Anyone ever try one of the "safety" knives for cutting seat belts and stuff for unzipping a deer? At first glance it looks to be perfect for the task. Anyone try it? I feel as though it would be the perfect unzipping tool after the initial cut.

They make another one that is hunter orange.

About any sharp knife makes a perfectly suitable "unzipping tool". I guess I just don't see the appeal of carrying an additional tool, when the one I carry is perfectly for the task.

Zipping is an easy task with a sharp blade. Just don't see the need.
As is the case with most fishing lures, they are about catching the fisherman more than the fish.

Fair enough. Wise indeed.

If I can get my carcass into camp for skinning and gutting inside an hour I don't fool with zipping or field dressing at all.

When I do 'zip' I do it with a conventional utility razor knife with a hooked linoleum blade - the blades are cheep, easily replacable and they work great.

I've never had enough problems opening a deer without paunch damage with a drop point knife to warrent carrying another special tool just for that purpose.

I have two of those exact same knifes, in sheaths securely fastened to mine and my wife's kayaking PFD's.

For that they are great.

For field dressing a deer, as others have said, no need.

Pinch up some skin, make your initial cut, slip two fingers inside, pull up, slide the knife blade between your fingers, and slice.

Takes more time to type it than to do it, and with no special tools.

I'm with most of these guys, just one more thing to pack up the hill...not needed.

Yep.

Save your money.

I've always been curious about gut hooks but then, a few years back, I learned to quick quarter deer, elk, etc. It's quick (of course), simple, and eliminates the messiness associated with conventional gutting - not to mention dragging a lot of needless waste back to camp.

My main field knife has a built in "zipper"...

I see no reason for another gadget either.

The opening on the seat belt cutter is a little small IMO. If you want a gut hook, the Buck Pak Lite or the Gerber one that takes razor blades will probably work better. The opening on them is about a half inch.

IMO, they are nice little trinkets, especially if you are working on a deer that has been dead awhile and the stomach has swelled.....but not anywhere close to critical. I would rather have the hook separate from my knife.

like most i seen no reason for a gut hook. most wodsman should be more then up to the task of field dressing. its only a 5 minute task if youve done enough of 'em. those 'butt out' tools are pretty funny too. they do work i guess from what ive seen but by the time a fella digs that thing out ive already made a half moon cut around the a-hole and have anal canal out.

I've gutted deer with no problem using the tiniest buck knife pocket folder, after that any blade makes it easy. I recently got a new Helle Jagermester for my birthday and I plan on blodying that blade until I pass it on to my grandson one day, which will be a while since my boy is only 4 now.

I wonder if this has ever happened to anyone else? Last deer I shot I just happened to remember I had a Wymoning knife in the glovebox and hadn't used it in awhile and thought the gut hook might be handy again. In my haste I pulled a little hard and over-rotated the knife causing the top blade to plunge right into the stomach. I had [bleep] blast me from head to toe. It was quite an ordeal!

I carry a Buck Alpha with built in gut hook, if I use it. now a friend pulled out a little pelvic saw last year while gutting a deer and must say it worked like a charm. May give one a try

Why anyone guts deer is beyond me..

I've always just used my Buck, but this year I bought one of these just to see if it's better. I'll still have the Buck if it fails.

http://www.outdooredge.com/Flip-n-Blaze-Double-Blade-p/flip%20n%20blaze%20double%20blade.htm

Up until this season in WI, it's been required to check the whole deer (guts not required) at a DNR registration center. If you've got a gutless method for that, I'm all ears.

How do you get the heart out? Ribs would be a pain also perhaps?

Because in some states it's not legal to quarter them and dropping 30-50 pouds out of them by gutting makes a lot more sense than dragging the extra poundage out of the woods.

Not everyone has easy access to an atv or tractor path where they hunt and we have to drag them.

everyone i ever hunted with in va. field dresses deer

If you have a utility knife this would work the same.

I was given one of the Hunters Edge "Switch-blade" (IIRC) for Christmas last year. Seems like a pretty cool tool for an all in one. I always just use my regular knife propped on two fingers to unzip them with ease, but may give the new gizmo a run. Damn thing is very sharp from the package.

The good ole shingle hook. Many uses, fletching removal is another.

Coyotes and birds can have my share of heart and liver...

It's easier to get at those inside tenderloins if the guts are out and I usually save the heart. Otherwise I would not gut one at all.

If you want the heart you have no choice, but otherwise, it's not that hard to get the tenderloins out with the gutless method.

+1. Anytime I ever strolled past a gut pile days later...the coyotes had left the liver. Hmm

The reason I do is that by the time I get through with a deer, all I want left is a bunch of bones picked so clean that what I do throw out ticks the coyotes and buzzards off.

I don't throw away the heart, liver, rib meat, flank meat, brisket, neck....etc. I could make a surprising amount of burger off of what the "no gutters" leave for the critters and I don't mind taking extra time to get it. That is just my way not to say it is better than anyone else's....just how I choose to utilize the animals I get. I was raised not to waste food.....my Dad and Grandpa really were big on it.

BTW, the shingle cutter blade....it will work but the hook on it is too narrow....kind of like the seat belt cutter only maybe worse. Plus you have to get the hair, blood, and other "stuff" out of your utility knife when you finish.

Other than the heart and liver. I can get everything you mentioned with gutless.

I agree on that.

Heart is good, muscle meat, just a different sort of muscle. If you have a dog boil up the liver but do that when you can have the doors open, it can get pretty "fragrant." They absolutely love it. Usually it's some for me, some for the dog but each to his own. Careful removing the gall bladder, gall will make it unpalatable for people though the Sioux favored a little gall to "spice up" raw meat, particularly when winter killed buffalo floated by in the spring.

We always field dress, never have much of a drag if any. Then hang, cool/age, and cut up at our convenience and comfort. But our dads were meat cutters. I like a 3-1/2 to 4 inch drop point knife, fast and easy to unzip with that. Dad once had to dress one with his little and not so sharp pipe knife so it's technique more than tools. (BANG! Oh hey, did anyone bring a knife?? Wish I was there to see what happened next. )

I LOVE heart. In fact my favorite breakfast after killing a deer is fried heart and eggs, with some biscuits of course.

I stopped eating heart years ago.I collect them for others ,but dont eat it myself.
Gut piles never last overnight where I hunt.Usually just a bloody spot left the next day.

I didn't get to the top of the food chain so I could eat guts.

But...I do save deer heart and liver for my dead hunting partner's widow. She loves it. I give her all my deer meat, so I just take the heart and liver too.

Can't speak to elk or mule deer but a whitetail does not have a gall bladder. miles

No whitetail don't have a gall bladder in the typical sence that would normaly attach to the liver...but they do have a urine bladder thats located inside thier pelvic cavity. I have drained and saved the piss from many of them.

Entirely different things. miles

Yep.

We have come back the next day, gut pile completely gone and a large pile carnivore crap in the red snow.

Also, on a decent run it hasn't been unusual to take or see other deer near the kill site or gut pile a day or two later...

Our coyotes must be picky. Maybe they're filling up on quail and rabbits. Anyways, more times than not(in most of the ones I've paid attention to), that liver lays there till it rots.

Nothing left here but bones.

Whitetails most certainly do. If it happens to be empty you have to look carefully for it. But if it's full it's that green ping pong ball right up close to the liver. Easy to nick trying to cut around it.

deer facts

Look at number 16. miles

I didn't find a source on the Internet that I had confidence in either way (if it's on the Innanet it must be true ) so I went down and talked with my vet. He said other ruminants have gall bladders and didn't know why deer wouldn't too. So I described what I took to be the gall bladder and he said I described a gall bladder exactly.

In any event, if you see a little greenish sac closely attached to the liver don't nick it, the contents are intensely bitter.

Well, I have gutted lots of deer and have never seen one with a gall bladder plus all of the info that I can come up with says they do not have one. I have seen them on rabbits, squirrels, cows, hogs, and chickens. Makes me not trust your vet. miles

So then what's that little greenish sac that contains a vile dark green fluid that's attached to the liver so closely that it's hard to cut around it when removing the major vessels?

On some deer I see it but more often I don't notice it. Gall bladders fill and empty to aid digestion and when empty are collapsed and hard to spot, particularly when you're more interested in getting the job done instead of studying anatomy.

Thing is, I usually save the liver, which means that if a gall bladder were there, I would have to remove it. I have never had to remove one from a deer. I have taken them off beef, pork, chickens, rabbits, squirrels, but never from a deer. miles

No gall bladder in deer.

Then what the heck am I looking at? Seriously, if it's not a gall bladder I'd like to know what it is. Possibly a regional genetic difference since ruminants and apparently at least some ungulates have gall bladders?

Haven't used one of those tools, but did wind up getting a "Sling Blade" as a present one year. It actually works very well and is still only one tool/knife. Actually holds an edge as well which was a bit of a surprise.

Damn if I know. Are you sure that you are looking at a deer? miles

Think so, none of the farmers whose land I hunt on is mad at me anyway.

Its a bladder, but its not a gall bladder. and its not attached to the liver. Its not full of bile,...its full of piss.it looks like a pink walnut shell...

Nope, definitely not pink and when you nick one nasty looking dark green fluid comes out. I retrieve the liver after field dressing the usual way so it's all out in the open and free it when cutting the vessels between the lobes and that's near where the little bugger sits.

Looks pretty much like this drawing but looked significantly smaller relative to the liver though I can't say I paid that much attention to it. Suggests it's become vestigial in some regional groups but still functional in others? Don't know, wild-ass speculation. Would be an advantage for the digestion of corn and soybeans which are high in lipids and which is a big part of the diet around here.

Deer season starts mid-November here, I'll have to try to remember to get a picture.

just a good sharp knife

here is video of a guy cutting out the bladder I'm talking about (interesting enough the link even refrences "gall" bladder ). It is just inside the pelvic cavity, nowhere near the liver that hangs just to the back of the lungs. Its just the very first of the video, the rest is somekind of promo or something.
I have cut out hundreds+ livers from whitetails and never seen what your refering to. I would be interested in seein a pic of what your talking about the next time you gut one if you have a chance. thanks

http://www.zimbio.com/Gallbladder/articles/SfXLsFhCjMQ/Deer+Gall+Bladder+Removal+Highland+Hill+Farm

other than my first deer I have never pay attention to any thing inside of them when i gut

now i am going to have to look for this thing

while the bladder is still hanging on the deer you can clip the bottom of it with a pair of scissors and drain it into a small bottle. I have killed quite a few deer that have walked straight to my stand following a scent trail I've made using the piss from a perviously killed deer. Apparently the old man in the video has no use for it!

only time I have ever thought a gut hook was handy was on a moose when opening up the seems on the spine and legs. On deer I only make 5 actual cuts with a knife to dress it in the field so I have never found the need for the hook. We bring them out whole as well and for 70 bucks we can have it cut wrapped and frozen around here , its well worth the money the guy does a great job.

i have done that once or twice

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Our coyotes must be picky. Maybe they're filling up on quail and rabbits. Anyways, more times than not(in most of the ones I've paid attention to), that liver lays there till it rots.quote]

Must not have too many black bears. My last "gut pile" was nothing but a red stain in the dirt with paw prints the next morning.

How do you others get the tenderloin out without gutting it?

tndrbstr, the entire Internet says I'm wrong so I probably am, never found a site at the top of the trust list like a veterinary school that gave me an answer though. But I can't imagine what I could have seen that would make me think gall bladder. Can't wait for November to figure it out.