Hori Hori Ultimate & Sheath

I love BareBones products and enjoyed this Hori Hori Ultimate knife for a couple of years. It's a super useful tool, but mine broke recently. It caught on a root while digging a small hole, and the blade snapped right off above the bottle opener notch and hit me in the face. Not sure if mine was defective or not, but it's now outside the 1 year limited warranty.

If I could only save two things in a fire, pets excluded, it would be my Barebones Hori Hori & foraging bag (which I will also review separately).

This tool is the best thing I ever bought myself. It does the work of a spade, shovel, knife, small saw, hammer, and rooter all in one. What used to take me multiple tools & several minutes to do now takes mere seconds. I can forage roots, branches, and everything in between without having to carry a belt full of equipment. It also has a gut hook, although that is not something I have personally used.

The knife end of the blade is not exceptionally sharp, but it serves its purpose. The saw end is much more vicious and capable of a lot. The metal pommel is great, and strong enough for the occasional hammering job. The whole blade is easy to clean on the go, as well, using moss, leaves, your hand, what have you, which is a must for a forager or other woodsy type.

The sheath is sturdy, with an open tip, so you don't have to worry about debris building up. The clip in the back is metal, not plastic, and just pliable enough to make clipping it into place easy.

To bring up my other favorite item again, my Hori Hori sheath latches perfectly onto my foraging bag, making wildcrafting excursions that much easier, with or without a belt.

The device looks and feels macho. It is very utilitarian with the exception of the knife blade itself. As it came from the box the knife blade was not sharp at all; it could cut warm butter but not much else. Maybe that is the way they ship it so no one gets hurt opening it (although the saw teeth are fearsomely sharp!!). I took the tool to my shop and tried to get a sharp edge to the blade with whetstone, then file, then grinder. I could now barely cut myself it I tried really hard, but it still won't cut paper. Your experience may differ from mine, but I'm still trying to sharpen mine. First knife in my life I couldn't put a sharp edge on. It has a complicated edge geometry because the blade is in the shape of a semi small trowel, so one side of the blade is mildly concave and the other side is mildly convex. I still really like it and can't wait for an excuse to carry it openly somewhere. The handle has a solid metal head for some hammering if needed, the semi trowel shape obviously for light duty digging, the measurements in inches helpful in knowing how deep you have dug. It has an aggressive point, dagger shaped, that would make a frightful stabbing instrument, with inch markers to show......well let's not go there. It would get 5 stars except for the difficulty with sharpening what should be the blade.