Bark slabs and strips can be dried and stored at any stage. Heavy slabs may need soaking for more than a day to reconstitute them. Thin strips may need only a half-hour in warm water. Inner barks are sometimes pounded and stripped even finer for the weaving of cloth-like items such as the cedar bark blankets of the Northwest coast. Soak the large strips until the papery layers start to come apart by themselves. Then lay the strip on a flattened log and gently pound it with another piece of wood. Pounding with a rock tends to break the fibers instead of separating them.

Sometimes you can find “road kill” bark slabs that have been run over by logging trucks so many times that they have separated out into perfect fluffy shreds. Log yards are good places to find many kinds of bark, but ask first.

Another type of bark that is good for rough weaving, especially twining, is the soft, dry, shreddy outer bark which exfoliates, or hangs in festoons off of the branches. Try to gather not the outermost layers, but the layers between these and the live bark. These are the strongest. These dry barks need only to be rubbed or rolled between the palms to break up the clumps.

Try the following dry barks: sagebrush (Artemsia sp.), ninebark (Physocarpus capitatus), antelope brush (Purshia sp.), cliff rose (Cowania sp.), evening primrose (Oenothera hookerii), clematis (Clematis sp.) and reedgrass (Phragmites sp.).

Vines

Nature’s twining and climbing plants are naturals for basketry, but they are not always as strong as you might think, they need support for their growth and often have weak wood themselves. Vines are seldom used in traditional basketry, but there are some exceptions. Experiment. They need no preparation at all, or you may want to split them once to get more mileage out of your material.

Try the following vines: grape vine (Vitis spp.), traditional in the west for rim finishes; honeysuckle (Lonicera sp.), traditional in Northern California and the Southeast; clematis, morning glory (Ipomoea sp.); blackberry (Rubus spp.), especially the native variety called devil’s shoelaces; wisteria (Wisteria sp.); and kudzu (Pueraria lobata).

Seed Pods

This tiny section is added to include the useful and fascinating devil’s claw pod (Proboscidea fragrans or Proboscidea parviflora) of the Southwest. It has been cultivated by the native peoples of Arizona for centuries, selected for its long black hooks on the pods. This is an easy annual to grow, but needs ample heat to produce good pods.

Collect the pods before the green sheath has completely fallen to prevent the sun from bleaching out the color. Split the claws in half, either directly on the pod or cut them off at the point where the claw joins the pod. Lay the claw on a board, stick an awl into the middle of it at the tip end, and pull the claw away to start the split. Continue the split as described above. Some weavers start the split from the fat end of the claw.

The fibers are very short in comparison to other weavers but they are incredibly strong. They are used mainly in coiled basketry for the black design, especially at the start of the basket where it receives the most wear. Some modern weavers incorporate the whole pods, like little alien heads, into fantastic art basketry.

Leaves and Grass

Leaves and grasses are widely used but usually in the more impermanent baskets or those destined to be used, like brown paper bags, until they fall apart. There are some notable exceptions, however, such as the yucca baskets of the Southwest and the tule baskets of the Plateau. Most leaves and grasses require a minimum of preparation. Those that are used for structural basketry are listed here. Those that are used for non-structural decoration are listed in the next section.

Tules, cattails, rushes, palm leaves and iris may be used in soft basketry where there is no strength requirement. These may be weavers or foundation.

In Klamath Lake and Modoc basketry, tules are carefully sized down into strips and tightly twined on a cordage foundation. Different parts—culms, basal leaves and roots—give different colors. These tule baskets were used for everything including hot rock boiling.

The grasses listed below can be used as bundle foundation in coiled basketry. They don’t have the strength or flexibility to make the turns necessary for weaving. Wheat straw is an exception. Used for centuries in the Celtic nations, it is soaked and woven into “corn dollies” at harvest time. According to legend, the spirit of the grain lives in the weaving until the next planting season when it is buried in the new fields. New Zealand flax is an import used a lot in landscaping. It is used in traditional Maori weaving and is exceptionally strong, either whole or separated into cordage fibers.

Try the following leaves and grasses: yucca (Yucca sp.) and agave (Agave sp.), tule (Scirpus sp.), cattail (Typha sp.) including juncus rush (Juncus acutus), palm (Phoenix sp.), and iris (Iris spp.), New Zealand flax, bunch grasses including wild oats (Avena sp.), wild rye grass (Secale sp.), salt grass (Spartina spp.), wheat straw (Triticum spp.), sweet grass (Anthoxanthum sp.) and southern beargrass (Dasylirion sp.).

Yuccas, agaves and their kin are technically leaves but their structure requires some preparation. Only the narrow-leafed yuccas, such as Yucca elata and Nolina species have the flexibility to be used whole. To prepare yucca leaves for weaving, let fresh leaves wilt for about half a day. This relaxes them so they don’t crack in splitting. Split the leaves flatwise as described above and trim them to the desired size. Leaves collected in early spring from the center of the plant are pure white like a cauliflower. The green leaves will eventually turn yellow.

Some yuccas and agaves can be retted and pounded to remove all but the inner fibers. These are suitable for cordage or bundle coiling particularly at the start of the basket. You can do this carefully and leave the thorn at the end of the leaf, especially on agaves. This is a natural sewing needle with the thread attached. Be careful of agaves. Some species, mainly the large century plants used in garden plantings, are toxic, producing a bad rash in most people. I have had no problem with the small native Agave desertii.

Wood Splints

In spring, when the sap begins to flow, a tree will produce a spurt of growth which is visible as a ring. In winter the tree grows more slowly. Trees produce a ring of growth each year. A healthy, fast-growing tree will have wide growth rings. These layers of wood can be separated into strips and used for weaving exceptionally strong plaited and wicker baskets.

Find a straight-grained, medium-sized tree in the growing season and cut it. You can use limbs if they are straight. Cut it into three-to-six-foot lengths and remove the bark. Make a score into the first ring of wood the length of the log, this gets a splint started. Begin pounding to one side of the score with a hard wooden mallet. Old, wooden bowling pins work well. A good log will begin breaking apart into flat strips along the spring growth rings. When you get a good section loosened, grab the end of the strip and pull it off of the log. Work the outside of the log first, and continue down into the lower growth rings. It is important to do this as soon as you can after you cut the log. The rough strips can be thinned by splitting flatwise as described above, or they can be planed down with metal shaves.

Try the following trees: ash (Fraxinus sp.), oak (Quercus sp), hickory (Carya sp.) and maple (Acer sp).

Decorative Overlay Materials

Though a strong, functional basket can be made with the materials described above, most people delight in the decoration of even the most common household tools. The following materials have been used by native peoples in the west to give color and shine to their weaving, though they are weak and brittle by themselves. These materials are used by laying them over or wrapping them around a stronger weaving material during the basket making process. Overlay twining, wrapped twining, false embroidery and imbrication are all techniques done with these materials. Some of the shoot and root materials listed above are both strong and have a dark, contrasting color.