Tips for Making a Fire Pit Inside Your Tipi

It might feel a little dangerous to have a fire pit inside a tipi if you are unfamiliar with how tipis have traditionally been used. But the truth is people have been lighting fires inside these temporary homes for hundreds of years.

The American Plains Indians used tipis widely as their primary living quarters, and would have fires in the center of them for warmth, food and for gathering around and sharing stories and memories.

Designed for Fire Pits in Utah

When you think about it, the shapes of tipis are perfectly conducive to having fires inside of them. They have a wide circular base, and the fire gets positioned directly in the center. The smoke can rise up through the hole at the top.

Today’s modern tipis have canvases that often are designed with smoke caps on the top that can be pulled back with ropes, allowing for an easy escape for the smoke.

Of course, when you’re lighting a fire inside your tipi, you’re going to want to do everything in your power to avoid a huge buildup of smoke on the interior. With this in mind, below are some tips that can help you out. This is useful information to keep in mind even if you’re experienced with making fires in other settings.

Avoid letting the fire burn down too low

You should try to keep a regular flow of logs going on to the fire. If you forget to add more logs and then try to put a few too many back on to get it burning again, this will just serve to create a lot of smoke. Therefore, if you’ve got a fire lit inside your tipi, always keep an eye on it, and keep one person or team of people specifically focused on stoking the fire and tending to it.

Make sure you use the proper wood

Just as there are firewood type guidelines for inside a fireplace in your home, there are also certain types of wood you should or should not use inside a tipi.

You should avoid birch bark, which gives off a lot of black soot, as well as pine stumps and spruce wood, which give off flying sparks. You can find smokeless logs at a lot of hardware stores across the country, and those will give great results. Other types of hardwood are also going to be less likely to produce sparks or smoke you’d expect out of softer woods.

Avoid putting any debris in the fire—just wood.

Clean It and Keep It Safe

Make sure the fireplace is clean and free of ash and debris every time you’re about to start a new fire. This will cut down on smoke significantly.

Always respect fire whenever you’re using it. It must be treated with care to ensure your safety with its use. Be responsible with what you keep near the open flames, and keep children away. There should at least be one sober person in charge of tending the fire. For more information about making a fire pit in Utah inside your tipi, contact us today.

Categorised in: Teepee Poles

This post was written by Writer