Raku: A brush with fire and art

We are back at the pottery studio at Wildacres after our field trip to Terry's place, and we are on our last day of the workshop. From the initial planning stages of our trip, the group has been talking about doing a "raku" firing. I'm not sure what this is, except that it sounds potentially dangerous, like a pit firing only with a closer encounter with the flames. Ordinarily conservative in my approach to risky situations, this time I feel emboldened. I don't know exactly what raku is, but what the heck - Bring it on!

First, our bone-dry pots are treated to a coating of terra sig, a thin slip of watery clay that helps the pots take the glazes, then they are bisque-fired. The next step is to apply one or more of several glazes that Terry has cooked up for us. Most of them have made-up names, like Rumply-Crumply (which we also called Humpty-Dumpty and Rumplestiltskin when we got the giggles), Slurple (purple) and Some Kind of Blue. Celedon was the only color going by its right name, I think.

Diane and Sue, glazing
"What does Rumble-Bumble do again?"

The raku kiln platform was small - we could only get four pieces in for each firing. With the eight of us in production mode, it looked as though we would be in for a marathon session in the studio.

Remember that pinky-purple vase
in the front right corner.
You will see it again at the end.

After the kiln was loaded, the shroud was lowered and two huge propane burners were lit on either side of the base. You can see the opening below the platform in this photo.

One load in the kiln, the next one "on deck"

Terry kept an eagle-eye on the state of the kiln through openings in the top
and side of the kiln, waiting for just the right moment when the glazes had melted to the appropriate stage.
Meanwhile, some lowly metal pots and garbage cans stand by piles of sawdust, awaiting their cue,while the potters wait (im)patiently for the action to begin.

Ginger, Peggy and Sue

Sue, Michelle, and Mary
(Michelle's the one who is big on safety.)

At just the right moment, Terry pulls the chain to raise the shroud and reveal the white-hot pots glowing inside.

And the potters step up, one by one, to pull their treasures from the furnace with long metal tongs and transfer them to the piles of sawdust.

The heat was incredible, and almost unbearable.

Each pot required two people - one to pull it from the kiln and deposit it on the pile of sawdust, another to quickly cover it with the metal pot, then "burp" the pot to let in a brief gust of oxygen. This caused the sawdust pile to flare up, fuming the pot.

Here we are in action:


And here is one of the pots, still too warm to touch, after firing. This is Carol's vase from the kiln photo above.

My first Raku-fired pot. Glazed in Celedon and Slurple-purple (with Lumpy-Bumpy inside), the black lines are caused by the smoke from the sawdust packed around it.

Cool, huh?

Mystery Bird Revealed

Well, the mystery bird quiz wasn't as much fun as I anticipated. Of course, Donald and Hap were right, with their answers of juvenile Eastern Towhee, but I was hoping for more guesses and discussion. Let me walk you through my thought processes and tell you how I arrived at the same conclusion, albeit more slowly than either of the guys.

After my initial shock, when I had no idea what sort of bird had crashed into the porch window at Terry's studio in western North Carolina, I recovered enough to start working through the clues.

First, habitat. When someone says to me, "I just saw a bird and it was ..." (blue, brown, red, white, big, little, etc.) I always interrupt and ask, "First, where did you see it? In the woods, in a field, at the beach, on a pond," because habitat helps us rule in or out many species, before we start guessing based on color or size. In this case, we are on a porch on a quiet back road in a wooded area of North Carolina.

Next, I looked at its head. One of my birding mentors once told me you could reliably ID any bird by the head alone, using the bill and any field marks. I'm not sure I could do that, but I can usually get pretty close.


In the case of Mystery Bird, we see a short, stout, "finchy-type" bill, often incorrectly called a "seed-eating bill," typical of sparrows. Also looking at the head, we see a decided lack of field marks, like crown stripes, eyelines, eye rings, "eyebrows" (supercillia) or "mustaches." Since most sparrows have a lot of field marks on their heads, this is contradictory. Still, I feel confident this bird belongs in the sparrow family.

Also, I have an odd feeling in my gut that this is a young bird. Maybe it is the faint yellowish wash to the edges of the bill or just something about the GISS (General Impression, Size and Shape) of the bird, but regardless, I think it is a juvenile. That makes my job harder, since young birds quite often have much different plumage than the adults of the same species.

Next, I looked at the breast streaks.
I have seen fine, "pencil-mark" streaking on the breast like this before, on Lincoln's Sparrows.

Lincoln's Sparrow,
image from National Zoo website

I know this isn't a Lincoln's, but it is one more reason why this might be some sort of sparrow. Vesper Sparrows also have this field mark, and I have never seen a Vesper, so I move this to the top of my differential list. It seems bigger than it should be, but I know that Vesper Sparrows are on the largish size for sparrows (about 6.25" long) and I also know that size is deceiving, and is one of the less useful tools when it comes to bird ID. So, I photograph it with the only thing I can find for scale - my 58mm lens cap.

My last field mark is the white on the outer tail feathers.


A key field mark for Vesper Sparrows is white outer tail feathers, so now I am fairly certain this is what I am holding in my hand. I find it ironic that my "Life" Vesper Sparrow is, in fact, dead. Of course, in my excitement, I have completely ignored Rule 1, habitat. Vesper Sparrows live in agricultural fields or sparse pastures, not in wooded areas.

I'm sure you are all laughing at me by now, but please keep in mind, I am working without a net. I have no field guides, no web sites, no helpful expert birder or Science Chimp standing behind me, looking over my shoulder, and I have a cluster of non-birders watching me, eager for an answer. So, I clutched, and called it a Vesper Sparrow.

That identification bothered me till I got home and pulled out my field guides.

Vesper Sparrow,
image from NPS website

Clearly, my bird was not a Vesper Sparrow, even allowing for variations which might occur in a juvenile bird. So, it's back to work.

Using my lens-cap photo from the previous post, I calculated the Mystery Bird was about 8" long, way too big for any self-respecting sparrow. Now, I'm in trouble. I don't even know which page of my field guide to look on, so I revert back to Beginning Birder 101 - start at the front of the book and flip through every page till you see the bird in question.

Of course, I didn't start at the very beginning - I was able to rule out ducks, herons, shorebirds, owls, and woodpeckers right away. Page by passerine page, I carefully looked through my trusty Peterson's Guide to the Birds East of the Rockies, 4th edition (1980) till I found it. On page 276, half-hidden behind the female, is a juvenile Eastern Towhee, what was still referred to at that time as Rufous-sided Towhee.Note the bill, the streaky breast, and the white on the outer corners of the tail feathers. This is where I messed up in my leap to Vesper Sparrow. As seen in my Peterson's, the entire outer tail feathers are white from base to tip in a Vesper, not just the corners as we see above. (Of course, there are also the chestnut shoulder patches, the riot of field marks on the head, the size, the habitat, and so on and so on ...) Look at two more things. In the first photo of the head, notice the dark eye, which would be red in an adult Eastern Towhee, male or female, but is black in a juvenile, like my victim.

And finally, in the drawing, check out the white "handkerchief" marks on the wings of the adult birds. Peterson doesn't show it, but in his written description of the juvenile he says: "Streaked below like a large sparrow, but with the diagnostic Towhee wing and tail patterns."
I can attest to the fact that the patterns were there, staring me in the face all along. (Gotta love a bird artist who says "diagnostic.")

So, I was close. I was right about the juvenile part and I was in the sparrow family (You do know that Towhees are sparrows, right?) but I missed the species.

When working on a bird ID, I always go to Peterson's field guide first, and I am rarely disappointed. In checking my Sibely's eastern field guide (not the Big Book) I didn't find the juvenile plumage. I Googled "immature Eastern Towhee" and came up with several photos, none of which showed everything that one drawing did, but which helped me confirm my ID. Finally, I sent copies of my photos to Julie and Hap, and they concurred. (BTW, watch the next issue of BWD for Julie's take on "Confusing Summer Towhees."

Thank you, Roger Tory. I promise never to go on vacation without you again, even when I am told I am limited to one suitcase. I will leave out extra socks to make room for you.

Mystery Bird Quiz

While visiting Terry Gess' studio, along a quiet, wooded road in Mitchell County, North Carolina, my birding expertise was called into question. There was a dead bird on his door step, a victim of a window strike, and the potters wanted me to identify it. I'm sorry to say, I failed the initial test, but when I returned home, to my field guides and Internet access, I was able to redeem myself.

Let's see how you fare. Can you ID this bird? (For the sake of scale, I photographed it with my 58mm lens cap, in order to get some sense of its size.)

click any photo to enlarge

Post your answers in the comments section. Just for fun, tell me if you knew right away, worked it out on your own, or used reference materials to reach your conclusion.

Terry Gess studio

Tuesday was our field trip day. We visited Penland School, the subject of another post on another day, and the studio of our instructor, Terry Gess. Terry has a Master's of Fine Arts degree and a wealth of experience, including teaching at Penland and studying in China. He uses a wood-fired salt-glazing kiln big enough to walk into. The brick walls themselves are glazed from years of use.His technique uses colored slips over stoneware, to create his own unique style. His work is beautiful and the muted earth tones speak to me. His forms are interesting; he makes a lot of square pieces. For someone who still struggles to make her pottery round, I have a hard time wrapping my head around pottery that is deliberately altered to other shapes, but I can appreciate the skill and effort that goes into every one of his pieces.











please click to enlarge and appreciate the art pottery

A potter's porch in North Carolina

Tomorrow: We find a surprise on that porch ...

Wildacres Birds (and moths)

It can be hard to focus on a pottery workshop when the birds are calling right outside your door day and night. I had to apologize to Terry for slipping off for some surreptitious birding on several occasions.

By far, the most common birds I saw or heard during my week at Wildacres were Chipping Sparrows. Their trilling calls woke me at 6am every day, and the begging cries of the young ones followed me all around the mountain top all day long.
I never managed a decent photo of an adult, as they were all busy flitting around catching moths for their starving offspring. However, this juvenile posed nicely for me. He was on the top of a retaining wall while I was on the stairs below, so that we ended up at eye level, which made for some nice angles.

"Are you my mother?"

While walking down the road from the entrance to the retreat, I heard a trilling call that I nearly passed off as yet another Chipping Sparrow, when something about the quality of the song caused me to stop and look for the singer.
A Dark-eyed Junco! While I have certainly seen my fair share of winter juncos in Ohio, I have never heard them sing on territory. Luckily, this fellow was right at my eye level and in no hurry to leave. I was able to shoot a dozen or so pictures, with all sorts of camera settings, till I got just the right one.

Probably the second most common birds were the Red-eyed Vireos. They were everywhere, singing incessantly, and remaining invisible most of the time. This one, the one I initially called a Philly Vireo based on his song, was the only cooperative guy I found. Lighting was tough in the dark canopy, but I think you can tell what he is.
Practically from day one, I heard a song that I thought I should know. "Indigo Bunting" kept popping up as the answer, but I couldn't figure out what one would be doing in such heavily wooded habitat at 3300 feet. When I discovered the horse pasture below the firepit, I began to think I might be right. Using the iPod, I called it in.
OK, you and I both know this picture sucks. The thing is, at first he landed on a fencepost so close to me I could practically touch him. It startled me so that I missed my best photo op. After that, he knew the iPod wasn't a real bird, so he kept on the move, just out of camera range, looking for his imagined rival. I had to really push this photo to get it at all.

Moths were everywhere, indoors and out, and more varieties than I could possibly imagine. A few I knew:

Luna Moth
Rosy Maple Moth

Polyphemus Moth

my old friend,
Tulip-tree Beauty Moth

but many more, I could not recognize.

"patterned porch-step moth""dark lampshade moth"

"white studio-door moth"

"tan floor mat moth""funky lodge-hall moth"

Edit, June 24: Thanks to Hap from New Hope, we have a name for the funky moth from the wall of the lodge hallway: It's a Spotted Apatelodes - Apatelodes torrefacta.

And, just so the other half of the Lep family doesn't get jealous, here's a Pipevine Swallowtail, one of the few butterflies I saw that week. (edit: corrected ID, thanks to Hap)

My birding Trip List for the week (Now, you just knew there would be a list, didn't you?)

American Robin
Northern Cardinal
Chipping Sparrow
Ruby-throated Hummingbird
American Crow (I tried to turn a couple into ravens, but no joy)

Indigo Bunting
Black-throated Green Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
Hooded Warbler (missed a great pic of this one)
Red-eyed Vireo

Wild Turkey
American Goldfinch
Eastern Towhee
Dark-eyed Junco
Eastern Phoebe

Carolina Chickadee
Mourning Dove

and the "heard onlys"
Tufted Titmouse
White-breasted Nuthatch
Carolina Wren
Wood Thrush
Yellow-billed Cuckoo (I'm pretty sure about this one)

Caution: Potters at Work

Our first morning in the studio, Terry demonstrated basic wheel-throwing skills: centering the clay, opening, and pulling up the walls of a simple form.

Terry, giving a demo.

He then assigned us the task of making several straight-sided cylinders, to assess our skill level. Because he was teaching different techniques than what I had learned, I felt like a total beginner. My first couple of pieces didn't even survive the early steps, and those that did make it to the cylinder stage were of rather poor quality. Nothing from my morning's work was worth keeping, and all went to the recycled clay bag for re-use in the afternoon.

One thing Terry had us do after lunch was to cut open our cylinders to inspect our work. The photo below shows the one piece that came closest to achieving my goals - a flat bottom, straight sides, and walls of equal thickness, top to bottom.

The walls aren't totally straight, and there is still some residual clay at the bottom of the wall, where it joins the floor, but the rest is okay. This minor accomplishment spurred me on to work harder in the afternoon, when we graduated to shaping the cylinders into basic forms. These simple vases were the end result.

bottom-heavy, both of them
Pottery must mirror the potter.

Terry's pots, drying on the ledge of the studio's back deck, served to inspire us.
So, we kept on plugging away, everyone determined to accomplish some good work as soon as possible.

Ginger at the wheel

Sue, hand-building specialist

Carol, completing a pot

from left to right:
Diane, Sue, Michelle, Mary, and Peggy,
all hard at work

finished work at the end of day one

After several days, we had a full kiln load of greenware, ready to fire. Opening the kiln is like Christmas morning. The anticipation of seeing our treasures was almost more than we could bear.

Terry, at our first kiln-opening

No one could believe how much pottery Terry could squeeze into the kiln.

The whole crowd, behind a table full of our work.

Beginning the workshop

Thursday night we arrived at Wildacres, Little Switzerland, NC about 6:30pm. We were late, because of horrific storms that blocked the road with downed power lines, downed trees, and a truck wreck (pronounced wra-yuck in Tennessee) and were rushed to dinner immediately.
Meals were served family-style in the large dining room, seen here from above. Life on a mountain top means plenty of stairs, indoors and out. There, we met Mike, the manager of Wildacres Retreat, who served as organizer, "cruise director," problem solver, and all-round good guy.After dinner, we retired to the library to have our first talk with Terry Gess, our instructor for the week,and then visited the studio, our home-away-from-home for the next six days.











Soon, it was off to our beds with visions of beautiful pottery in our heads. With no TV, radio, or cell phone service and spotty Internet access, there was little to impede our sleep. Open windows kept our bedrooms "air-conditioned by nature" all week, as the old ads for Wildacres used to read.




Need to make an emergency call?
Here's the phone booth.


Our rooms were in the south lodge, shown here from the pathway below, at the foot of the stairs that lead to the patio. Two twin beds, a sink with a long counter, and a private bath were all my roomie and I needed, since we were rarely there.If your tastes run to the outdoors, as mine do, the lodge's wide deck, equipped with plenty of rocking chairs for comfort and conversation, is all you need .
The decks of both the north and south lodges face the stone patio below, and are a great place to sit and listen to the rain.

I sat on the patio often,
watching the ever-changing mountain views.Let the work begin tomorrow ...... today, I'm on vacation.

Wildacres update (edit June 19)

This was originally posted on Saturday, June 13, from Wildacres, but with words only, no pics. I tried for 3 days to add photos to it, and my tenuous WiFi connection kept conking out at the worst possible time. So, here is the new, improved version, with photos, from my home computer.

~~~

The pottery workshop is going well. We are awakened by a bell at 7:30am (except myself, out birding and Michelle, who is out for her morning walk/run) and called to breakfast by a 10 minute warning bell and the actual breakfast bell at 8:00.

the dining hall

We meet at the pottery studio at 9 am and work until lunch. Our instructor, Terry Gess, has scheduled meetings at 10am and 2pm, when he shows slides and does demonstrations.

the studio is down the stairs on the left,
in the lower level of this building

In the afternoon, we work until about 5-5:30pm, and are called to dinner by the 6pm bell. In the evening, most of us work some more. Last night, we had a bonfire in the fire ring at the amphitheater, which was very special since we were the only guests. It was an amazing feeling, having the whole mountain to ourselves.

the amphitheater and fire pit

The birding is going well, though interrupted by all the pottery. No bird photos yet, but hold your horses, I hope to bag some birds. I am gradually moving birds from the "heard only" category to actually seen. Today, I added Hooded and Black-and-white Warbler to my previous Black-throated Green, thanks to my iPod.

Nina, I am drinking the honey mead from Valley Vineyards every night, and looking down. Just wait till you see the pictures I took! And yes, there has been snailing.

More tomorrow ...

Wordless Wednesday, June 7, 2009

Live ... from Wildacres ... It's Friday Night!

I have survived my first day of the pottery workshop, despite feeling like a total newbie, wrecking most of the work I started and getting only one or two small pieces that are even worth keeping. Still, there is some compensation. The mountains of the Pisgah National Forest in Western North Carolina are lush and green.

The fire pinks
and mountain laurels are in bloomand there is a view around every corner.
I have been birding, too, mostly by ear, although it seems as though every Chipping Sparrow in the county is feeding 2 or 3 fledglings. I see and hear begging babies everywhere I go. Best bird by far is the heard-only Philadelphia Vireo. I am 99% sure I got that song right after listening to my BirdJam (Hi, Jay!) Please, if I'm wrong and Philly Vireo isn't found here, wait until after I get back to break the bad news. I need to feel like I know something this week.

Edit, Monday: I would like to formally retract my Philly Vireo ID. Yesterday, I tracked down the same bird in the same spot and thought he sounded more like a Red-eyed Vireo. I called him in with the iPod and even got a photo.


Thanks for not embarrassing me on the 'Net and letting me learn from my mistakes.

Set of four - And more

I'm about to head off to North Carolina for a week-long pottery workshop. I thought this might be a good time to update you on the latest pieces I have completed (aside from the pit fired things in the last pottery post.)

One of the things our instructor, Rachael, big on is having us do a matched set of four pieces. This could be bowls, plates, etc., but most often takes the form of a set of four mugs.

This sounds easy - make a mug, then make three more just like it. Trust me, this is harder than it looks. First, you weigh out four equal weight balls of clay. Next, you make your first piece. Then you measure it - height, width, diameter of both the base and the mouth - and try to replicate both the size and shape of your first piece three more times. (It helps to use templates - pre-made patterns - to keep the shape consistent, but so far, I am doing it by hand. No cheating till I can get it right!)

After that comes the trimming stage - taking off excess clay at the base, and, in the case of mugs, adding handles. Handles. My biggest nemesis.

Next, you pray that all four pieces make it through bisque firing without developing "S" cracks in the bottom or the handles falling off.

Finally, glazing. This step covers a wealth of errors. After all, once the four pots are finished in the same color, people may overlook the many mistakes you made during production.

Here is my set of four mugs - the third (fourth?) time I have tried to do it. Compare the mugs below to my first attempt here. I think I am getting better - you be the judge.
white clay glazed with "Seaweed" (plus "Satin White" inside to allow the seaweed to run and drip.)
A "handle-side view" - size and shape are pretty close. The mugs measure 3" high by 3" diameter at the mouth and hold 6 to 8 oz.

This is the handle shape I was going for.

Got it in three of the mugs, but ...

... OOPS! Here is mug number four. This handle didn't go quite right.

One trick to getting a set of four matching things is to make at least five, sometimes, 6 or more pots, to allow for screw-ups. The mug below was originally one of the set above.
Too small and trimmed differently at the base, I decided to use a different glaze, simply called "Yellow," with the same "Satin White" interior and details stenciled in black underglaze. It's still cute, just not part of the set.

This wide, shallow bowl came out great. I was very pleased with the size and shape, as well as the glazing. I dipped it in "Morty's Green" first, then the other side in the lighter "Celery." The overlapping of the two glazes gave the bluish green shade in the middle.
About 2.5" high by 9" in diameter, I call it a pasta bowl, but it could be for salads, too, I suppose. I might make four smaller matching bowls, and sell it as a set.

This 5 inch tall vase of white clay is glazed in "Ironstone," with a rim of "Saturation Gold."

This 9" diameter plate of brown clay turned out pretty well, with only a tiny warp. (Plates are tough to get right.) I dipped approximately 2/3's of it in "Tomato" and then the other 1/3 in "Blue Rutile." I then drizzled some more blue over the tomato section. Interesting effects, I thought.

I should have wireless Internet at Wildacres, in Little Switzerland, NC, so I hope to post from there with pottery workshop updates and insights. I'm also taking my binoculars, to do a little birding on the side. The mountains of western North Carolina should be good for some interesting birding, maybe even a Life Brown-headed Nuthatch.

It's that time of year again.

The time of year when I start getting the dreaded phone calls. They all start out differently:

"I found an orphaned (fawn, rabbit.)" "I found a (bird, squirrel) out of its nest." "We picked up a (turtle, frog, salamander) from the woods."

Then, the kicker, the question that all these calls have in common: "What do I feed it?"

AARRGGHH!!!!!

"What do I feed it?" depends on the exact age and species of the critter in question, which most people don't know. It is practically impossible for the average person to concoct a balanced diet for any wild thing, even when they know exactly what they have.

"What do I feed it?" ignores the bigger question, "How do I house it?" Besides food, every species of wild animal has specific habitat needs - the right temperature, humidity, amount of daylight, contact with their own kind, etc., etc. - none of which you can replicate in your home.

"What do I feed it?" means that some well-meaning but ignorant person has just kidnapped a wild animal and taken it home. It means that the wild animal is doomed to die, usually a slow painful death caused by malnutrition, improper habitat, stress, and exposure to environmental hazards. Even if it does survive, it will never lead a normal, wild, free life, but will be kept artificially for however long it lives.

So, once again, from the beginning:

When you find an apparently orphaned animal in the wild, LEAVE IT ALONE. Most babies are NOT abandoned. Does, both rabbits and deer, are working moms. They care for their babies in the early morning, then they go off to work, leaving their young in a safe, sheltered place. They come home at night, after feeding and avoiding predators all day, to feed the kids their dinner. How would you like to go to work in the morning only to come home and find your children had been stolen while you were away?

If you find young, feathered birds hopping around on the ground, they are fledglings. They are supposed to be there, and you can bet their moms (and maybe dads, too) know where the kids are, so LEAVE THEM ALONE. Corral your cats, dogs, and human children and walk away.

If you find birds or squirrels that are obviously too small to be out of the nest, try to find the original nest and PUT THEM BACK. If you can't find the nest, use an appropriate sized plastic container to make an artificial nest. Punch drainage holes in the bottom and line it with DRIED grass or leaves. Wire the nest to the tree or bush as near to the original spot as you can find, put the babies in it, then LEAVE THEM ALONE.

While it is cool to pick up a box turtle or garter snake, or to scoop up a crayfish, tadpole, or amphibian in a clean container for brief observation, DON'T take them home and put them in a tank. How would you like it if aliens swooped down on you during the course of your normal day, took you to the Mother Ship and kept you confined?

If you find an injured baby or adult wild animal, call a wildlife rehabilitator or your local game warden. DON'T call your dog and cat vet. Rehabbers are required to have state and/or federal permits to keep and care for wild animals, and most of us vets aren't qualified to do this work. In some cases, it is illegal for us to have them in our buildings, and we definitely aren't allowed to keep and treat them.

"But" you say, "what if the animal is sick or injured and I can't find someone to take care of it? It will die."

Yes, it will die. Nature is not kind. Many wild things die. If they didn't, we would be up to our eyeballs in rabbits. Most of the wild things you pick up and try to hand raise are going to die, too. The difference is, when it dies in your care, it will go to the landfill. When an animal is injured in the wild, it goes to feed predators or scavengers. Snakes, owls, hawks, and vultures have familes to feed, too, you know.

The incident that started this rant happened today. Someone came by with a "puppy" they found this weekend. It was in a box that was tossed out of the car ahead of them as they drove through the state park. They pulled over, opened the box, and found a "skinny, brown puppy" that they named "Pickle" and took home to their cat and small child. Funny thing is, this "puppy" was not a dog. It was a young coyote, about 8 to 12 weeks old by its teeth (assuming coyote pups shed their baby teeth on the same schedule as dogs.)

Because this pup was not afraid of people and was used to eating dog food, I hypothesized that it had been in captivity for some time. Given the story I was told, I concluded that someone else had picked up this baby at 4 to 6 weeks old, taken it home, and then either a) discovered that they had a coyote, not a dog or b) knew it was a coyote from the beginning, but had second thoughts or got caught with it. Either way, they decided to dump it. Nice.

Enter the rescuers. When I told them they had a coyote, I also told them they couldn't keep it. Now, it becomes MY responsiblity to deal with it. The pup was too young and too imprinted on people to just turn it loose, so I called the Ohio Dept of Natural Resources regional office, hoping to push my problem off on the authorities. Turns out, no one wants your orphaned coyote pups. There is an open season on hunting coyotes, and no one wants to rehab an animal that is imprinted on people only to turn it loose to be killed by hunters. Great.

Bottom line, the ODNR guy instructed me to euthanize it. Double great.

So, thus ends my day and my rant. Do me a favor. Don't pick up wild things, but if you must, don't call me.

Edit: Tues. Yet another phone call - People who picked up and raised an orphaned litter of squirrels, who aren't calling with a "What do I feed it?" question, but instead are asking "What do I do with it now?" Well, now you are in trouble, because your squirrels are A) Imprinted on people and B) Completely unable to fend for themselves. Now, you have to teach them how to be squirrels, including to be afraid of people.

And here are the results

We uncovered the pit Monday night and fished out the pots. Some of them were still hot, 48 hours later. Gloves and tongs were required to move them.

First the aluminum foil and any remaining material, like burnt copper scrubby pads, was peeled away, then the pots were washed.

click on any photo to enlarge

Afterward washing, a protective coating is applied to the finished pot. I used liquid floor wax, but paste furniture or car wax can be used as well. Here are my results:
The black iron oxide details I painted on this pot didn't take, and washed off during the cleaning process. All I got was some gray smoke patterns. Simple, plain, attractive perhaps, but not what I was hoping for.

Two sides of the same pot:

First, I incised the stylized grass pattern in the leather-hard clay before bisque firing. After it was fired, I painted red iron oxide in the grooves. The black lines come from a length of baling twine that I soaked in a salt brine solution. When dried, the twine was wrapped around the pot.
Next, I encased the twine-wrapped pot in a copper scrubbing pad. You can see the effect in the pattern of dark dots scattered over the surface. Finally, I wrapped the whole thing in a dry rag that had been soaked in a concentrated solution of Miracle Grow.

Red iron oxides were used for the spiral on this shallow vessel. I tried to follow the spiral pattern I made in the wet clay when I threw this piece.

An "altered art" piece. When throwing it, I goofed up, and what was intended to be a mug became a flop instead. (Sorry, Kyle. Still working on your coffee mug!)
So, I decided to experiment. This pot was filled with dried horse manure and then wrapped in brine-soaked baling twine. (Did I mention that none of the pit fire pieces are food safe?)

The results were less than stellar.

Again, showing two sides of the same piece. The uneven nature of the pit fire often leads this sort of schizophrenia.

This pot was also encased in a copper scrub pad, then a Miracle Grow rag.

The pattern made by the copper links is particularly evident here.

So, there you have it. The unusual and unpredictable conclusion of this year's pit firing. Each year, we learn more about what to expect (In fact, I have a few ideas for next year already) but as I am quickly discovering, this process continues to surprise us.

Let's make some fire!

Last Saturday was the annual pit firing party at Scarborough Fair pottery. After we make our pots and bisque-fire them, they are decorated with a variety of components and put into a pit in the ground for a second firing with wood. The combination of chemicals and heat sometimes produces lovely color patterns on our primitive wares. Unfortunately, it may also produce muck. Part of the thrill of a pit firing is never knowing what you are going to get, just like a "box of chawk-lets."

Decorating the pots: We used low-fire or raku glazes, banana peels, coffee grounds, sisal twine soaked in salt brine and dried, iron oxides, copper sulfate, Jello granules, dried horse manure, copper scrubby pads, and a paste made of Miracle Grow fertilizer, among other things. Then, the pots were wrapped tightly in aluminum foil.

Wrapped pots awaiting the pit.

The pit, a permanent hole in the ground in Peggy's side yard, has a metal pipe leading into one end and another pipe out the opposite corner, to allow for air flow. Prior to firing, Peggy fills the bottom with fresh sawdust and adds some dry hay.

The wrapped pots are placed into the pit.

Smaller or delicate pieces are covered with an inverted terra cotta flower pot, called a sagger, to protect it from breakage should a heavy piece of wood fall on it.

"Chemical bombs," wads of newspaper containing who-knows-what sort of toxic chemicals, are added to the mix. This is the one day of the year that I turn my back on the environment.

Once all the pots were loaded into the pit, we bunched up lots of old newspapers and scattered them over the pots.
Last year's fire was slow to start, so this year, Fire Marshall Ken elected to heap charcoal briquettes in one corner to stimulate rapid acceleration.

Then, we began to transfer a huge pile of twigs, branches, and other yard waste to the pit. I think this is how Peggy gets us to clean up her yard debris every year!
Everybody helps, each to his or her own level of ability.

Finally, we get a mound of wood that looks like this:

Ken, Chief Arsonist in Charge, adds lighter fluid to the brittle, dry cedar to get this conflagration under way.

Peggy lights the first match.

Several matches and cigarette lighter attempts later, we make fire!

After the flames die down, the pit is covered with sheets of metal roofing, creating an oven to bake our prizes.

Safety first: The area around the pit was sprayed down with water before we lit the fire and several times after we covered it, till we were as certain as we could be that no flames would escape.

Eating and resting after our labors.

The next phase comes Monday night, when we unload the pit, clean off our treasures, and discover what we have accomplished. Photos to follow ...