technique?
I've heard of some people using oak, but apparently it doesn't work as well.
Can you make a video showing how they are made? :)
No, I took a course where they taught the weaving, but they didn't show us how to prepare the wood beforehand.
@@MalcolmPL Ah, okay 👍
I have nothing to say about this, I like the video but have nothing to add. That being said, the computer mind that decides who to show your videos to shows favor to those disciples who give offerings of words. Words are food for the computer mind, and I am leaving my offering.
Crazy how the ash trees are disappearing just like the American Chestnut before it. Hopefully we can fight back and save our forests.
There is a slightly different situation between the chestnuts and the ashes, the thing that really screwed the chestnut trees was people writing the species off as doomed and cutting most of the live trees so as to save the lumber. Which inadvertently killed off most of the resistant ones.
People lost hope, which is always a self fulfilling prophecy.
With the ash, 1-2 percent are resistant or semi-resistant. That's enough that if we just leave the survivors alone then the tree will bounce back in 60-100 years.
Selective breeding programs between resistant trees might be able to bring that recovery time down to a few decades. They've already identified that the trait which protects resistant trees is just a slightly higher tannin content in the sap.
@@MalcolmPL That is reassuring, I didn’t know that.