I've never used a gut hook. My favorite knife for dressing and skinning deer is a Shrade LB5. It's a folding lockblade that's about 2 3/4" long and has a chip point blade.

My best advice is to get a hold of a video by Larry Metz entitled "Processing Deer From Field to Table". I believe it's now a two video set available from Cabelas. He shows the easiest method for field dressing deer that I've seen.

In simplest terms...

1) "Core out" the anus. This frees the end of the intestinal tract.

2) Cut from reproductive organs to breastbone, using two fingers under the blade to keep from cutting the internal organs (very easy to do).

3) If you see something inside the deer near the pelvis that looks like a blackish water balloon...it's the bladder. Sometimes deer will empty this when they die, sometimes they won't. At the base of the bladder, nearest the pelvis, there will be a "tube". Pinch off this tube with your fingers, cut it away from the bladder, and get it out of there...FAR away.

4) Roll the deer on it's side.

5) Pull the intestine out of the anus and into the body cavity.

6) Gently pull out the intestines and stomach. There will be several areas of connective tissue under the spine. Some gentle pulling and minimal cutting with the knife will detach the tissue.

7) Cut and break through the diaphram (muscle wall separating the intestines from the thorasic cavity (heart/lung area). Use your hands and your knife around the edges of it to cut it away from the body cavity wall. If you got a perfect broadside double-lung passthrough, this is where it'll get very bloody very fast.

8) Reach up and grab the heart. It'll feel like a soft rock. Pull it out firmly. The lungs, or most of what's left of them, will come out attached to it.

9) Finish removing the entrails. They should come out in one big piece, with the exception of "lung froth" in the thorasic cavity, which will be in the pool of blood in the body cavity.

10) Reach up and cut the windpipe from the inside.

11) Lift the front end of the deer up and drain the blood out. It should run out the hole where the anus used to be. You can always roll the deer on it's belly and drain it that way too.

12) Get ready for some GOOD eating!

A word of caution...ALWAYS make sure that there is no broadhead or blades in the deer first. If there is...go slow and be VERY careful.

JRW