What's the point of a spey blade on a Trapper?

T. Erdelyi

T. Erdelyi

Joined
Feb 3, 2001
Messages
32,354
Alright I got this Tennessee River Trapper by Schrade, I love this knife, beautifully hollow ground blades, fit and finish are outstanding, warm amber jigged scale with grooved nickle silver bolsters. :D

It just feels great in my hands, all this for $17, probably one of Schrades last and nicest production knives.

Considering it's a trapper and geared toward skinning trapped game, why would you put a spey blade on a skinning knife, or why would you neuter a dead squirrel? :eek:

All kidding aside it is one of the more functional blade styles. :)
 
The spey blade is used on more knives than for neutering anything. A.G.Russell uses it on a fruit knife with just the one long narrow spey blade. On a trapper, it's for skinning.
 
What Esav said........

I'd prefer a wharncliff instead of a spey on the trappers but tradition is tradition. The Hawbaker pattern, sometimes called the "improved muskrat", comes with a clip and wharncliff or sheepsfoot. I'm unaware if shrade ever manufactured such a pattern. If they did I'd sure like to find one!
 
The trapper is a knife designed for a specific purpose...skinning relatively small fur bearing mammals w/o damaging the hide. Skinning mammals with commercial value like mink, beaver, etc. The small size and swell in handle allows for easy control in the hand. The blade w/o tip is not for speying animals, but for skinning where a sharp tip may puncture the hide and thus ruin its commercial value. I believe its a skinning blade not a spey blade. Spey blades are on stockman. Custom trappers often have a little bit of swell in the belly of the skinning blade to improve performance.
 
The "spey" blade is for skinning. The clip point is for making the slits at the animal's "back end". Most furbearers are skinned "cased". Basically you open the back end and pull the pelt off like taking off a sweater.

Paul
 
It is for skinning. It has no point so as not to puncture the hide while skinning.
 
brownshoe said:
.... The blade w/o tip is not for speying animals, but for skinning where a sharp tip may puncture the hide and thus ruin its commercial value. I believe its a skinning blade not a spey blade. Spey blades are on stockman. Custom trappers often have a little bit of swell in the belly of the skinning blade to improve performance.
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Guys I'm not disagreeing about the purpose of the blades on the Trapper, I question the terminology.

Everywhere you look the blunted blade on a 2 blade Trapper is called a Spey blade.

click here for desripion of trappers

Ca6254-80M.JPG


I could find a hundred sites that call it a spey blade on a trapper, so let me rephrase the question, why would you put a spey blade on a trapper? :confused: :D
 
well your right, a spey blade is for "speying", thats commone sense, but a spey on a trapper is for skinning, so you will not puncture the hide by accident. Also it is longer than a normal spey for this purpose.
Why call it a spey on a trapepr? Good question!
 
Just because it's common usage on knife selling sites doesn't make it correct usage. Per a discussion on levines site, the same concept applies to the term jack knife. Stockman's may be a more common pattern and that's why it's called a spey. Maybe some factories move their spey from the stockman to the trapper w/o retooling. However on trappers, it's a skinning blade, and I've heard it called that by more than one person. I believe on custom knives, spey blades are straight edged for castration on stockman patterns, but the spey/skinning blade on a trapper has a little belly for skinning. Ask on Levine's forum, someone may have a more definitive history of the terms.
 
All of these may or may not be true. But back when we used to run a fair number of cattle, my dad's favored knife for cutting the bull calves was an Eye Brand trapper. He used the spey blade for castrating them and notching their ears. And the clip blade for slicing barbecue during lunch. Ah, those were the days.

James
 
>"What's the point of a spey blade on a Trapper?"

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I have another question: What's the point of carrying a trapper? :grumpy: Sorry, I just never liked 'em. ;) Other than collectors and, uhh, actual trappers (how many trappers are there these days anyway!?), I can't understand why anyone would opt for this pattern over a stockman or two-blade jack. 'Course I know they sell a lot of 'em .... I just never understood it.
 
Spey just refers to the blade shape on a trapper, I guess. Why bother changing the the name for the trapper's blade when spey already refers quite accurately to the blade's shape? You say spey blade, people get a definative picture in their head. They know exactly what it is. Adding some new name to that type of shape would just complicate things.


The Stockman and Cattle knife patterns predate the Trapper by a few years, so I figure some knife designer saw the spey on those knives, and thought "Well it does a good job not damaging live animals, so it'll probably do a good job skinning them also. Let's try a longer version on a new pattern....".
 
I got a Tennessee River Trapper w/3" clip and spey blades in WalMart's "discontinued" bin, for 12 bucks. I've been wondering what good the spey blade is, since I'm used to spear points and clip points.

After slicing up a lot of apples, granola bars, letters and partridges, I've decided it is my favorite blade. The clip point blade lies idle.

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I didn't want to like the spey blade, but I couldn't help myself. :footinmou
 
I agree with Erasmus. I carry a custom medium trapper and the skinning blade gets the most use. You don't need a point for a lot of things, and the blade shape is great at a lot of utilitarian chores from apple to paper slicing.

The trapper is a good daily knive for a lot of reasons. The handle shape works nicely, that's the advanatage over a stockman or jack. The swell helps fill the palm giving more control. The knife is a little wider than some stockmans and jacks. The flat ground blades are excellent for any cutting chore. The "snap" of the springs is more than sufficient to hold the blade open, you don't need a locked blade for most things. The honey picked bone and mirror polished bolsters are pretty and the file work gives it a special artisan touch. The ATS-34 is heat treated just a hair on the soft side for ease of sharpening. Finally a gorgeous blond USAF second liuetenant complimented me on it...people find it pretty and non-threatening.
 
After a lot of looking, the average length of the spey blade on a Stockman is about 1/2 the length of the spey blade on a Trapper other than that they are identical, the only other similarity is to some Mellon Testers, and than the blade is about 3/5 the length but the shape is still the same, ever try to spey a watermellon?

Basically same shape, same name, different uses, that's english for you. :rolleyes:
 
There use to be a Stockman pattern called the "Great Western" that had a clip, sheepsfoot, and you guessed it, the long spey blade. No one make it now, I must admit that I'd be happy if someone did. It's so odd, it's cool looking.

The Melon Tester with a spey blade seems to have started with Queen, most others still use a spear point. I guess they use the spey as a safety measure.
 
Pardon the necrothreading but I came across a claim the spey blade shape was named after a knife used in Scotland near the river spey. They claimed a knife pattern used to skin fish is where the name actually comes from. I haven't been able to verify the source-reference but I'm sure someone can settle this one with proof. Thanks.
 
PWork said:
The "spey" blade is for skinning. The clip point is for making the slits at the animal's "back end". Most furbearers are skinned "cased". Basically you open the back end and pull the pelt off like taking off a sweater.
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Pretty hard sweater to just peal off unless it's a rabbit. Personally I think the muskrat pattern is the best all around furbearer skinner. I like the sharp pointy blades. You just have to pay attention to what you're doing. It becomes almost second nature to you after you've done about a 100 animals. But you have to be especially careful with something like a mink or any high value fur. I have almost zero use for a spey blade on a trapper pattern knife other than to do misc cutting.

Oh, didn't notice this thread was from 2004 until after I posted. But my opinion remains the same.

Interesting about the Spey River.
 
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