Knife Activities

Knife Skills require Supervision from a qualified Adult

The Knife has always been the most important survival tool in Scout and in Bushcraft.  It has so many uses, yet few get to learn and unlock the potential of the Knife.

Knife Safety

Every knife class starts with a Safety Talk.

A knife needs to be treated with respect and great care. 

• Safety Zone

  • AKA - Blood Circle

• Cut Away from Body

  • Generally downward

  • Away from body parts

  • Clear of legs

    • Cut to femoral artery (inside of upper leg) can result in death in 2 minutes!

• Safely Open a Pocket Knife

• Withdraw a Knife from its Sheath Safely

  • scouts.org.uk - how-to-withdraw-a-knife-from-its-sheath-safely 

  • You MUST have a Solid Sheath

  • Knives with cloth sheaths and many with thin leather sheaths are unsafe to carry and use

• Passing a Blade Safely

  • Ideally folded or in sheath

  • If blade is exposed, hold spine of blade with edge facing away from your hand

• Keep Knife Clean and Sharp

  • A dull knife can catch, slip and cause injury

  • A clean knife handle is less likely to slip out of your hand

• Falling Knife

  • Never try to catch a falling knife - it is so easy to slice your hand open

Knife Skills

Basic Knife Skills are vital in a survival situation and are fun to learn and work on. 

Basic Knife Skills

• Baton Wood

  • Splitting wood

  • Beaver Chewing to cut larger branches or trees

• Feathering

  • Making feathers and feather sticks

  • Done with knife in hand (choked up on handle towards head)

  • Done with knife secured in wood (feather stick is pulled toward axe)

• Carving

  • Piece of wood for Scouts

  • Soap from Dollar Store for Cubs is fine

• Tent Peg

  • Classic Skill 

  • Peg making guide

• Making a bowdrill kit with fireboard

• Start Fire

  • Using spine of knife to make fatwood fuzz and strike a ferrorod to start a fire

• Deadfall Traps 

  • Making Deadfall Traps can be really fun

  • Probably best avoided for most units and most Scouts

  • These are great skills to master, but come with real hazards and potential problems

  • It is vital to teach Scouts that they should not and can not set these up for real use

    • It is generally illegal and unethical to kill animals with these traps

  • If you are using heavy deadfall, hands can get crushed when trying to set them up

• Sharpening 

  • Using Stone

  • Using Diamond Sharpener

  • Stropping

  • Honing

Example Knife Training Class

Intro to "The Knife"

• Brief talk on history of Knife and the BSA and Bushcraft

• Knife safety 

  • Cut AWAY from body

  • Don't cut near in legs 

  • Don't use knife near other Scouts

  • Don't horseplay or walk next to someone with a knife

• Knife examples – original BSA (Swiss Army), lockblade, fixed blade, hatchet/chopper

• Knife use examples – cut, feather, split, carve

  • Keep this demo very short as it will be covered in the Breakout Classes

Breakout Classes

Split larger groups up and have them rotate between classes.

Class 1 - Baton

• Baton with knife

• Split wood into kindling

Class 2 - Feathering 

• Feathering

  • Knife in hand

  • Knife in wood (stick pulled towards blade)

• Making wood shavings and feathers

• Feather Stick

• Feathers used in fire class

Class 3 - Tent Peg

• Tent Peg

• Make a tent peg

Class 4 - Fire Making (if big enough class) 

• Fatwood

• Shave fatwood and light with ferrorod - both using spine of knife

• Burn Feathers and Kindling

Supplies needed:

• Small wood rounds 

  • Used as platform for work (baton splitting, feathering and tent pegs)

• Small wood to split

  • Easy to split – cut boards or 2x4 are fine, but small wood without knots are better

• Branches – lager than adult thumb

  • Green is fine and maybe even better

  • Used to make tent peg

• Batons

  • Used for baton knife splitting

• Fire Pans

  • Used to start fires on

• Scout Hats

  • Used to collect feathers in

• 3 Fatwood Sticks

• Ferrorods

• Knives

  • Ideally fixed blade Morakniv

  • Instructors should bring their own knives for demoing different knives

  • Scouts may bring their own Knives

    • This requires judgement and supervision by adult leadership

    • Most Scouts do fine with knives

      • Some will need extra supervision

      • Some just aren't ready yet.  Maybe next year they will be. 

Knife Craft

A great way to develop knife skills is to work on Knife Craft.  There are many useful camp tools that can be made with a knife.

See our Knife Craft Page for more.

Knife Throwing

The BSA prescribes the rules of Throwing activities in the Shooting Sports Manual.  Activity must be approved by a council Shooting Sports Chair or National Camping School Shooting Sports Director.

To be clear - Knives should NEVER be Thrown at any time other than at a Council approved activity. 

Knife and Tomahawk Throwing is PROHIBITED for Cub Scouts.

Four-round competition

Youth ages 16 and over

Throwers compete in four rounds of three tomahawks from each of five distances, for a total of 60 tomahawks.

Each round consists of 15 tomahawks, three thrown from each distance:

• Three at one spin at a minimum distance of 10 feet

• Three at one and a half spins from a minimum distance of 13 feet

• Three at two spins from a minimum distance of 19.5 feet

• Three at two and a half spins from a minimum distance of 23 feet

• Three at three spins from a minimum distance of 29.5 feet

Maximum 300 points

Youth ages 11–15

Youth follow the same throwing progressions as adults, but with no minimum distance.

Maximum 300 points