Kids Bushcraft at Tigh Mor

Brilliant bushcraft session today. Young Alice, Sophie, Neil, Thomas and Emily all enjoyed the activity (especially the pig nut digging, wood sorrel lemonade and marsh mallows). Mum's and Dad's had Douglas Fir tea as their refreshment. Despite the wind we managed a group shelter/tarp too.

Wood Sorrel with heart shaped leaves and droopy white flower in the Spring. Don't eat/drink too much due to the oxalic acid in it and always check further if you have any medical conditions.

Sorrel Lemonade

• Gather about a handful of sorrel, add it to about 2 pints of boiling water and let it infuse.
• Leave to cool
• 'Sodastream it' optional!

Magick Wands at Tigh Mor

Luckily we were making wands indoors today at Tigh Mor as it was hoofing down!  The new magic makers were keen to get going with the spells so these lovely magical tools should help them with their wishes.

From left: Thomas & Elsa chose Hawthorn, Sophie & Neil chose Hazel.

Alice chose Hawthorn too, which was quite ironic her Mum said as this wand can help teach the importance of patience!

Bushcraft at Forest Hills and Tigh Mor

We have started to do Bushcraft & Survival walks at both Forest Hills and Tigh Mor.  At Forest Hills we offer session for all ages on a Monday, Tigh Mor is just for the adults and older kids on a Thursday outside of school holidays (Arthur will continue to offer kids bushcraft during the holidays at Tigh Mor) . 

We were joined by a lovely couple at Forest Hills braving the rain (which died off thankfully) on Monday who seemed quite impressed at all the wild foods that are out already. Lots even on the roadside and along country lanes. I think they are looking forward to showing their nephew what they had learned as he is bushcraft mad apparently!
Thursday we were joined by five lovely eager to learn adults and young Brendan with his Batman figure for added enjoyment at Tigh Mor.

Will over ran a bit again, sorry, I can't stop his passion for this session whilst he is in full flow!

Daisy, or the Day's Eye. Edible and good used as an astringent.

Pignut, not Daisy the dog (although she is a bit like a hairy piglet), but something to look out for as it is just starting to come out up here in the Trossachs.  Dig down following the stem and at a 90 degree angle you will find a nut, edible and really scrummy.  Nothing to bark at really so get grubbing for nuts!!

Easter at Tigh Mor

Great fun at Tigh Mor decorating eggs, then getting out to enjoy the glorious weather.  Starting with egg rolling (and body rolling for some), which finished really quick with only one egg casualty!  This was a bit more tricky as the rules state you have to roll the eggs with your nose :-).

Next up were the egg and spoon races, separated by ages with everyone winning an egg - it's the taking part that counts eh Dad's!

Next the hunt itself.  Everyone had to find hidden clues around the site grounds, collect a magic symbol to later crack the code for the password to the chocolate egg - great fun! Interestingly the hardest clue seemed to be "Now it's time to meet the Queen"?

 

First back with all the clues was Miryam and her friend in about 18 minutes!

Next it was off upstairs to the family room again for face painting :-)

 



 

 

 

 

Bushcraft at Tigh Mor

Great to see all the lovely free foods starting to come out at Tigh Mor.  Just as things were starting to get chilly, out came the space blankets to see what these lovely families could come up with. Good effort we say, especially on their scavenger techniques!

Slight rip for Thomas and his Dad, but duck tap to the rescue!

Magick Wands at Tigh Mor

Fifteen lovely new magick makers joined us today at Tigh Mor for magick wands. :-)

Mostly wands from either hazel or ash chose their new owners, with a couple of oaks and one silver birch finding new homes too.  This must mean lots of creativity, wisdom, strength and one new beginning then! 

Here's a selection of most of them (the youngest new magick makers couldn't wait any longer to be let loose with their new magick making tool).  I wore my new witches cape, but with all that magickal energy in the room it was too hot and I had to take it off!

Bushcraft at Tigh Mor

The sun had finally put his hat on and shined down on Tigh Mor - a beautiful day for our first bushcraft session of the year.  We even saw some lovely young common sorrel, a bit 'green' rather than refreshingly lemony, but lovely to see signs of the promise of Spring :-).

Thankyou Neil from NSQ Photography (also the maintenance chap at Tigh Mor) for the first three photo's more can also be seen at the Facebook page Nix in Nature.

Mmmm, common sorrel

I'm a fire starter!

 

Discussing the flavour and the many uses of soft rush or rush light.

Will showing the guys some natural navigation techniques

All Hallows Eve at Tigh Mor

Unbelievably the rain held off for the two hours so that we could all enjoy our Batty Halloween Walk at Tigh Mor, our last bat walk for the season. We had earlier been making magic wands and Charlotte kindly did a rain spell for us so thanks Charlotte :-)

Thank you to all those that joined us today to help raise money for the Bat Conservation Trust. We will update everyone on the final count next week.  There were 16 magic wand makers, 9 getting their faces painted and a whopping 39 on the walk.

 Charlotte and Olivia show off their painted faces, a self designed pink cat and Olivia went for a tiger (again).  Other faces were a vampire and his wife, Frankenstein, butterflies and cats.

 

 

Charlotte's wand was made from Rowan, the best for protection so great for Halloween. All were amazingly creative and individual :-)

To celebrate the Celtic New Year we had a few tricks and treats up our sleeve for this bat walk, the bats by the way were staying in if not already in their bat caves for a snooze though. Some excellent costumes and stories by those attending. Some had to earn their treats as they used to do traditionally, so there were a few jokes kicking around too, mostly from Sam, one of which was, "how do you get a tissue to dance? Put a bit of boogie in it!"

 Death.......... just there to accompany you to the other realm!

 

 Having to resort to wellies instead of my fluffy boots! I'm trying to represent where this custom originated, with the Celts on Samhain or Summer's end. They were said to wear masks, especially animal masks to confuse mischievous spirits and faery folk who could easily slip into our realm when the veil between worlds is at their thinnest on this day.

 

 

'Death' helps Stephen the bat find lots of moths the size of children to eat for his dinner!

There were hand made pendants with protective rowan berries and elder beads for the best dressed and best spooky tales, a few apple and divining games and everyone celebrated the Celtic New Year by placing a piece of ash while releasing something unwanted in their lives in order to start afresh. We had to remind the little ones that it didn't mean getting rid of your annoying brother or sister!

 Batty Pumpkin

 

 Thanks Lesley from Cobleland Campsite for the brilliant cat and owl pumpkin.

 

Pumpkins were an extension of the mask, to scare off unwanted spirits. They would have been carved from neeps or spuds though before the Irish travelled to America taking their customs with them. Pumpkins are easier to carve though :-)

Windy Wet Rafts at Tigh Mor

We were saved by the gilly hut today being able to get creative under cover.  It was yet another wet day but that didn't put off the young raft makers at Tigh Mor!

Jacob's Jolly Roger and Joshua's Viking battling out the weather.

 oops, Jakob's Victini takes a tumble! Below shows his excellent sailor (which survived).

 

Sophie's The Jolly Roger after a speedy session down the river.

Tigh Mor Soggy Bat Walk

A huge thank you to everyone who joined us on the soggy bat walk at Tigh Mor! We charged half price due to the rain, but I think we still all had fun. Unfortunately the bats were staying in the trees for the night, probably wise and laughing at us lot in the rain trying to find them!

Andy, probably our most keenest bat ever, who actually nearly took off with his wings and not at all deterred by the rain!!

Tigh Mor Rafts & Crafts

Four rafts and a magick wand this week at Tigh Mor....

The adorable Anna made this (probably most ever decorated) Hazel wand. Amongst the gems and ribbons you can see that Anna used magickal Theban script writing and a Celtic Ogham alphabet symbol for Hazel which will help enhance her already creative skills even more! Her wand is also infused with the magic from the water faeries or Kelpies, love it :-)

Here's Kate's fabulous T1 

Kate's brother Fraser designed this brilliant raft, calling it 'Stringy' - of course! 

Anna's older brother's Jamie and Rob designed J.M Rocket and The Grassinator, I'm sure you can tell which is which! Both looked great on Loch Achray. 

Tigh Mor Bat Walk

The bat numbers are on the downward slope now as they ready themselves for the bat cave, but a few Soprano Pipistrelle's came out to play at Tigh Mor.

Here is Conal the bat, who in his own words said "That's the most fun I've ever had in a field"! Brilliant, we love our bat suit!  His father-in-law was understandably keen to get the photo's to show the family :-)

Conal tries out his bat wings - hard to flap at the hands and not the arms though!

Flapping bat ear muscles at 200 times a second proves tricky too!

 Will explains how bats have evolved to be the amazing midge hunters that they are.

Tigh Mor Guided Walk

Our walking guide friend Arthur Jones from Trossachs Treks asked us to cover his walk today in Brig O'Turk whilst he was away on short notice meeting his first grandson, Matthew, aah :-).  What a gorgeous setting for a guided walk so thanks for asking us Arthur!!

Glen Finglas

We were joined by Mike the bat again, his lovely wife and yet another lovely couple who all enjoyed the sunshiny walk amongst the oak and ash, mushrooms and lochs.

The Bicycle Tree - spot the bike!

Bat Walk at Tigh Mor

Thanks for being our bat Mike, you look excellent against Tigh Mor, very spooky  :-)  It was a good night for real bats too, with Sorprano Pipistrelles and Daubenton's busy eating as much as they could in preparation for their bat caves.

Mike the bat!

Daubenton's or the water bat about to scoop up a tasty meal!
Image from Meneith Fisheries, not sure if they had a super duper photographer take the picture from there?

Rafts & Crafts at Tigh Mor

Lots of great creativity this weekend at Tigh Mor....

From left: Henry's HMS Titanic and Eleanor's 'Eleanor'

Nick's 'Wooden Craft' and James' HMS Victory

Magick Wands from left: Ben & Luke's Hazel wands and Rose & Sam went for Hazel too - must have been the invisibility and creativity powers within them :-)  Interestingly it is the Celtic Ogham month for Hazel, see these kids are using their intuition well :-)

 

Aaah, Loch Achray :-)