Folding Belt Knives
If you hunt out of a truck, (example: bear with dogs) you will be getting in and out of your vehicle a lot. Usually, your pistol hangs off one side and your knife hangs on the other, so you end up (pun intended) sitting on one of them.
Folding belt knives are almost as effective as good hunting knives. You can fix your knife so it has a one-hand opening stud and a bolster hole, but the lookback feature on the blade has to come from the factory. Lookback folders carry up, out of the way. and are concealed by most jackets. You won’t even know it’s there unless you reach for it. Of course, folders are not the knife of choice to use for cooking; food particles stuck to the blade work their way into the handle crevice and will create a high bacteria count on the blade’s cutting edge.
Several companies make folders with more than one blade, so you get a variety of good uses out of the same handle. Remington’s Big Game knife provides a lock-back for both blades. One clip blade penetrates and skins (somewhat), and the other has a gut hook on the end of a boning saw. Gut hooks are miserable to sharpen, and you shouldn’t need to cut through bone in the field. Animals were designed by God to come apart at the joints when tendons are cut.
If you’re thinking of buying a folding knife and it doesn’t have the blade lock-out feature, forget it. It’s only an overgrown pocket knife in a belt pouch, and when the blade collapses on your hand, you’ll bloody wish you’d bought the real thing.
One hunting season in Oregon, a folding knife was all I used. I dressed out a couple of deer and a bear with it. The knife was a little short for the tasks, but it was a dream to carry.
A marlinspike knife is for yachtsmen or fishermen. You use the spike for splicing rope and taking out knots that would never respond to finger picking. For hunters and outdoorsmen, however, ropes are being replaced with other fasteners, so the marlinspike knife may lose some popularity.
Fixed blade combat knives.
In my opinion, noone should buy a combat knife without buying a training knife made of rubber. If you own one and don’t practice with it, you’re just asking for trouble when you try and make it work for you. Path Finder’s philosophy on combat, however, is don’t. Knives get you into criminal trouble if you win because you assulted a lesser-armed villain with a deadly weapon. If you go up against an opponent with a firearm, you just give him an excuse to pull the trigger. Finally, in a tie. both parties to the conflict lose. Therefore, your chances are lose, lose, or go to jail. Bigger blades are better because they give you more reach. Therefore, you can extend your range from your opponent and move in when you have an opening. Consider, for example, the Mamba from Black Jack Knives. Cold Steel makes the TrailMaster, which is a long bowie-type blade. Tanto, also from Cold Steel is a good combat knife because the tip of the blade angles back so it slices nicely.
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