Fillet Knife for Kings

[David Williams]

My wife is planning to go fishing for King Salmon this year and I'm going after Silver Salmon. Our supply of reds is running out!

Her assignment to me is to look for a better filet knife than the Fred Meyer $7 special. Has anyone bought a filet knife from CS, CRKT, Browning, Buck? Is one brand better than the other? Are ther others out there? Being a Buck Knife fan I'm leaning towards the Oceanmate. She is looking for a longer blade of 9" or more than what is availeble at retail outlets which hover around 7" max. (please refrain from phalic remarks

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[Yekim]

Wow, a fellow Anchorite, cool....I was feeling lonely..

...

Don't bother with normal fillet knives, they truly are a pain to use on larger fish. The type of knife you should use depends on the type of filleting you do. IF you like to just do one bif heavy cut and slice off the rib bones of the fish, a fairly stiff unit will work best, fairly wide, so that can slide along the spine and not veer off too easily.

I use a different method where I start from the top of the fish, at the dorsal fin, and follow down the bones and carefully cut the meat off the rib bones. The first method is fast, but kinda wasteful, the second is more efficient, and yields a much better looking fillet(after practice anyhow). (I lived on the beach in Seward for a couple of summers and made a living at cutting fish on the docks..) For the second method you need a fairly flexible knife that is around an 1-1/4" wide that does not have a really pointy tip. The knife I use is a 7" forchner that was reground a little so it wasn't so pointy. The knife also has to be extremely sharp, and preferably have a convex edge. It just seems to work better that way.

For head&Guttin' get a big bread knife. Lop off all of the fins (save for the tail), make the cut from the anus to the jaw, and then cut behind the head. After a little practice you shouldba able to cut halfway behind the head, flip the fish, finish the cut, and flick the head and most of the guts out. Lop off the tail (I save it for last because it is nice to have something to hold onto). I prefer a stiff bread knife for the task.

Have fun catching fish...

YeK



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It is not a matter of whether or not you are paranoid, it is a matter of whether or not you are paranoid enough.