Helpful hint … also DO NOT use a fillet knife to slice a bagel … my SIL did and it took over 20 switched to close the gash between her thumb and index finger. My fillet knives stay razor sharp … and now not in the kitchen!I about cut my thumb off trying to cut a chicken in half on a backpacking trip fifty years ago.
Rapala filet knife. It’ll do the job if you can find one.
Nah … for tuna you use a Maguro … a samurai sushi sword. No joke a 3 foot fish sword!For large fish like tuna and red snapper I use a
Dexter Russell Traditional 8" Butcher Knife 4691 012G-8BU
The blade shape is great and you don’t need as much flexibility as with a pompano or bluegill. For the little guys just use a 7“ rapala.
The Dexters are what I use processing meat chickens. As long at whatever your cutting doesnt have hairy hide it works great.I have some $50-$80 bubba blades that are okay. I prefer the $12-$15 dexter Russell white handle knives though. I don’t think the bubba blades are worth the money personally.
Rapalas were good but now in the name of cheap all made in china now. That is when I found Dexters.I about cut my thumb off trying to cut a chicken in half on a backpacking trip fifty years ago.
Rapala filet knife. It’ll do the job if you can find one.
I about cut my thumb off trying to cut a chicken in half on a backpacking trip fifty years ago.
Rapala filet knife. It’ll do the job if you can find one.
Title says it all.
What brands are the ones you dream of?
Who is the best Tuna knife?
What is the best in field skinning knife for deer or elk?
Thanks
I’ve bought some of the Victronix knives from Cabela’s and been happy with them. If you want a good answer on a game knife I’d ask @thrillhill .
Montana Knife company just released a filet knife. Actually drops for sale this Thursday. Based on the others I have, hard to see anything being better.
And if you sign up for their text alerts (like I did) they will promptly text you at 8pm notifying you of the knife drop that happened an hour ago (7pm) and is already sold out!!!
It's 7 pm mountain. 9pm eastern. But they do sell out in a few minutes. If you are not on the site at 9pm for the drop, you are probably out of luck. And if you looked at 8pm eastern you got the general sold out tabs because they had not dropped yet.
Now I feel like an idiot.
Thanks 🤦🏼♂️
Lol yup Bill is the cutlery guy. I'm more of the basic prison shank type guy.If you want a good answer on a game knife I’d ask @thrillhill .
This^^^
Wasn't gonna say nothing, but the 'lectric knife seems to be the go-to 'round here, 'least for the meat fishermen. I can imagine if yer working yer way through a couple limits of crappie or white bass, you'd be glad for the assist.Lol yup Bill is the cutlery guy. I'm more of the basic prison shank type guy.
Here is my favorite cheap filet knife hack....
I love catfish. I have seen a hundred ways to clean them. Filet is my go to way and
I use an electric bread knife from the thrift shop. Works unbelievably well and is only $3. I have a couple of them I utilize. I can have the fish thoroughly cleaned and in the grease while he is still flopping.
Wasn't gonna say nothing, but the 'lectric knife seems to be the go-to 'round here, 'least for the meat fishermen. I can imagine if yer working yer way through a couple limits of crappie or white bass, you'd be glad for the assist.
And that, is the value of CFF. Thank you @thrillhillFrom the way I understood the OP's question, we're talking about a couple different knives or knife categories, or even "task categories".
What's "the best" or "premium/top of the line" fillet or fish processing knife/knives and what is the best/premium knife/knives for processing deer or elk sized game?
I'd like to explain the way I'm looking at these questions because that informs my answers.
Knives are a lot like guns in this regard.
Let's say that I have a $500 PSA AR-15 with a $200 Holosun optic on it. I shoot paper at the range out to 100 yards and and hit some steel targets out to 200, maybe once every other month or so. I then take it home and clean it, and put it away wet. I don't take any classes or compete or have any trained background. One day a coyote shows up in the edge of my farm yard at dusk and I pop him with that PSA. I'm proud of that rifle, it did what I wanted it to do just fine.
I'm on my local gun forum and I hear that @JBoyette is a respected tactical rifle instructor. He recommends a Wilson Combat AR-15 because it's a premium rifle. But it costs 4 times what I paid for my PSA. I save my money and get one because I want to be better at doing AR-15 stuff. And I can't have a WC AR with a Holosun on it so I save up and get an Aimpoint.
I go back to the range several times over the next few weeks and proudly shoot my Wilson Combat premium rifle at the paper. I can't tell any difference at 50 and 100 yards. I don't hit the 200 yard steel with any more or less regularity than I did with the PSA rifle.
Now I feel kinda bummed that my shooting is not any better even though I dropped a lot more money on my gear. I feel hoodwinked. Those guys that recommended this stuff are just gear snobs, fan-boys, shills for their favorite brand. I'm kinda irritated in fact. This premium rifle didn't help me do anything better than I did before.
So yeah, if that's all your gonna do with your rifle, or all you expect from it, YOU ARE NOT GOING TO NOTICE ANY DIFFERENCE between the high-end rifle and the "budget" rifle.
It's almost EXACTLY the same with knives.
Let me skip over fish for now and go straight to deer and elk sized game processing.
If you only kill one or two deer per season, you are NOT gonna see ANY performance difference between a $30 Walmart skinning knife and a $300 Bark River. NONE. (Until you go to sharpen them that is, and let's be honest, I have a lot of friends who will do that then buy another $30 knife next season instead of learning how to properly sharpen.)
But one or two deer per season is not how my family rolls. Our meat processing season was kind of light this past winter. We only did 15 deer, 2 goats, 6 racoons, 2 snapping turtles, 76 squirrels, and I lost track of the chickens, geese, ducks, and rabbits. I didn't do any hogs last winter.
This kind of use is where YOU WILL notice a difference between bottom and top of the line.
Much like you would notice the difference between the PSA and Wilson Combat if you all of a sudden started shooting 20,000 rounds a year, taking classes, competing in 3 gun, wallowing around in the mud the blood and the beer, etc.
As mentioned I do REALLY like and appreciate Bark River knives. I appreciate their handle geometry, and I love their steel, specifically their CPM-3V steel, but there are certainly lots of other steel options in their lineup.
My favorite game processing knife is the Ultralite Bushcrafter (ULB for short). I have 3 of them.
View attachment 501915
The ULB is a small knife. The more my knowledge base and experience increased over the years, the smaller my knife got. To a degree, it is my knowledge and experience that allows me to go faster than most everybody else, to "do it better" than a lot of folks. Not my knife. To a large degree anyway. If I wanna "go fast" and still be precise I need CONTROL. So yes, on this knife, the handle is larger than the blade (in the knife world this is the equivalent of not putting a $200 scope on a $2,000 rifle). Speed + control.
What the extra money buys me is not really how long it stays sharp. The harder a steel is the longer it will "hold an edge", but conversely it's harder to sharpen. The heat treat on the 3V steel from Bark River allows me to clean a deer from start to finish, and then simply strop it, and it will once again be sharper than any production knife you have EVER handled.
If you don't learn about sharpening, you are wasting your money buying high-end knives for these tasks.
So, my premium game processing knife, if I can have only one, is gonna be a Bark River Ultralite Bushcrafter. I wouldn't hesitate to clean anything from a racoon to a bison with it. And I've done fish as well, but we'll get to that.
Below is a picture of the Ultralite Bushcrafter below a J-frame .38 for size reference.
View attachment 501919
The knife above the J-frame, is the Bark River Mini Kalahari Sportsman.
We have 4 of those. They belong to my wife and stay in her kitchen. She does most of the "bird" killing and processing. She also makes all the final cuts on the mammal meat. They look like a fillet knife, and can be used as such, but they are not as flexible as what most folks think of in that regard. Hell of a good knife to have on the homestead. In the field, not so much.
The picture below is a selection of some of my favorite and most used knives when it comes to food processing.
The blue handled one on the top was a Frost branded knife made by Mora. It was geared towards commercial fisherman. I take it when we go King Mackerel fishing. We are usually just cutting them up into "steaks", not filleting. It cost $25 at the time I bought it.
The black handled "swept back skinner" looking knife below the Mora is a cheap ($12 maybe?) Cold Steel that I clean the majority of my fish with (will explain that shortly).
Below that we have the Bark River ULB on the left and a Mini Kalahari Sportsman on the right.
Below those are the J-frame for size reference and to the left of that we have 2 versions of the Benchmade Meatcrafter knife. Looks like they are fillet knives, and they could serve as such, but that is not how we use them. They are more of a "deboning" knife in our lineup.
And the weird looking knife on the lower left is the now discontinued Benchmade Nestucca Cleaver. It allows me to cape the hides super fast without punching through.
View attachment 501918
Being around the homestead lets me approach a processing task with multiple "specialty tools". That's what they are after all. Tools. You wouldn't try to take apart a car with only a flathead screwdriver. Why on earth would you try to take apart an animal with just one knife? At home anyway. In the field it's obviously different. I'd carry one or two knives and handle the task just fine, but it takes longer.
For processing fish, I'm not really the guy to ask about "premium" knives. I do it quite often. But not to the degree that other folks do. Plus I do things different than the "average white man" nowadays.
I very rarely fillet. I go the "poor people" route on most of my fish (catfish and some saltwater being the exception). Below is an example of what I mean.
View attachment 501917
When I come home with a mess of bream, crappie, and even a bass or two, I don't fillet. I get a spoon, yes a big spoon from the kitchen, and scale the fish. Then I cut the head off (not always), make a little slit in the bottom, and pull the guts out (PLEASE save the guts and heads for garden fertilizer! LOL).
And for that, 90% of the time I use that goofy looking Cold Steel. I rock it through the spinal cord and then cut my slit with it.
When it comes to filleting I would certainly defer to @Infamous1 in a heartbeat. I only clean one or two catfish here or there. I'm slow but thorough. If I got into a dozen plus I'd probably hit him up and ask him if I could swing by his place so he could show me how to go fast. And we know what @Bigdave0924 does for a living, and we've all seen @chiefjason pictures. I would defer to guys like that in a heartbeat when it comes to equipment choice.
So all that to say, my premium game knife is the Bark River Ultralite Bushcrafter.
There are lots of other good options out there.
There are very few legitimate "right vs. wrong" answers here. It varies by need, perceived use, and skill level.
Great example, within the context of this discussion, there are also $20 Mora knives that would get me through the apocalypse in fairly confident manner. But only because I have the knowledge to sharpen even with "field expedient" supplies! LOL!
If you are not gonna learn how to sharpen, don't spend $300 on a knife. Buy 25 Mora Companions and use them until you are dead.
Just like tactical AR-15 use discussions, in the game processing world, knowledge and experience is generally more important than gear.
Good gear can compliment knowledge and experience.
If any of y'all want to learn in-person about knife sharpening or game processing, hit me up. Folks are always welcome to come out and visit. And I love passing on what little knowledge I've accumulated.
if you were to scale, filet, fry those bream, instead of eating just 5, you could eat 15 of them. Trust me on that one.From the way I understood the OP's question, we're talking about a couple different knives or knife categories, or even "task categories".
What's "the best" or "premium/top of the line" fillet or fish processing knife/knives and what is the best/premium knife/knives for processing deer or elk sized game?
I'd like to explain the way I'm looking at these questions because that informs my answers.
Knives are a lot like guns in this regard.
Let's say that I have a $500 PSA AR-15 with a $200 Holosun optic on it. I shoot paper at the range out to 100 yards and and hit some steel targets out to 200, maybe once every other month or so. I then take it home and clean it, and put it away wet. I don't take any classes or compete or have any trained background. One day a coyote shows up in the edge of my farm yard at dusk and I pop him with that PSA. I'm proud of that rifle, it did what I wanted it to do just fine.
I'm on my local gun forum and I hear that @JBoyette is a respected tactical rifle instructor. He recommends a Wilson Combat AR-15 because it's a premium rifle. But it costs 4 times what I paid for my PSA. I save my money and get one because I want to be better at doing AR-15 stuff. And I can't have a WC AR with a Holosun on it so I save up and get an Aimpoint.
I go back to the range several times over the next few weeks and proudly shoot my Wilson Combat premium rifle at the paper. I can't tell any difference at 50 and 100 yards. I don't hit the 200 yard steel with any more or less regularity than I did with the PSA rifle.
Now I feel kinda bummed that my shooting is not any better even though I dropped a lot more money on my gear. I feel hoodwinked. Those guys that recommended this stuff are just gear snobs, fan-boys, shills for their favorite brand. I'm kinda irritated in fact. This premium rifle didn't help me do anything better than I did before.
So yeah, if that's all your gonna do with your rifle, or all you expect from it, YOU ARE NOT GOING TO NOTICE ANY DIFFERENCE between the high-end rifle and the "budget" rifle.
It's almost EXACTLY the same with knives.
Let me skip over fish for now and go straight to deer and elk sized game processing.
If you only kill one or two deer per season, you are NOT gonna see ANY performance difference between a $30 Walmart skinning knife and a $300 Bark River. NONE. (Until you go to sharpen them that is, and let's be honest, I have a lot of friends who will do that then buy another $30 knife next season instead of learning how to properly sharpen.)
But one or two deer per season is not how my family rolls. Our meat processing season was kind of light this past winter. We only did 15 deer, 2 goats, 6 racoons, 2 snapping turtles, 76 squirrels, and I lost track of the chickens, geese, ducks, and rabbits. I didn't do any hogs last winter.
This kind of use is where YOU WILL notice a difference between bottom and top of the line.
Much like you would notice the difference between the PSA and Wilson Combat if you all of a sudden started shooting 20,000 rounds a year, taking classes, competing in 3 gun, wallowing around in the mud the blood and the beer, etc.
As mentioned I do REALLY like and appreciate Bark River knives. I appreciate their handle geometry, and I love their steel, specifically their CPM-3V steel, but there are certainly lots of other steel options in their lineup.
My favorite game processing knife is the Ultralite Bushcrafter (ULB for short). I have 3 of them.
View attachment 501915
The ULB is a small knife. The more my knowledge base and experience increased over the years, the smaller my knife got. To a degree, it is my knowledge and experience that allows me to go faster than most everybody else, to "do it better" than a lot of folks. Not my knife. To a large degree anyway. If I wanna "go fast" and still be precise I need CONTROL. So yes, on this knife, the handle is larger than the blade (in the knife world this is the equivalent of not putting a $200 scope on a $2,000 rifle). Speed + control.
What the extra money buys me is not really how long it stays sharp. The harder a steel is the longer it will "hold an edge", but conversely it's harder to sharpen. The heat treat on the 3V steel from Bark River allows me to clean a deer from start to finish, and then simply strop it, and it will once again be sharper than any production knife you have EVER handled.
If you don't learn about sharpening, you are wasting your money buying high-end knives for these tasks.
So, my premium game processing knife, if I can have only one, is gonna be a Bark River Ultralite Bushcrafter. I wouldn't hesitate to clean anything from a racoon to a bison with it. And I've done fish as well, but we'll get to that.
Below is a picture of the Ultralite Bushcrafter below a J-frame .38 for size reference.
View attachment 501919
The knife above the J-frame, is the Bark River Mini Kalahari Sportsman.
We have 4 of those. They belong to my wife and stay in her kitchen. She does most of the "bird" killing and processing. She also makes all the final cuts on the mammal meat. They look like a fillet knife, and can be used as such, but they are not as flexible as what most folks think of in that regard. Hell of a good knife to have on the homestead. In the field, not so much.
The picture below is a selection of some of my favorite and most used knives when it comes to food processing.
The blue handled one on the top was a Frost branded knife made by Mora. It was geared towards commercial fisherman. I take it when we go King Mackerel fishing. We are usually just cutting them up into "steaks", not filleting. It cost $25 at the time I bought it.
The black handled "swept back skinner" looking knife below the Mora is a cheap ($12 maybe?) Cold Steel that I clean the majority of my fish with (will explain that shortly).
Below that we have the Bark River ULB on the left and a Mini Kalahari Sportsman on the right.
Below those are the J-frame for size reference and to the left of that we have 2 versions of the Benchmade Meatcrafter knife. Looks like they are fillet knives, and they could serve as such, but that is not how we use them. They are more of a "deboning" knife in our lineup.
And the weird looking knife on the lower left is the now discontinued Benchmade Nestucca Cleaver. It allows me to cape the hides super fast without punching through.
View attachment 501918
Being around the homestead lets me approach a processing task with multiple "specialty tools". That's what they are after all. Tools. You wouldn't try to take apart a car with only a flathead screwdriver. Why on earth would you try to take apart an animal with just one knife? At home anyway. In the field it's obviously different. I'd carry one or two knives and handle the task just fine, but it takes longer.
For processing fish, I'm not really the guy to ask about "premium" knives. I do it quite often. But not to the degree that other folks do. Plus I do things different than the "average white man" nowadays.
I very rarely fillet. I go the "poor people" route on most of my fish (catfish and some saltwater being the exception). Below is an example of what I mean.
View attachment 501917
When I come home with a mess of bream, crappie, and even a bass or two, I don't fillet. I get a spoon, yes a big spoon from the kitchen, and scale the fish. Then I cut the head off (not always), make a little slit in the bottom, and pull the guts out (PLEASE save the guts and heads for garden fertilizer! LOL).
And for that, 90% of the time I use that goofy looking Cold Steel. I rock it through the spinal cord and then cut my slit with it.
When it comes to filleting I would certainly defer to @Infamous1 in a heartbeat. I only clean one or two catfish here or there. I'm slow but thorough. If I got into a dozen plus I'd probably hit him up and ask him if I could swing by his place so he could show me how to go fast. And we know what @Bigdave0924 does for a living, and we've all seen @chiefjason pictures. I would defer to guys like that in a heartbeat when it comes to equipment choice.
So all that to say, my premium game knife is the Bark River Ultralite Bushcrafter.
There are lots of other good options out there.
There are very few legitimate "right vs. wrong" answers here. It varies by need, perceived use, and skill level.
Great example, within the context of this discussion, there are also $20 Mora knives that would get me through the apocalypse in fairly confident manner. But only because I have the knowledge to sharpen even with "field expedient" supplies! LOL!
If you are not gonna learn how to sharpen, don't spend $300 on a knife. Buy 25 Mora Companions and use them until you are dead.
Just like tactical AR-15 use discussions, in the game processing world, knowledge and experience is generally more important than gear.
Good gear can compliment knowledge and experience.
If any of y'all want to learn in-person about knife sharpening or game processing, hit me up. Folks are always welcome to come out and visit. And I love passing on what little knowledge I've accumulated.
But then you would be tossing some the best part- the fins!if you were to scale, filet, fry those bream, instead of eating just 5, you could eat 15 of them. Trust me on that one.
The tail!!!!! If you're good, you keep the tail on one fillet. We scale, then filletBut then you would be tossing some the best part- the fins!
For game, if I could only have one it would be my gerber folder with a guthook and rubber grips.