The students are fabulous at problem solving. Alexandra took her knowledge of wood burning stoves to set up a schedule for the second team to mix the oak and the scrap wood for optimum heat and then for the third team, Monique designed a sandwich of a layer of poplar or pine, then oak, and then a layer of poplar and pine again. The temperature rose nicely but stalled and then we used only a mixture of poplar and pine to finish the firing. Ms Zhang cannot wait to open the kiln; she noticed all the beautiful colours in the ember bed. And once again we are all grateful to Keith and his table saw and Matt for bringing batteries that worked for the Oxyprobe. All of the students showed up and the first entry in the log book showed that the temperature today was warmer than when we fired in October. The wind wasn’t a problem either. The only nuisance was the damp.
Wool really helped! There was food and laughter and well…did I say blessed? We will open the kiln together on Friday but it is hard to wait. Oh, and leave it to Monique – she decided to burn an entire pallet!




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Published by maryannsteggles
I went to the UK as a Commonwealth Scholar in 1990 and received my PhD from the University of Leicester in 1993. After three decades of university teaching, I retired to devote my time to the study of raptor behaviour. I am particularly interested in Ospreys and am working on a long term project on third hatch survival and siblicide in these raptors. My blog is a result of a fascination with my local wildlife and the desire to encourage others to love and care for birds! I live on the Canadian Prairies and prior to the pandemic travelled a lot. I am questioning the use of aviation fuel at the moment as we all strive to help our planet. My early research was in politics and art including British public statues exported to Southeast Asia and Vietnam Resistors that contributed much to Canadian ceramics. Books and articles were published on those subjects over a period of 3 decades. Now I am working on books for children so they can learn about the challenges our raptors face.
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