Small stealth Dakota fire Pit

[riverwye]

Hello folks,
I have been toying with the idea of constructing a Dakota Fire Pit for stealthy wild camping now for some time to eliminate the need to carry a stove or build a traditional above ground fire.

For those interested, here is a link [video=youtube_share;_6JPuayw2Z4]https://youtu.be/_6JPuayw2Z4[/video] to a video I made showing how I got on constructing and using this underground fire method.

Paul

 

[Jaeger]

Aye Up riverwye,

I first came across the Dakota fire pit during formal survival training (several!) decades ago where it was described as the method used by North American Indians for heating and cooking inside their teepees.

The one demonstrated had an air inlet tunnel AND a smoke outlet tunnel, the latter constructed from used compo ration tins opened up at each end and used end-to-end to create a sub-surface, horizontal chimney pipe to carry the smoke some distance away from the fire (where it was dissipated within foliage).

The inlet and outlet tunnels were not directly opposite one another where they entered the fire pit but offset (think 6 and two on a clock face - 6 (inlet) facing into wind).

A useful bi-product was that sleeping over the 'chimney' also provided a small degree of 'under floor' heating (for one person - the Chief - (Instructor)) for at least as long as the fire was kept going and a little beyond.

They were by no means a true 'stealth' fire as there can be a fair amount of smoke on start up and not forgetting the ground sign from the excavation.

CRUCIALLY - In 'Bushcraft World' - any demo of this technique should be accompanied by at least the following caveats

1. Do not create close to trees due to possible damage to root systems either through the digging and/or the heat;
2. Do not create in peat soil or in woodland where there is deep leaf litter deposit.
3. Do it on private land - at your own risk!

Below is an example of a fire in woodland reigniting 24 hours AFTER the 'stealth' campers believed that they had extinguished it appropriately.

 

[santaman2000]

Aye Up riverwye,

I first came across the Dakota fire pit during formal survival training (several!) decades ago where it was described as the method used by North American Indians for heating and cooking inside their teepees....

Seems unlikely though. The purpose for this fire pit was/is to have a fire in high winds common on the prairie; meaning outside as there are no high winds inside a Teepee. Interestingly the conical design of the teepee is also to withstand those same prairie winds.

Fortunately for them most of the safety rules you posted don't apply on that prairie: no trees or peat to worry about. But the warning about private land is reversed here; it's frowned upon on public land (open range) but nobody else's business on your own land (private)

 

[Robson Valley]

I see the teepee as it's own chimney = the apex is open and the wind flaps help to vent the smoke.
The geometry of the thing is brilliant.
Dedicated cold air intake is hard to rig up in dry prairie sod, the consistency of brick.
However, winter camp pit houses were 4-6' into the ground and many did have a stone-covered cold air intake channel in the floor.

I like the stealth concept but the smell will give you away, every time. I see some fuel stoves so compact and light,
so fast to ignite and very little smell, you could eat and be gone before anyone was the wiser.

"Prairie wool." The dead debris of the grass cover. High speed prairie fire storms were certainly dangerous.
I don't know how many times I was sternly lectured to as a kid on the Regina plains about the dangers of burning dry grass.
And, fire appears to have sustained the grassland biome by destroying stands of young aspen saplings from the Parkland just to the north.

Geologically, the Boreal Forest Biome followed the melting of the glaciers of that most recent ice age, some 8,000 - 10,000 years ago.
We don't really have soils with organic content. Not even in the valley bottoms without intensive agricultural practices.

What you do find in this forest is 6-12" dead needles, twigs and leaf debris over a mineral base.
Get an underground fire going in that and even with suppression, it could flare up again, next summer!

 

[C_Claycomb]

Paul,

This scheme of yours doesn't scan all that well. What it sounds like is that you want to be able to have a fire when you camp somewhere you do not have permission to be, or have permission to have a fire. That is not something that this site condones. Further, in this crowded isle, the creed of "leave no trace" camping is even more important, whether you are stealth/trespass camping or not. Fires are hard enough to disguise, but the earth works needed for this arrangement seem even harder to make disappear. If the aim is leaving no trace and having a low footprint, a stove is going to be the way to go.

Also, saying you want to eliminate the need for carrying a stove by cooking on something that you use garden gauntlets, a heavy trowel and a bit of grill racking to produce...LOL

It is a neat bit of bushcraft, but its the apparent reasons for practising it that don't stack up.