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Blazes painted on a tree, photograph taken along Hunter's Creek Park, near East Aurora, New York, October 10, 2020, by the Author.
This
is this is the second
of a series of articles, you can find the first article called “There
and Back Again...Finding Your Way©”, HERE
– Authors Note.
Sometimes
you are following a trail that has been well marked with flags or painted
rectangles on the trunks of nearby trees or piles of rocks alongside the path,
rock piles being frequently used if you are above the tree line or are in a
desert or other treeless place. Other
times you are blazing your own trail and are making and marking a path as you
go. Now you should always practice your “Leave No Trace” manners and not
disturb the wilderness any more than you must when you travel through it,
however in an emergency all bets are off!
In an
Emergency...
 |
Trail markers, an excerpt from The Book Of Woodcraft, by Ernest Thompson Seton, page 162-163.
In an emergency, if you must move, you should mark
your trail as you walk, so that you can find your way back again if you must. This is called trail marking and you can mark
your trail with broken branches, piled stones, arrows made of twigs, twists of
grass, or blazes. There
are two reasons why, in the case of an emergency, you should mark your trail, one,
you might have to retrace your footsteps or, two, other people, such as
rescuers, might be looking for you and it will make it easier for them to
follow you1. But just how should you mark your trail is
the question, since there are many ways that you can mark your trail in an
emergency, and how and with what you mark it depends mostly on what is at hand
around you in the wilderness.
Signs in
twigs...
 |
An excerpt from The Book Of Woodcraft, by Ernest Thompson Seton, page 162-163.
Like
the twig signs in the excerpt from Ernest Thompson Seton’s The Book Of
Woodcraft, shown above, you could break or bend over branches so that the
tips of the branches point in the direction you travelled. If you come to a
trail intersection, and turned either to the right or left, bend or break a
branch so that its tip points towards your new direction of travel. Remember the undersides of leaves are lighter
in color than are the tops, remembering this will help you to find your trail
marks later if you return along the trail.
 |
A Japanese knotweed broken to show the direction of travel, the red arrow points in the direction I travelled. Note how the undersides of the leaves are lighter than the top side of the leaves, photograph by the Author.
The Native Americans also used to mark trails by bending saplings down
so that their tips pointed in the direction of a trail or their travel. Often these trees would survive and continue to
grow and the branches along the bent trunk would grow into new trunks. Sometimes, if you are lucky, you can still
find one!
 |
This was likely an “Indian Trail Tree” since it was located near a known Seneca trail which led toward a favorite passenger pigeon roost, photograph taken by the Author, along the Hearts Content Trail, Allegheny National Forest, October 22, 2010.
You could also mark your trail with arrows made of twigs or stones
that point towards your direction of travel, like in the picture below. Ernest Thompson Seton showed laying broken branches
on the trail with the butt (wide) end, pointing in your direction of travel.
 |
Marking a trail with arrows, photograph by the Author.
Signs
in stones...
 |
An excerpt from The Book Of Woodcraft, by Ernest Thompson Seton, page 162-163.
Or you could mark your trail with piled up rocks, which are called cairns
or “ducks”, or piles of snow, ice, or wood.
 |
Examples of piled rocks marking a trail, on the left “this is the trail” and on the right “important warning”, photographs by the Author.
 |
Examples of piled rocks marking a trail, on the left “turn left” and on the right “turn right”, photographs by the Author.
Signs
in grass...
 |
An excerpt from The Book Of Woodcraft, by Ernest Thompson Seton, page 162-163.
You could even twist and knot bundles of grass together to mark your
trail.
Signs
in blazes...
 |
An excerpt from The Book Of Woodcraft, by Ernest Thompson Seton, page 162-163.
You might even blaze trees, if necessary. Blazes are simply hack marks or gashes
through the bark that expose the light-colored wood underneath and are made
with an axe or heavy fixed bladed knife.
One blaze is made on the side of the tree in the direction you are
traveling and two are made on the return side of the tree. Old fashioned blazes are today called “etchings”
and modern blazes, which are still commonly used to mark paths2, are
now painted rectangles!
 |
An excerpt from Better Ways Of Pathfinding, by Robert S. Owendoff, page, on blazing trees in an emergency.
Gashing
the bark of trees to make blazes can leave marks that will last a longtime, and
can disfigure the tree, so this method should only be used in emergencies. The picture below is a picture of a blaze
made on a tree that grew near the shore of Lake Louisa in Algonquin Provincial
Park. It survived being blazed and had
even started to scar over when it died.
It was blazed sometime in the early to middle years of the 1900s!
 |
Blazes can last a long time, a decades old, blazed tree, found on the shore of Lake Louisa in Algonquin Provincial Park, during July 2015, photograph by the Author.
Don’t forget to come back next week and read “There And Back
Again...Walking in Circles ©”, where we will talk about how and why human
beings tend to walk in circles, unless they are following a trail, using a
compass or practicing “beelining”! Also
continue to come back, because this is the first of a series of
articles where we will be discussing some of the
points raised in this article in greater depth.
 |
Following a trail, photograph taken along the Earl Cardot Eastside Overland Trail, October 20, 2014, by the Author.
I
hope that you continue to enjoy The Woodsman’s Journal Online and look for me
on YouTube at Bandanaman Productions for other related videos, HERE. Don’t forget to follow me on both The
Woodsman’s Journal Online, HERE,
and subscribe to BandanaMan Productions on YouTube. If you have questions, as always, feel free
to leave a comment on either site. I
announce new articles on Facebook at Eric Reynolds, on Instagram at
bandanamanaproductions, and on VK at Eric Reynolds, so watch for me.
That
is all for now, and as always, until next time, Happy Trails!
Notes
1 Doing this will also help rescuers, who might be searching for you,
but remember they can’t find you if you keep moving, so if you don’t have to
move stay put!
2 Below
are some trail side blazes that you would commonly see on paths today.
 |
The most common blaze marks, from Wikimedia, HERE.
 |
Examples of trail marking blazes in Hunters Creek County Park, East Aurora, New York. The left picture shows a double blaze and indicates that there is a right turn ahead and the right picture also shows a double blaze and means that there is a left turn ahead. Photographs by the Author.
 |
Examples of trail marking blazes in Hunters
Creek County Park, East Aurora New York.
The left picture shows a single blaze which means that the trail
continues straight, the right picture shows a double blaze indicates an
upcoming turn (this blaze was described in “Humpback Rocks Hiking Trails” by the
National Park Service, U.S. Department of the
Interior), photographs by the Author.
Sources
Del Giudice, Nick; “The
Marks of a True Trail”, June 29, 2018, [© 2021 American Forests], https://www.americanforests.org/blog/the-marks-of-a-true-trail/,
accessed September 17, 2021
Hodgkins, Kelly; How to Read Hiking Trail
Signs, Markers and Blazes, updated January 16, 2021, [© 2021 Greenbelly Meals],
https://www.greenbelly.co/pages/how-to-read-hiking-trail-signs-markers-blazes, accessed September 17, 2021
Owendoff, Robert S.; Better Ways Of
Pathfinding, [The Stackpole Company, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, 1964], page
34
National Park Service,
U.S. Department of the Interior, “Humpback Rocks Hiking Trails”, https://www.nps.gov/blri/planyourvisit/humpback-rocks-trails.htm, accessed September 17, 2021
Tawrell, Paul; Camping and Wilderness
Survival, 2nd, [Paul Tawrell, Lebanon, New Hampshire, 2006],
page 41
Wikimedia,
“The most common symbols used in trail blazing”, April 7, 2007, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Trail_blaze-symbols.svg,
accessed September 17, 2021
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