Into the Woods: Dennis Henschell collected bottles and cans until Whole Foods shut its recycling center. Now, to draw inspiration for music, he says, “I ask the universe, ‘Give me some songs.’”

Dennis Henschell plays one of his homemade flutes next at his campsite.

Dennis Henschell unrolls his sleeping bag and sets up camp for the evening in Del Monte Forest.

Dennis Henschell uses a heated drill bit to burn air holes in the flute.

Dennis Henschell uses leather lace to tie a bird onto the flute.

Into the Woods: Dennis Henschell collected bottles and cans until Whole Foods shut its recycling center. Now, to draw inspiration for music, he says, “I ask the universe, ‘Give me some songs.’”

Dennis Henschell plays one of his homemade flutes next at his campsite.

Dennis Henschell unrolls his sleeping bag and sets up camp for the evening in Del Monte Forest.

Dennis Henschell uses a heated drill bit to burn air holes in the flute.

Dennis Henschell uses leather lace to tie a bird onto the flute.

Dennis Henschell is showing off a brown tarp. It’s his newest possession, a gift, and the first component of a new set of backup supplies in case his home is dismantled.

Considering all his belongings – which fit into a backpack and a gym bag – have been stolen three times in two years, Henschell is pleased to have the start of a spare stash. The 57-year-old is committed to the basics of his Boy Scout training: Always be prepared.

He builds his camp every afternoon following a well-established ritual. He carries his bags up a path near the Del Monte Shopping Center, stepping over a few small branches he’s laid across the trail; if they’re broken, that’s his cue cops or Pebble Beach security have been through for a sweep. He hangs his hoodie on an oak branch and unrolls his tent and sleeping bag. He’s got REI gear – lightweight, high-quality stuff. While his sleeping pad inflates, he positions his radio (for listening to Giants games) on a tent pole and his tools on a tree stump.

The stump is where Henschell sets up his backpacker’s stove to cook dinner. (Today he has no food, just a quarter-pound of bird seed he scatters in his campsite.) This clearing is where Henschell crafts flutes. He gathers bamboo from people’s yards, cuts it down with a Swiss Army knife, then makes holes with an upside-down drill bit wedged into a wide wooden dowel.

Today, Henschell’s biggest concern is that he’s nearly out of gas. The small canisters he buys for $6 each contain enough fuel to make three flutes. Plus, it’s a haul to REI from the forest by bus.

He heats the drill-bit contraption in the blue flame, then wedges the hot metal into a narrow hole in the bamboo, scorching out a wider one.

“The more crisp the angle, the better the quality of air going through,” Henschell says as a wisp of smoke rises.

“Let’s see how this one sounds,” he says, bringing the flute to his lips. It’s hollow and light, lacking the hearty, woody sound of one he likes better.

Since he became homeless five years ago, Henschell has made 175 flutes. He had worked as a restaurant manager, security guard and then as a handyman in Santa Cruz. After his Jeep Cherokee with all of his tools in it was stolen, Henschell was on the street.

Then he happened across an online guide at the library on making flutes. “I wanted to make something to keep from going insane,” he says.

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He prices his flutes depending on the style. Traditional Indian flutes are horizontal, easier to make and go for $40 each; Native American-style flutes, played vertically, go for $70.

At least theoretically. Years into this craft, Henschell has traded dozens but sold only four. Donovan Campbell, the manager of the Verizon store in downtown Monterey, owns two.

“They’re absolutely beautiful-sounding, traditional flutes. All you have to do is hit a note,” says Campbell, a percussionist. He says he’s quitting his Verizon gig to pursue music and finish a documentary about Monterey’s homeless community.

“As a fellow artist, seeing how he’s faring, I wanted to get a flute,” he says.

Henschell plays a flute with a hat out at Custom House Plaza or Fisherman’s Wharf, making $20 on a good morning. He relies on $200 a month in government assistance for food stamps but refuses to use pharmaceuticals or spend on health care. He does yoga daily in the forest and shows off an opening in his gum where he says he pulled out an achy tooth.

He hopes to someday have enough cash to rent a studio apartment.

“All I really need is a place to be,” he says. “I would have a chance to increase the number and type of flutes I make. And I could make wind chimes, bongs or plugs for kids [for piercings].” Now, he can’t carry more than six flutes. And he doesn’t want to risk hiding them.

Henschell talks about life in the forest in two eras: pre – and post-Occupy Wall Street. Before the movement expanded with an Occupy Monterey encampment in Veterans Park, Henschell says, the only people in Del Monte Forest were men over 50. (He calls them OGs: older guys.) He criticizes younger “travelers” passing through for bringing drugs and litter, and dismisses them as “the Occupy children that want to scoot their high chairs up to the table but not add to the table at all.”

His contribution: teaching people to play music. His sign offers free lessons, and he carries a baggie of antiseptic wipes for tourists who might be interested in trying a flute. He also carries a pretty tune on bamboo.

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