Weblog:Make natural quills and ink very easily - Revision history

70.150.198.66: /* Next next steps */

2012-11-15T18:54:38Z

‎Next next steps

24.147.147.255: /* The ink: */

2010-06-12T18:33:21Z

‎The ink:

Seth: Blog:Make quills and ink very easily moved to Blog:Make natural quills and ink very easily

2009-01-06T02:06:52Z

Blog:Make quills and ink very easily moved to Blog:Make natural quills and ink very easily

Seth: /* Next next steps */

2009-01-06T02:06:16Z

‎Next next steps

Seth at 02:04, 6 January 2009

2009-01-06T02:04:04Z

Seth at 02:03, 6 January 2009

2009-01-06T02:03:05Z

Seth at 02:01, 6 January 2009

2009-01-06T02:01:32Z

Seth at 01:43, 6 January 2009

2009-01-06T01:43:58Z

New page

I've been experimenting with fast an easy methods for making quills and ink. Here is what I know. I'll start with the simplest possible functional account and provide little elaborations, it is an 80/20 thing, the first part gets you 70% of the way, and additional tweaks take you closer to perfection.

===The ink:===
*where
**In California, oak galls grow everywhere (on oak trees), but particularly in the central valley and places further from air pollution. They look like [http://www.torreypine.org/animals/Insects/Oak%20Gall.jpg this]. You'll inevitably stuble on some if you ever walk on anything that calls itself a trail.
**Throughout the Midwest, pick walnuts of any variety, pick them whole anywhere from yound to fully rotted and completely gross. They look like [http://z.about.com/d/forestry/1/0/G/l/bwalnut3.jpg this].
**Anywhere else, I don't know, hell, you can use coffee. Take the minimal instructions for a pen below and even coffee will work, espresso/turkish are best (darkest/most concentrated)
*To make more ink than you need take as few as two galls/nuts, soak them for a week in a mason jar or something. The amount of water you use is the amount of ink you will have, and you don't need as much as you will inevitably make. If you use oak galls, throw in an old nail, pin or anything made of iron, other wise it won't work.
*pour it into somethin you want to use as a ink well. That is the 70% ink, it sounds in-credibly easy, as in not believable, but that is real ink, that real people used to use. And it is beautiful, both start brown, the oak turns grey over the first two or three months.

===Next Steps===
*With just two weeks of soak and no boiling it will be on the light side. They next step, if you want to get way 20% closer to real ink, is to make it darker, soak for more than 2 weeks or boil it down. It might seem like wicked stuff, but you can use kitchen pots without worry, they will clean up fine.
*As for touching up, for that last 10% to real ink, you can do the following:
**When pouring into an ink well, pour it through an old sock or tshirt to strain out the plant parts, You can use a cheese cloth, if you don't mind it being permanently stained and a little less food-grade than it was when you started.
**My oak gall ink has molded over before. To fix that pour in rubbing alcohol or

← Older revision		Revision as of 18:54, 15 November 2012
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	===Next next steps===		===Next next steps===
−	I have learned to make paper yet, but once I've done that, I'll be able to send entirely naturally locally made letters: paper, envelope, ink, quill; all but the stamp. Let me know if any of this works for you. As you can see, all you have to do for ink is pick and soak. All you have to do for pen is pick and cut. How did we ever make this kind of knowledge abstruse and arcane?	+	I have not learned to make paper yet, but once I've done that, I'll be able to send entirely naturally locally made letters: paper, envelope, ink, quill; all but the stamp. Let me know if any of this works for you. As you can see, all you have to do for ink is pick and soak. All you have to do for pen is pick and cut. How did we ever make this kind of knowledge abstruse and arcane?

@@ Line 7: / Line 7: @@
 **Anywhere else, I don't know, hell, you can use coffee.  Take the minimal instructions for a pen below and even coffee will work, espresso/turkish are best (darkest/most concentrated).  It is actually really pretty.
 *To make more ink than you need take as few as two galls/nuts, soak them for a week in a mason jar or something.  You don't even have to slice or cute them.  The amount of water you use is the amount of ink you will have, and you don't need as much as you will inevitably make.  If you use oak galls, throw in an old nail, pin or anything made of iron, other wise it won't work.
 *pour it into somethin you want to use as a ink well.   That is the 70% ink, it sounds in-credibly easy, as in not believable, but that is real ink, that real people used to use.  And it is beautiful, both start brown, the oak turns grey over the first two or three months.
 ===Next Steps===

← Older revision		Revision as of 02:06, 6 January 2009
Line 32:		Line 32:

	===Next next steps===		===Next next steps===
−	I have learned to make paper yet, but once I've done that, I'll be able to send entirely naturally locally made letters, paper, envelope, ink, quill; all but the stamp. Let me know if this works for you.	+	I have learned to make paper yet, but once I've done that, I'll be able to send entirely naturally locally made letters: paper, envelope, ink, quill; all but the stamp. Let me know if any of this works for you. As you can see, all you have to do for ink is pick and soak. All you have to do for pen is pick and cut. How did we ever make this kind of knowledge abstruse and arcane?

@@ Line 5: / Line 5: @@
 **In California, oak galls grow everywhere (on oak trees), but particularly in the central valley and places further from air pollution.  They look like [http://www.torreypine.org/animals/Insects/Oak%20Gall.jpg this].  You'll inevitably stuble on some if you ever walk on anything that calls itself a trail.
 **Throughout the Midwest, pick walnut fruit of any variety, pick them whole anywhere from yound to fully rotted and completely gross.  Only contraindication to rot is you might see grub crawling if you handle them much.  They look like [http://z.about.com/d/forestry/1/0/G/l/bwalnut3.jpg this].
-**Anywhere else, I don't know, hell, you can use coffee.  Take the minimal instructions for a pen below and even coffee will work, espresso/turkish are best (darkest/most concentrated)
+**Anywhere else, I don't know, hell, you can use coffee.  Take the minimal instructions for a pen below and even coffee will work, espresso/turkish are best (darkest/most concentrated).  It is actually really pretty.
 *To make more ink than you need take as few as two galls/nuts, soak them for a week in a mason jar or something.  You don't even have to slice or cute them.  The amount of water you use is the amount of ink you will have, and you don't need as much as you will inevitably make.  If you use oak galls, throw in an old nail, pin or anything made of iron, other wise it won't work.
 *pour it into somethin you want to use as a ink well.   That is the 70% ink, it sounds in-credibly easy, as in not believable, but that is real ink, that real people used to use.  And it is beautiful, both start brown, the oak turns grey over the first two or three months.

← Older revision		Revision as of 02:03, 6 January 2009
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	*You will dip the pen every line or so.		*You will dip the pen every line or so.
	*You will sharpen the nib every 4 pages or so. It isn't bad.		*You will sharpen the nib every 4 pages or so. It isn't bad.
		+
		+
		+	===Next next steps===
		+	I have learned to make paper yet, but once I've done that, I'll be able to send entirely naturally locally made letters, paper, envelope, ink, quill; all but the stamp. Let me know if this works for you.

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
-I've been experimenting with fast an easy methods for making quills and ink.  Here is what I know.  I'll start with the simplest possible functional account and provide little elaborations, it is an 80/20 thing, the first part gets you 70% of the way, and additional tweaks take you closer to perfection.
+I've been experimenting with fast an easy methods for making quills and ink with natural materials v. likely in your ecosystem.  Here is what I know.  I'll start with the simplest possible functional account and provide little elaborations, it is an 80/20 thing, the first part gets you 70% of the way, and additional tweaks take you closer to perfection.
 ===The ink:===
 *where
 **In California, oak galls grow everywhere (on oak trees), but particularly in the central valley and places further from air pollution.  They look like [http://www.torreypine.org/animals/Insects/Oak%20Gall.jpg this].  You'll inevitably stuble on some if you ever walk on anything that calls itself a trail.
-**Throughout the Midwest, pick walnuts of any variety, pick them whole anywhere from yound to fully rotted and completely gross.  They look like [http://z.about.com/d/forestry/1/0/G/l/bwalnut3.jpg this].
+**Throughout the Midwest, pick walnut fruit of any variety, pick them whole anywhere from yound to fully rotted and completely gross.  Only contraindication to rot is you might see grub crawling if you handle them much.  They look like [http://z.about.com/d/forestry/1/0/G/l/bwalnut3.jpg this].
 **Anywhere else, I don't know, hell, you can use coffee.  Take the minimal instructions for a pen below and even coffee will work, espresso/turkish are best (darkest/most concentrated)
-*To make more ink than you need take as few as two galls/nuts, soak them for a week in a mason jar or something.  The amount of water you use is the amount of ink you will have, and you don't need as much as you will inevitably make.  If you use oak galls, throw in an old nail, pin or anything made of iron, other wise it won't work.
+*To make more ink than you need take as few as two galls/nuts, soak them for a week in a mason jar or something.  You don't even have to slice or cute them.  The amount of water you use is the amount of ink you will have, and you don't need as much as you will inevitably make.  If you use oak galls, throw in an old nail, pin or anything made of iron, other wise it won't work.
 *pour it into somethin you want to use as a ink well.   That is the 70% ink, it sounds in-credibly easy, as in not believable, but that is real ink, that real people used to use.  And it is beautiful, both start brown, the oak turns grey over the first two or three months.
@@ Line 13: / Line 13: @@
 *As for touching up, for that last 10% to real ink, you can do the following:
 **When pouring into an ink well, pour it through an old sock or tshirt to strain out the plant parts,  You can use a cheese cloth, if you don't mind it being permanently stained and a little less food-grade than it was when you started.
-**My oak gall ink has molded over before.  To fix that pour in rubbing alcohol or
+**My oak gall ink has molded over before.  To fix/prevent that pour in just the smallest dab of rubbing alcohol or any booze over 40 proof (stronger the better).  It turns out that the scribes did that too.  I think the walnut ink is nasty enough to keep infection out, I hear it is a natural insecticide.