Pine Pitch and it's Uses

Pine pitch is made from the sap of pine trees.  Pine sap that has hardened from exposure to air is also called "pine gum" or "pine resin".   You can chew pine gum, although it might be an acquired taste.  Amber comes from resin, but making amber is not a do-it-yourself (DIY) project because you wouldn't live long enough to see the resin fossilize.  Fortunately, making pine pitch takes much less time.  Why make pine pitch?  Pine resin that has been turned into pine pitch makes a good glue for fletching your arrows (adding feathers to the shaft) and sticking the haft of the arrowhead to the shaft.  The haft of an arrowhead is that little handle at the bottom.

Pine sap oozes from injuries to the bark of pine trees.  While it is possible to tap pine trees for their sap (a task which works better in warmer weather), you can probably find lumps of resin already hardened still on the trees.   You're going to melt the resin and mix it with powdered charcoal and finely-ground, dry plant material.  You could gather the dry grasses and leaves to grind them into the small particles you'll need to bind your pine pitch.  You could also use the dry dung from plant-eating animals such as rabbits, deer, or moose, depending on what's available in your area.  The dung is already ground-up plants.  You'll still have to grind the droppings to get a powder that's fine enough to use, but it'll take less time and effort.   If you don't already own a mortar and pestle, a rounded rock can serve as a pestle.  A flat rock or a rock with a hollow in it can be your mortar. 

Your heat source could be a campfire, a camp stove, a grill, or a Dakota fire pit/hole.   Resin catches fire very easily so you'll want to be very careful.  If the resin ignites the flame could be several feet tall.   In fact, even the fumes from your melting resin can catch fire.  Make sure there is nothing flammable nearby, including tree branches overhead.  Definitely do not attempt to make pine pitch on your porch.  Don't try to make it on windy days because the wind may cause your fire to get out of control. 

 

If you've never made a campfire before, you're going to need enough rocks to form a ring around the fire, tinder, kindling, and larger pieces of wood.   While water and dirt can put out a normal campfire, it wouldn't hurt to have a fire extinguisher on hand in case your resin ignites.  Tinder is the light, dry material that catches fire first.  Dry leaves, twigs, pine needles, bits of bark, grass, weeds -- just make sure your tinder is very dry.  The tinder goes inside the ring of rocks.  Use a match or fire steel or use steel to strike sparks from flint to get your fire started.  Keep the wind behind you.  If you want to give your arms a workout, you may try rubbing two sticks together.  Kindling is made from sticks that can be up to one inch in diameter.   They're used to make the fire bigger and better after you've got the tinder burning.  Don't put your kindling sticks in too close together.  Fire needs air to burn.  Once the fire is burning well, you may add the larger pieces of wood, one at a time.   Your wood should be dry because green wood doesn't burn as well.  Green wood still has its moisture because it hasn't been that long since it was cut or broken off.  

 

A Dakota fire pit should be dug in dirt that's not too rocky, too wet, or too sandy.  You want your hole to be able to hold its shape.  Start by creating a soil plug about a foot in diameter.  Set the plug aside.  Dig a hole that's a foot deep as well as a foot around.  If you don't want to spend time cutting or breaking up your firewood, make the bottom of the hole a couple of inches wider than the top so you can fit longer pieces of wood in it.   Find out which way the wind is blowing.  That's the direction you need to dig your airway tunnel.  Start the tunnel a foot away from the edge of the fire hole.  The tunnel should be 6 inches in diameter and break into the bottom of the fire hole.   Partially fill the main hole with tinder and set it on fire, then add the kindling, etc.   The Dakota fire hole/pit uses its fuel more efficiently than a campfire does, so you won't need as much wood to keep your fire going.  If you have metal rods, you may lay them across the top in a grill pattern.  If not, sticks of green wood will do.   Fore safety's sake, let your fire burn down to hot coals before you start melting the resin.

 

Now it's time to turn that resin into pine pitch.   If you've made a Dakota fire pit/hole, an aluminum pan will be fine.  The resin goes in first.  After it's melted, stir in one part ground charcoal and one part ground dung to five parts of resin.  Stir the ingredients together until it turns thick and sticky, like tar.  Your pine pitch will harden quickly when you take it off the fire, but heat will soften it again.

 

You could use a soup can with holes the size of the heads of common finish nails punched into the bottom and two tuna cans to make your pitch.  Yes, all three cans should be empty and washed out first.   The lids should be completely removed.  The soup can and one of the tuna cans together will work like a double boiler.  If you've never seen a double boiler, it's a set where the shorter but wider pan is filled with water and the deeper saucepan fits inside.  The pan with the water in it goes directly on the heat source the way a regular saucepan does.  The water allows the heat-sensitive ingredients (such as eggs or chocolate) in the deeper saucepan to cook slowly without scorching or overcooking.  The first tuna can will be playing the part of the bottom of a double boiler.  The resin will be in the soup can that you'll set inside the tuna can.  (Don't use a soup can that's too big to fit into a tuna can.)    Preheat the resin before you set the cans on your fire/camp stove/grill.  The holes in the bottom of the soup can will act like a strainer so any bark or other stuff stuck in the resin will stay in the soup can while the melted resin will run into the tuna can.   When all of the resin has melted, take both cans from the fire.  Use tongs to slowly remove them to avoid being burned.   After all of the resin has drained into the tuna can, return it to the fire and stir while the resin liquefies.  Use a wooden stick or spoon because a metal utensil would get too hot.  Fill the second clean tuna can about one-third full with the liquid resin.  Add two pinches of binding agent to the resin.  You may use powdered charcoal and dung or sawdust, bone dust, or hardwood ash.  (Either pinch the binding agent from its container or pour a little of it into the palm of one hand and gather a pinch of it with the other.)   Stir until it turns into pitch.  Heat a stone at the same time.

 

The heated stone is for smoothing the pitch as you coat the part of the arrow shaft you're going to fletch.  Keep the shaft near the fire so the pitch stays soft while you press your feathers into it.   You'll also put the pitch on the front end of the shaft and around the haft of the arrowhead to make them stick together.  More pitch will secure the ends of whatever you use to bind the feathers and the arrowhead.   Pine pitch is also a good glue for other purposes and can be used for water proofing.