Machetes look like great fun in jungle movies, with everybody up front chopping away at six foot grass and sapling thickets and hardly slowing down the march–but try one in the American woodlands and you’ll quickly realize that the full length machete was meant for tender green growth, not the briar thickets and hardwood saplings of North America.
Meyerco redesigned the machete to create a brush knife for the American forests, 19″ long with a full 12″ of heavy quarter inch thick stainless steel that’s as much ax as knife. The rubberized black handle incorporates a wide hand guard to give more protection in places where “everything either bites or stings or stabs you.” At just over 2 lbs, this won’t likely fit well into your ultralight kit, but it’s not too much for a canoe trip, or even as a hip knife (a sturdy nylon scabbard is included) if you’re hunting in heavy brush.
Years ago I hiked in bear country with a fellow who always carried the biggest Bowie knife he could find, only a little smaller than Meyerco’s Short Machete. His reasoning was that if he ever did meet a bear he wanted something along that would make an impression on it. Even a false sense of security is sometimes worth the extra weight.
