You're having a bad day when you're patiently clickclkciclickclicking away with your flint/iron pyrites combo and an ant comes along and steals a lump of your tinder!

I love that they show All the striking effort. People like me who barely step foot off pavement, need to see the whole process and not an edited down 30second highlight that makes it seem like 2 strikes should shoot fireworks off a rock is the norm. Realistic expectations!

Wish Ray was still on tv I loved everything he ever made

Considering how inefficient the pyrite is at making sparks, I’m surprised that it was even discovered.

Interesting video Mr. Mears. My wife and I were on photo safari in Tanzania some 20 years ago and had the good fortune to stay with a family of Hadza. While there we made fire and I helped make some arrows with the family patriarch. This was about the first of March, then end of the dry season. It was dusty dry. The hand drill was a piece of unknown green wood, looked like an arrow we made later. The notched base plate was old, dry, Acacia. Tinder a very dusty dry piece of elephant dung. The Hadza gentleman could have smoldering ash in a mater of seconds, I thought I'd worn my hands down to the bone before I got a wisp of smoke. Crack the dung in half, but still attached. Put the smouldering ash in the center and with a very shallow breath, directed off to the side, the dung would ignite in a half minute or so. Watching you tinder take off sparked the memory. Arrows the same as you've shown. Strip the bark, heat and bend with our teeth. Wood unknown. Still have an arrow, the hand drill and notched base. However, once back in Ohio, the fire system only worked for about a week or so. Assumed the humidity was too high for that fire system. Fun video sir. Thanks for reminding me of a great memory. All the best.

Ray makes living in any environment like home. So chilled.

One thing to consider is that this "kit" is probably the equivalent of a modern day lightweight fire starting kit used when you're out hunting/camping so everything is smaller and a bit harder to use. There's a YT short where someone has a larger rock with some pyrite in it, and a much larger bed of tinder and when he hits the pyrite with a palm sided rock he's making a usable ember every 1-3 strikes. This is the kind of thing you could have back at your community camp.

I remember being at a scout camp and we found a boulder that would sometimes give off a few sparks when we threw stones at it. You had to do this at night in ordwr to see the sparks but that method might be a good way to discover two different rocks that when struck together would produce sparks

I've tried to start a fire using modern flint, steel and tinder. On my first attempt, I wore away about half of the flint with repeated striking before I got a spark to catch in the tinder. Using flint and steel is an art. And that iron pyrite makes the whole thing a lot harder.

I could watch and listen to Ray forever. A legend.

Ray Mears is brilliant

Les Hiddins and Ray Mears are true legends...both brought real bushcraft knowledge to the masses.

Ray mears are among the very best.

Ray just has that skill and teaching magic all in one. A true master of his craft.

Most important....time was all they had. No meetings, no programs to watch and no true deadlines to meet.

I’ve seen similar demonstrations on tv & KZfaq before, and it always leaves me with the same feeling. WOW !🤩 Like magic. Yeah, I would have gone along with him being the leader of the clan, sure.

IT WAS AT THIS PIONT, 1:40 RAY REALISED HE WAS SAT ON A ANT HILL, TRYING TO START A FIRE 🤣🤣🤣... EXCELLENT VIDEO, STAY SAFE

Now Imagine a caveman that has to do that every day in order to survive, I bet he lights the fire faster than I light my cigarette 😂

Miss Ray Mears series. Back in my old backpacking days

Ray mears is a bushcraft legend.

I love Ray Mears - More please!

Excellent. Glad that people can see a demonstration of how challenging this can be.

thank you so much for showing how not easy and variable fire starting can be !!! *)

ray the best

Ray Mears, REAL Bushcraft 👍

Ray in his prime, miss those years....👏

Very Impressive, indeed. Well done, cheers...

There is a book called Eric Sloane’s America written around the 1950’s. It’s not about early primitive life, but he does explain in fascinating detail how pioneer type people did the things they did.

That is not easy. Respect.

Thank the lord for matches and Bic lighters. I remember seeing a guy shave ice into a lens and using the sun to create a fire.

Great work. thanks

I think a good striking stone cost one Walrus Tusk.

this is so in-efficient compared to piece of pure quartz hitting other piece of pure quartz, that's mad.

Bob Mortimer is the ultimate bushcraft guru

Ray is my survivalist of choice.

Did you notice he used the outermost papery bark of a birch tree? It makes great tinder. He also found dry dead grass (not always easy to find, depending on tbe weather), but I wish he would have said which species. Some burns better than others. The twigs he laid on the fire were rather green. I would like to know the reason, as I am sure he has a good one.

It is hard work , but seems peace full at the same time

The desire to eat is a strong motivator!!

This method would never have been discovered by me.

Necessity is the mother of invention . Skill and diligence it's father .

impressive!

The process to start a fire kept being laborious and time consuming for most of human history. This is why people usually kept a permanent low buring fire at home or took fire with them in specially designed containers when travelling. When their fire did go out by accident they would often ask to borrow fire from a neighbor rather than starting a new one. Matches and lighters where both only invented after 1820. Matches were called 'Lucifers' at first and early lighters took inspiration from flintlock pistols.

My favorite stone age fire starting technique is to wait for a lightning strike and resulting wildfire, steal some, and then carry it around in a clay bowl with plenty of both dry and damp tinder and twigs

Very impressive woodscraft.

Very impressive.

So nice to be outdoors

Looking at this video I must say that stone age man had a lot of patience😀😀😀

Very interesting

People ask, "why do you have waterproof AND hurricane matches?" , but then don't like the answers. Example: if it's my birthday, it's 42°F, drizzling, and someone gets drunk and falls off the boat, it's supposed to be me. And when it's not, and you do, I'll yell at you while I'm lighting the fire. I think instant fire is a taken for granted miracle. Fire goood. 😁🔥

Amazing skills, almost lost to us. Yes, it took a long time but it was not as if he was missing football on the t.v.

Incredible. Would not expect it to be possible to start a fire with ONLY stone tools + fibers and wood. Someone a LONG TIME AGO was really inspired to try it out.

I use lint from the clothes dryer as tinder - works great Taking the clothes dryer camping is now standard in the 21st century

One can clearly see this was filmed at the Riyal British Anthropology Proving Grounds. This is where generations of anthropologists learned the secret of our ancestors...

Ray is the king of survival

The time when they most needed a fire would've been when it has hardest to light one, cold & wet, looks hard work.

Living legend

"THE FINEST KIND"

"It takes perseverance..." or a match, or a mini blow torch =P

Thank goodness, we discovered matches

Nice.

I use Jasper, it's a little brittle, but it sparks great.

I remember when my uncle Ray invented that fire starting technique.

Do that while wet snow has been falling for six hours with a 20 gusting to 30 mph wind.....

Thumbs up for using the dactyl "higgledy-piggeldy".

Wow.

Just finding Pyrite is challenging let alone making a spark with it.. it’s much easier to just stand on a mountaintop during an electrical storm.. zap.. fire!

granite gives sparks more generously in my experience

Nice! Man I'm glad for flint and steel! And fat lighter!

IKR!

It is truly a miracle that any humans made it through this time and had kids. I believe this why we are so dam mean and ornery! The dedicated ones won the game.

Nice short demonstration.

I don't think we should use Ray's commendable efforts with pyrite as any more indicative of its effectiveness than a neolithic man's performance with a smart-watch.

Considering the description of this method in the "Earth's Children" series by Jean Auel, I believe she glossed over her description of making fire with iron pyrites and flint.

1:39 ... striking the flame took so long that a little creature tried to opportunistically steal your kindling.

Makes me really appreciate modern tools. Even the bow drill seems like cheating compared to this.

If you want to practice fire starting at home dryer lint is a perfect substitute for natural material.

I have a Swedish fire iron which makes copious sparks, but I still haven’t managed to get any tinder to ignite.

The fastest I ever started a fire using a flint stone was when my lighter stopped working and I just wanted a puff before going on a hike. Dug a small hole, filled with shredded lichen and dead grass, way way more than he was using here so that the sparks had more surface area to catch. Powdered it with dry pitch. Took maybe three minutes of striking, maybe less. Somebody asked me later why I didn't break the lighter and dump the residual fluid on the kindling... I also have a couple of rocks I've found over the years that almost certainly have spindle marks in them from repeated use sometime in the past. They seem so much more curious than the arrows and spearheads that are easier to identify. I gave my dad an old flint I found with a chipped edge and a square handle all cut out of one tiny rock that fit into the bend of your knuckle. Still razor sharp. Either had a perfect indentation for a thumb (including some interesting patina reminiscent of a thumb print) or was in fact smoothed away by another person's use.

In 1981 I spent a year on a mineral exploration programme in the the Arfak Mountains of Papua, Indonesia. On one week long traverse it had been raining most of the day and we needed to make camp. One of the local carriers started looking around for an fallen tree that had been chewed up by beetles. He pulled it apart and inside it was still dry and crumbly. He split another branch in half and laid that flat and used the tip of a small hard stick and vigorously rubbed a small groove in it while another sprinkled the crumbly stuff into the groove and blew gently. After 5 minutes they had the fire going. Didn't need to use a flint or spark at all, just friction and know how.

Nightmare lighting that fire

People here in the comments call it long and challenging, but this is by far the fastest method I have ever seen. Remember, that modern day humans who got shipwrecked on a remote island usually took months to produce a fire, if they ever managed at all.

It was only one way but there are many areas where this fungus was not available.

Bear grills Vs ray mears on Two islands. Who would survive. Ray of course.....

Our collective impatience even watching the host attempt this - created by the instant gratification of our technology- is why too many people believe “aliens must’ve given us that.”

Have to be a very dry day for making sparks at that slow rate. Someone finally got angry and came up with a better way

8,000-year-old trick that takes 8,000-years to start a fire...

Met ray last year on his UK tour ...may have been year before covid messed up my time line , was a bucket list thing for me , sad to see how many times on you tube his work has been stolen.

I think the sparking technique may be improved upon, perhaps increasing the chance of sparking as well as directing them better.

By the time the ancients got it to light, someone had invented the Disposable lighter.

I often wonder, which grunting hunter came up with the idea to dry a fungus, scrape the shit out of it and then figured out which two stones to bang together to get a spark? How did it all start?

Amazing technology ❤ even if 8000 y old

Chert red stone like red palladium hitting a basalt quarts rock could render a spark. My father was a geologists he told me about this trick.

The sounds of pre-history.

i always wanted to try this and i have a little kit that my brother gave me years ago that contains flint and steel and some kind of tinder. did you ever see the 1980's movie "quest for fire"?

Amazing. Also, get out the way, ant, or you'll be turned into crisp

An alien hand reaches into the shot with a lighter and click - the caveman's fungus ignites. _2001: A Space Odyssey theme_ ...

Understanding the value of matchsticks

The first stage of human interaction with fire, perhaps as early as 1.5 million years ago in Africa, is likely to have been opportunistic.

When you and the homie both forget a lighter after arriving at the smoke spot:

It's still a lot of work to make an arrow. It's just that we don't see the process, as it's most likely done in factories in China. Great to see them made by hand like this.