USA -(Ammoland.com)- I had a two-week trip lined up to Texas which started off with conducting some seminars at the Dallas Safari Club Conv. & Expo then moved on to a duck hunt in East Texas with Charles Allen, owner of Knives of Alaska and Diamond Blade knives then moving up to North Texas for a crow hunt then ending with Bill Olson the editor of Texas Outdoor Journal for a varmint hunt in NW Texas for the final week.
I thought that this would be a great trip to test a multitude of knives. I talked to Charles and asked him which one of his knives he’d recommend for the duck hunt. After talking to him it was decided that the Pinnacle II would work best for cleaning our duck, which turned out to be a great choice.
I believe it was really designed for caping big game. Caping is when you’re skinning out the head. For caping big game, you’ll want a 2 ½ inch, thin-bladed pointed knife. That way you can make the intricate cuts around the eyes, ears and lips on your trophy.
You’ll want the exact same design to skin out the feet and toes on your bears. This job requires intricate cutting as well, especially when you get to the toes. Caping knives will usually have a smaller or more compact handle but don’t buy one with so short of a handle that you don’t have control of it.
If you asked me to write the specs for a caping knife I’d write it exactly like the Pinnacle II has. The Pinnacle II is in the Diamond Blade line but if you’re on a tighter budget then buy the Cub Bear which is in the Knives of Alaska line. It has the same design but is not made out of friction forged metal. They both are excellent caping knives.
But back to our duck hunt. I decided to use the Pinnacle II to bone out the breast on our ducks on this hunt. They worked perfectly and I think I’ll use it from now on to bone out all of my birds, dove, grouse, waterfowl and turkeys. It should work equally well on all species.
It is also a good knife to cut the pattern when skinning animals. Cutting the pattern is the initial cut you make in the hide to start skinning. You’ll need a knife with a sharp point to make the initial incision when you run a cut down the belly and out each leg to the feet (It will be in an H pattern).
I’m on the last night of a hunt with Texas Best Outfitters and concluding our varmint hunt. Our guide Jr. Walker did a super job calling for us. One day he called in three bobcats and 3-4 coyotes. Jr. just used my Pinnacle II to cut the patterns on the varmints that we skinned.
You could finish the skinning job with it in a pinch but it’s not designed as a skinning knife. So use it for what it was designed to do and you’ll be a happy camper.
It comes with a nice leather sheath but also comes in a combo set with the Surge and has a double sheath with that combo. The Cub Bear can be bought by itself or in at least 1-3 other combinations as well if I remember correctly.
Happy skinning!
About Tom Claycomb:
Tom Claycomb has been an avid hunter/fisherman throughout his life as well as an outdoors writer with outdoor columns in the magazine Hunt Alaska, Bass Pro Shops, Bowhunter.net and freelances for numerous magazines and newspapers.
“To properly skin your animal you will need a sharp knife. I have an e-article on Amazon Kindle titled Knife Sharpening for $.99 if you’re having trouble.”
The diamond blade has an intriguing rap with D2 and their method of treating it. When I received mine I was less than enthusiastic about the fit, finish, and actual grind on the blade edge so I sent it back.
That’s the first negative comment I’ve heard about a Diamond Blade knife. We use them in Alaska and our field dressing jobs are a lot faster. They are comfortable to work with and cut like crazy.