Long blades on fillet knives

[Okanagan]

Dave's crappie fillets triggered a thought, or what passes for one within certain limited criteria.  Fillet knife blades longer than apparently needed work better for me in filleting fish. 

I am a slow learner sometimes.  It took me three years to really notice consciously that a friend in Northern Saskatchewan who used to be a fishing guide used a humonguously long bladed fillet knife.  He is super fast and whips perfect boneless fillets off of pike or whatever fish.  I'm not bad at filleting fish but had always chosen knives with blades not much longer than the width of the fillet. 

When I got back home and found a fillet knife on sale with a longer blade, I bought it and tried it on a sockeye salmon of maybe 6 lbs.  WOW!  (Edited insert later:  In my mind I remembered it as a foot long but the new blade itself, beyond handle, is only 8 inches long.  My old ones must have been really short!)

The long blade tends to smoothly lift off the entire fillet with one clean, effortless, sweeping cut. 

I don't think it would make much difference on short fish like crappie, but on pike, salmon etc. a blade that is as long enough to reach across and lie flat on many, many bones at once does a much better job for me. 

Then I found a big scimitar curved Kershaw knife in a commercial fishing outfitter down on the docks.  That one is the best I've ever used, long and curved.  It is not a big knife by commercial fishing comparisons but is a step bigger for me. 

I have a feeling that my discovery is old news to a lot of the fishermen here!   

[slagmaker]

I have tried long and short blades and I can say for a fact. In my hands,,, it makes no difference I still butcher any attempt at filleting a fish

[Dave]

Funny that I was thinking about this while filleting up those crappies the other day.  I have ALWAYS gone to the longer bladed knives but thought it was just because that's what I've always used (choices are 4", 6" or 8").  I usually use the 6" blade, which is a touch more flexible than the 4's for anything freshwater even to the smaller sunnies I'll keep when I'm desperate for some fresh fish.  Saltwater fish I always use the longer, thinner Dexter Russell. They are very flexible and can can easily bend for a smooth cut right along the backbone.  However, 95% of the time, I only use the top inch of the knife and sort of fillet by brail once I'm past cutting the skin.

[nastygunz]

 From my commercial fishing days out of New Bedford Mass to my tiny native Brooktrout in Vermont I always like a long thin flexible fillet knife with a good spring blade.  I see a lot of people on the fishing shows and on YouTube use electric fillet knife and they seem to work really well and really fast.

[Todd Rahm]

I prefer long blades. Even use them when processing game meat.

[FinsnFur]

I'm like Dave and prefer the shorter blade.
I can remember when my Dad was teaching me how to clean fish, certain areas of the fish I would hold the knife like a pencil. He used to get so mad at me and tell me that I'm not a artist, Im cleaning a fish. LOL
I bought a longer blade years ago thinking it would be nice. But I just couldn't be as finesse as I wanted so I went back to the shorter one.
I can tell by looking at Dave's fillets he's been doing this a while and knows what he's doing. Every filet is perfect. But maybe I'm just saying that that's exactly how my fillets look lol

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[Okanagan]

I suspect that part of it is the shape and size of the fish.  I would not know how to use a long blade on a crappie.  Dave and Jim are both getting perfect fillets. 

Here is a pic of three knives I like for filleting fish.  For larger fish, the Kershaw is my favorite and my main big game cutting knife as well.  I use the long curved belly more than the point.  The thin little Swedish Frost knife with the yellow handle is sweet to use on smaller fish and for certain boning operations on big game.  The 6" blade is very flexible on it.  Distance of each knife from the camera lens is distorting lengths a bit.  The Kershaw is 9" and longer around the curve.



Those pics of fish fillets have made me hungry.  Wish my grandmother was still with us to fry up some crappie fillets.  She was the best.  Gonna have to pull some halibut out of the freezer.  It is the best I can do right now for a meal of white meat fish.

 

[Hawks Feather]

While I have several fillet knives my fillets normally come with batter already on them and I don't use my knives.       I know that is bad, but the good thing is that I never need to sharpen them.

Jerry

[FinsnFur]

Jerry