By Joe Berk
You know I’m a knife nut. The collecting craze came to me late in life, and I’ve been making up for lost time. You also know that when you buy anything from any retailer, you’re deluged for life with an endless stream of emails pitching more products. Those emails work (at least they do on me), and sometimes they light a match that can’t be extinguished. That’s what happened here. An email floated in from an online knife retailer touting a sale, with a photo of a knife that that caught my attention.
So I clicked and the ad brought me to the online retailer’s website, but the knife wasn’t there. I spent a good half hour looking through hundreds of knives from that manufacturer (Rough Ryder) on the retailer’s site, and I couldn’t find the one in the ad above. I emailed the retailer asking about it, and didn’t get a response. I emailed the retailer again the next day and there still no response. On Day 3, I called the retailer. They apologized for not answering my emails and promised a response that day. They kept their word, but I didn’t like the answer: The knife was out of stock and they had no plans to order more. I also received an email from the man who owned the knife store. He apologized for the ad. That was a nice touch and it kept those guys on my “go to” list. But I still wanted the knife and they didn’t have it. Compounding the felony, the knife importer (Rough Ryder) didn’t have the knife shown above on their website, either.
I didn’t know anything about the knife, including its size or anything other than the fact that it was a folder and the scales were brown burlap Micarta. I Googled those terms and found the knife on Amazon! Woo hoo! I knew I had promised Susie I was done buying knives for a while, but you know how that goes. Add to cart, buy, etc. It arrived the next day.
Man, this is a big knife. Please, no jokes or questions about what I am compensating for. I just like these things and they are so inexpensive, I’m indulging whatever underlying cranial miswiring is fueling this collecting affliction. I sent a quick photo to Bowie-fabricating good buddy Paul, and he asked me how big it is. That led to more iPhone photos and this blog.
I learned on Amazon the knife is the Rough Ryder Deer Slayer, and the Rough Ryder series with brown burlap Micarta scales is their Tater Skin line. The Rough Ryder Deer Slayer isn’t offered any longer, but you can still find them on Amazon and one or two other retailers. The Amazon price is $39.97, and for a knife this size, that’s pretty reasonable.
The Rough Ryder Deer Slayer is nicely packaged. The box is fiberboard (cardboard, basically) and it probably won’t stand up to constant opening and closing, but it is nice. The knife doesn’t come with a sheath (or a holster, like a Buck does), which would have been even nicer. But it’s still pretty cool.
The blade is 4 inches long, and the knife (with the blade out) is almost 10 inches. This is a big knife.
The blade material is 440 stainless (it is razor sharp), and the brown burlap Micarta scales are aesthetically pleasing. The blade is a slip joint, which means it opens and closes like a regular pocketknife. The spring that holds it in either the open or closed position is strong, and I’m ultra-careful closing this one, making sure my fingers are out of the blade’s path as the knife is being closed.
The bottom line: I like the Rough Ryder Deer Slayer. I’ll probably never do anything with the Deer Slayer other than look at it (I’m certainly not going to slay Bambi with it). But I like it. If you want one, you should act fast as the knife is no longer being made. Amazon has a few in stock, and then that’s it.
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