How to Make Rope / String With Natural Plant Fibers

The history of ropes is very old, there are traces of ropes dating back 20,000 years at that time there were no synthetic fibers or plastic derivatives as there are today, only natural fibers from plants and that is what I will try to reconstruct: how to make rope with plant fibers that we can find in our garden. Almost all plants have fibers, but some are more suitable for ropes because of their strength, such as flax, sisal, jute, etc.

My rope was made with a plant that unfortunately I don't know the name of but is used a lot in my area to tie things with the leaves.

Let's see the materials:

1º Part of the plant from which the fibers will be extracted

2º A hammer [ To crush the plant ]

3º An old comb [To remove the fleshy part of the plant and the broken fibers]

4º Water

The plants in the introduction are the most famous for their fibers but there are many other plants that can also be used to make rope such as the stem of the nettle [urtica] photo 4, the leaves of the agave [agave americana] photo 6 and many other plants, just you research the plants in your area that are fibrous.

The plant I used is the one in the photo 5

The first step is to crush the plant, stem, leaf etc. It is important to separate the fibers from the fleshy part. Avoid hitting them in the same place all the time because that way you will break the fibers and in the part where you pass the comb there will be many more loose fibers that will be a problem in addition to having less resistance to the rope at the end.

When you think it has been well crushed, leave it in water for about 10 minutes and then rinse it with water to remove most of the "useless" part.

Use a comb to remove the broken fibers and the fleshy part, when most of it has been removed, leave it in water for another 10 minutes (preferably hot) and rinse.

Now you have to separate the fibers, as I'm going to make a braid I'm going to separate 3 sets, but it could also be a 4 braid. And pass the comb again in case there is any damaged fiber to be removed.

When ready, let it dry for 1 to 4 hours depending on the weather.

When it's dry, start twisting the cords to give them more firmness and make a knot at each end so it doesn't start to unravel.

In the pictures you can see better what I'm saying

Now you have to make the braid , as I said before I will do it with 3 strings but you can do it with 4 .

If you don't know how to do it, ask your sister, wife, girlfriend, they will know how to do it.

In the beginning you have to tie a knot in the 3 strings and in the end the same thing, I left two longer strings to be able to tie something at the end of the rope.

To improve the look, you can cut the fibers that stick out with scissors because even with the comb there can always be some broken, Now you already have a real rope made only of natural fibers and better than that, you made it yourself.

In addition, it is 100% diodegradable, that is, if you lose it in nature, it will decompose leaving no residue.

As for the weight you can lift, I tested lifting 4 5-liter bottles with the rope, totaling 20 kg, approximately 45 lb, and everything was ok, but I think I could handle much more.

This is an excellent bushcraft project to do in 2 hours.

Thank you and see you next time