I have a half dozen Buck Knives of various sizes and weight. The knife I carry now for all my deer gutting and woods work is a GERBER Gator with a 3 inch folding blade and a rubberized handle. Not one of the serated blades but a slick one. It' s absolutely the greatest. The steel will hold and edge long enough to finish gutting, skinning and boning out a deer and can be sharped up in a matter of minutes. The problem with the Buck knives is it takes a week and a half to resharpen them when they get dull.

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I have to disagree to a point; If you let your knife get that dull before re-sharpening it may take a while to get the edge back, but if you re-sharpen when it starts to get dull it doesn' t take much at all. I have gut and skinned 5 deer in one season without having to sharpen my knife -- I could still shave with it when I re-honed the edge before I put it away for the year. Buck uses a hard 420 or 440 SS(can' t remember which). When you put an edge on it, it stays for a while. I' ve used knives that are dull before I get done gutting....soft steel, junk, whatever! Gerber does make some fine knives from what I' ve heard, but I' ve never owned one. A friend of mine has a Browning FDT, it holds and edge quite well and isn' t as hard to put that initial edge on as my buck. BTW, I use a Lansky to sharpen and it has turned my blades into a razor in far less time than sharpening by hand.

Buck! I also have a diamond stone to sharpen them with and it does so without a problem. Besides, I can use the stone to sharpen my G5' s.[:-]

So, Jason, how do you hone/sharpen? I' ve just used the little " pull-through" kind where the blade sits between two stones (or metal bars). Just got a bunch of new knives on clearence (at wally-world) and I want to keep them sharp.

Well, you must not have read the last sentence!

I use a Lansky. When I get a new knife I use the coarse stone to put the initial edge on. I use 20 degrees as that has worked very well for me and stays consistant. After the initial angle is established I run a few passes with the medium stone until razor sharp. Then the hone(finest stone) for a while to remove any burrs and get that edge clean and crisp.....hair jumps off my arm at the mere sight of a finished blade![:-]

I got my Lansky as a gift for Christams one year....it was one of the best gifts ever. They' re not that expensive -- around $20-$30 if memory serves. Mine is just the 3 stone deal. They make a more expensive kit with diamond stones, but I can' t justify spending the money on diamond stones when I already have scary sharp blade. How much better could they be? Are they just more durable? Cut quicker? I don' t understand the hype of diamond stones, but some guys swear by them.

I use a hand made knife. It has a demascus blade and a deer horn handle.