James:
Here is a dry topic that most people have no skill in they just rely on the old Indian fire trick (liquid fuel on wet wood) which is wasteful, dangerous, and teaches you nothing. My school of thought is as follows:
Carry two major tools:
2 or more – butane/flint lighters
1 – Longer life flammable (such as Hexamine fuel tablets or bars and/or a 15 minute road flare)
The butane lighter can be quickly dried and burns for many minutes about as well as hundreds of strike anywhere matches in a match safe. The flint over
electrical ignition makes a bright spark which while not a real strobe is visible in darkness. Carry several they are super cheap and easily replaced.
Flame transfer can be a pocketful of tea-lites (candles in aluminum tins), oil and floating wick in jar, or a Hexamine Esbit stove brick. What we are looking for
is something which will transfer enough heat into your collected fuel to dry and ignite it.
American style road flares can not be carried in large numbers in your pack but in a real hypothermic emergency that pop-fizzzz and knowing you have enough
fire to light all but the wettest fuels is a comfort.
Another home brew gadget for lighting fires is carrying a short length of of brass tubing with several feet of surgical
tube (doesn’t get stiff when cold) to blow air to feed a small flame if you can get it started with matches/sparks. The Coleman battery-powered air mattress
inflaters also work for this application. Some aluminum foil can help concentrate heat in a tiny
incipient fire, practice using it.