Handmade, Hand Forged, Unique Custom Knives & Tools. Working Art. Since 1997
Chilcotin winter.jpg

Custom Knives and Tools (Tsilhqot'in territory)

Custom hand forged camp knives, skinning knives, gut hook knives, utility kniives, hide scapers, farrier (shoeing) knives. Different designs by Cariboo Blades from the past.

 

Custom Handmade Hand Forged Working Knives and Tools.

 

We support the Wet’suwet’en First Nation. We support all First Nations people, everywhere.

 

Some of the different knives and tools we’ve made for hunters, trappers, cowboys and indigenous hunters and elders. We use to peddle our knives and tools at rodeos, farmers markets, knife shows and art and craft shows. We took orders and made heavy duty camp knives, hide scrapers, skinning knives, horse shoeing knives, straight razors and garden knives and tools.

Over the past 27 years we’ve survived in the the bush, living simply, off most grids (there are logging roads) growing our food and hunting. This has given us a chance to develop working knives and tools.

https://aki-and-scott-fireweed.blogspot.com/2021/12/living-with-solar-power-for-25-years.

 
Custom hand forged camp knives.

Custom hand forged camp knives

Custom made camp knife.

Handmade camp knife. Forged tang to fit the curved crown.

Hand forged camp knife, 9 inch blade.

Custom hand forged camp knives. Forged lumber mill steel, elk antler scales, steel pommel, copper and brass. All recovered.

Big camp knives forged from leaf spring.

Custom chef knife for a camp. Both chef knives came with blade sheaths.

Custom chef knife for a camp. Both chef knives came with blade sheaths.

Camp chef knife. 8 inch blade, 3/16 inch spine, 5 inch walnut handle.

Camp chef knife. 8 inch blade, 3/16 inch spine, 5 inch walnut handle.

 

Custom Made Hunting Knives

The first couple of years here we foraged native plants and hunted for our food. Aki carved and Scott made forged hunting knives from leaf springs for cash to buy gas and sugar. We learned bushcraft skills and how to survive in the Chilcotin (Tsilhqot’in).

Now we grow most of our food.

Handmade skinning knife wrapped in a bit of leath moose antler point skinning knife balanced at the brass guard.

Handmade skinning knife wrapped in a bit of leather. An excellent skinning knife balanced at the brass guard.

Small handmade skinning knife. 2 1/2” blade. Moose Point skinning knives. We’ve made many.

Small handmade skinning knife. 2 1/2” blade. Deer Point skinning knives. We’ve made many.

 

All these knives were made 20 - 25 years ago. Most were sold on the road.

At shows. We had 20 - 30 tools going at the same time. Preparing for the show, re-stocking. Now we build1 to 4 tools and knives at a time. Everything is custom to order. We spend more time.

Custom camp knife. 7 “ blade, 1” finger choil,, 5/16” spine.

Camp knives. 6 piece set

 

Custom hunting knives set in ironwood.

Planer blade knives. Hand forged D2 steel. Recovered and repurposed into quality tools that will last generations. Original designs tooled into the sheaths.

3 small handmade hunting knives.

Handmade utility knives.

3 1/2 " Moose Point handmade skinning knives.

Larger Moose Point handmade skinning knives.

 
Handmade fillet knife for meat. No waste.

Handmade fillet knife for meat. No waste.

 

Custom made skinning knife..Bandsaw steel. 1998.

Sawtooth gut hook skinning knife. 3/16” spine.

The ultimate skinning knife.The ulu knife. Our Ulus.

The ultimate skinning knife.

The ulu knife. Our Ulus.

Deer skinning knives

Handmade hunting knives.

Custom skinning knife. Small hand forged 3” blade.

Custom skinning knife. Small hand forged 3” blade.

Custom hunting knife with a cherry wood and leather sheath

Small antler handle neck knives and skinning neck knives.

Small antler handle neck knives and skinning neck knives.

Custom made survival knife sheathed with leg belts and fire steel. Absolute security.

Custom made working sheath with leg belts. Absolute security.

Collection of our tools and knives sent to us by a customer in Belgium..

Collection of our tools and knives sent to us by a customer in Belgium..

Bull cutter

 

Custom Woodcarving Tools

 

We’ve worked, testing and experimenting with all our repurposed materials in the boreal forest.

Hunting for survival, raising animals for survival has been part of our lives here. Having a big garden, putting food away by drying, canning and freezing is a big part of our spring, summer and fall. 2019, we’re going into our 22nd winter.

Boreal forest

Boreal forest

Hand carved ladles

Hand carved ladles

Plum wood hand carved spoons

Plum wood hand carved spoons

Handmade wilderness survival knives.

Handmade wilderness survival knives.

Aki Yamamoto carving spoons. Her son Kai in the background.

Aki Yamamoto carving spoons. Her son Kai in the background.

Hand forged finishing adze. Aki carving totems.

Totem carvings by Aki Yamamoto

Totem carvings by Aki Yamamoto

We’ve made over 1000 custom hook knives in 20 years.

We’ve made over 1000 custom hook knives in 20 years.

 

Every so often we see carving tools we made 20 years ago on the internet.

Chisel slick. Second from the left. The offset handle lies flat on your work as you hammer.

Chisel slick. Second from the left. The offset handle lies flat on your work as you hammer.

A Haida carvers tool kit. Our mark was a brand at the time. You can just barely see the “S” (snake) at the top.

Couple of our tools here. The fishtail slick and the skew underneath. We found this photo on Getty Images.

Couple of our tools here. The fishtail slick and the skew underneath. We found this photo on Getty Images.

 
 

Handmade Gardening knives and tools.

Garden scorp. Gardening tools.

On the gardening scorp, Rob Borsato, an organic farmer, forged the blade from spent chainsaw file. We mounted and made the cherrywood handle. An excellent tool.

Zucchini knife edges.

Zucchini knife edges.

Cathy Allen, Rob Bosato’s partner designed this Zucchini knife.Both have run their 4 acre organic farm for 35 years.

 

Traditional living, processing your own hides

Tsilhqot’in hide scrapers.

Aki

Aki

Small hide scraper

Fish tail slick for hide scraping.

Fish tail slick for hide scraping.

 
Timber framing chisels

Timber framing chisels

Big Hand forged draw knives

Big Hand forged draw knives

 

Hunting in the back country with Horses.

Hunting with horses.

Hunting with horses.

Custom hand forged hoof knives, Elk handle

Hand carved Horse Bollo neck ties.

Hand carved Horse Bollo neck ties.

A small hand forged skinning knife with a gut hook

A small hand forged skinning knife with some weight.

The “Chilcotin Moore” custom hunting knife.

 
Handmade hunting knife with it’s cherry wood and leather sheath.

Handmade hunting knife with it’s cherry wood and leather sheath.

Mule deer crown handle. Hunting knives

Mule deer crown handle. Hunting knives

 
Caping Knives for trappers

Caping Knives for trappers

Handmade neck knives for skinning small game

Handmade neck knives

Mule deer crown and saw steel hunting knife.

Mule deer crown and saw steel hunting knife.

 

Custom hand forged hunting knives. Moose antler scales, 5” blade, 3/16” spine. The Gwaii Buck.

 

Pancake sheath and bull cutter knife

 

Blue pine masks. Beetle kill pine.

 
Custom made crooked knife with a deer antler handle.

Custom made crooked knife with a deer antler handle.

Forged spring steel adze and slicks.

Forged spring steel adze and slicks.

 

Adze, slicks, skews, chisels and knives. They are what we started with. Hunting knives, kitchen knives, timber frame tools and hoof knives came with living in the Cariboo.

Kelowna show.

Kelowna show.

 
We made all of these. Straight knives with long handles, slicks and skews.

We made all of these. Straight knives with long handles, slicks and skews.

A couple of Cariboo Blades carving slicks. Haida carver’s tools

A couple of Cariboo Blades carving slicks. Haida carver’s tools

Custom  wood carving slick.

Custom wood carving slick.

 

Broccoli knife. Handmade gardening tools.

We’ve made all kinds of garden tools. Hoes, bulb planters, specialty knives and shovels. Pictures are somewhere. We’ll post them when we find them.

Chilcotin morning

Chilcotin morning

Handmade Zucchini knife, Gardening tools

Handmade Zucchini knife, Gardening tools

Foot powered grinding wheel

Foot powered grinding wheel

Logging

Logging

 

Hide scraper blade angle

We’ve made a few dozen hide scrapers. Every rodeo and fall fair we’d sell a few. From top to bottom, a large hide scraper, a draw scraper knife and a small hide scraper. Like the ulu, it seems the hide scraper is a woman’s tool. Almost exclusively we sold medium size hide scrapers to older indigenous women. We can’t seem to find a picture of the medium size which was the most popular. Doing hides is hard work. The design (top and bottom scrapers) was from a drawing left for us on a napkin at the rodeo banik stand by the hereditary chief’s wife..

The large scraper pictured we still have and have used it as a hoe in the garden. It’s great. The small scarper (bottom) has the perfect angle. Great for deer hides. The medium size was preferred for moose hides.

We used wood hockey sticks (broken) for the medium hide scraper handles. We’d sand them and bring out the lamination’s. They where 16” - 18” long. To use the draw knife style scraper you’d hang your fresh hide on a pole sitting along and off the ground. Our fish tail slicks were a scraping tool of choice as well.

 

More Traditional Woodworking Tools

Offset (doglegged) chisels

We’ve made all kinds and sizes of chisels, slicks and skews.

Custom made scarf slick, flaren slick, cup slick and 1 1/2” HD chisel.

Custom made scarf slick, flaren slick, cup slick and 1 1/2” HD chisel.

Handmade timber framing chisels

Handmade timber framing chisels

 
Custom Horseman Knife.

Custom Horseman Knife.

Custom horse shoeing knives. Dpropped blades.

Custom horse shoeing knives. Dpropped blades.

We’ve been making custom horse shoeing knives for 20 years.

Handmade horse shoeing knife.

Handmade horse shoeing knife.

 

Hoof knife back.

Hand carved horse head

Hand carved horse head

 

Odds and ends

Japanese style kitchen knives on display at a show.

Japanese style kitchen knives on display at a show.

 
Crab apple throwing knife

Crab apple throwing knife

 
chef knife kicked back deer antler handle
Handmade straight razors.

Handmade straight razors.

Custom Handmade straight razor. Moose antler point handle.

Custom Handmade straight razor. Moose antler point handle.

Custom chef walnut_set_in_block.jpg
 
The Yunx custom knife sheathed.

The Yunx custom knife sheathed.

Custom drop point knife.

Custom drop point knife.

2 1/2 inch D2 steel blade, aluminum guard, stainless steel pins, copper lanyard insert in a moose antler butt.

Custom made knife with walnut scales.

Custom made knife with walnut scales.

 
The Filberg Festival on Vancouver Island.

The Filberg Festival on Vancouver Island.

 
Cariboo Blades first custom made knife.

Cariboo Blades first custom made knife.

 
Winter kill. Moose skull.

Winter kill. Moose skull.

We’re just building this page now, digging up old photographs. More to come.