Hunters, Get Ready for Viscera
I’m the product manager for Avid Design; my job is to bring new and inventive hunting and fishing products to life. We’re tired with the same old “stuff” out there, and strive to bring insights from the hardcore outdoorsmen into real products. Our goal is to set the bar higher, bringing quality and innovation at a cost everyone can afford.
Viscera™ is a new field dressing tool I had the privilege to invent and test for the first time last weekend. This 3-in-1 knife, guthook and pelvic saw is unique and ultra-functional. It made quick work of this boxy doe last weekend. It’s extremely exciting to use first-run prototypes, and this real-world test is recorded below.
The handle pivots over a center locking mechanism. Pressing a release button swings the handle to cover the blade, exposing a huge guthook and pelvic saw. The blade is a high hollow ground modified drop point. The blade edge is extremely sharp, 440 stainless steel. Viscera™ is 9” long and stored in a ballistic nylon belt sheath.
The primary design benefit is you combine the comfort and strength of a fixed blade, with the versatility of a folder. In a nutshell: everything you need for field dressing in one tool.
First cut: The sharper angle of the blade tip pokes through the hide with little effort, no risk of puncturing the soft bowel below.
Guthook: The guthook is much bigger than most. At 1” wide, Thick hides, tissues and fat layers all “fit” in the guthook at one time. It’s like adding a zipper into the cavity…really. Most guthook are way too small, they fill up with hair, defeating the operation. This doe was the biggest and healthiest I’ve harvested, 160 lbs. The hide was dense; her fat stores were 1½” thick above the rump! The guthook is extremely sharp and because of the ergonomic handle, could even pull through the breastplate, that’s a first for me.
Pelvic Saw: The saw is 3” long and the blunt end of the guthook acts as a buffer so you don’t puncture the intestines below. The handle was engineered to provide a strong grip, to cut in both opposing strokes. The forefinger fits into a channel below the pivot point, the handle fills the hand well, it’s oversized, with more girth and shape to follow the contours of the palm and make a great grip. 20 strokes and it was through, hips opened up to drop the internals.
Blade: The shape of the blade looks wicked. A sweeping forend makes skinning a breeze. You can choke up on the blade for finer detail work, spine jibbing makes for a good thumb hold. The 3½” blade is a great length for field dressing, not too small for aggressive cutting, not too big for delicate cuts around the lower tract and bladder.
Handle: Rubber inserts make for a good grip, extra girth fills the hand. Handle focus was on ergonomics and the many different holding positions hunters use when they’re inside an animal.
