This article acts as a comprehensive guide to batoning. Be sure to pay close attention to the last two sections (the one on proper batoning technique, and the one on troubleshooting the difficulties of batoning), as these two sections will help you most out in the field.
What is Batoning?
Batoning is a survival and bushcraft technique whereby a sturdy knife is lodged in a piece of wood then struck repeatedly by a baton-like object, a heavy piece of wood for instance, in order to split the wood.
Ontario SP10 Marine Raider Bowie – Amazon
Batoning’s Purpose
Among other purposes, batoning is often used to split logs and other wood to create kindling, to create access to the dry inner portion of a wet log for generating dry tinder, and to produce shingles, slats, or boards.
Advantages of Batoning
In many instances, batoning makes the process of splitting wood far easier than it’s alternative, chopping wood. Batoning requires less effort, takes less time, and results in a much cleaner cut than chopping. Batoning also requires much less experience to master than chopping, as aiming while chopping may be difficult to do at first. Batoning is an extremely handy technique to know when you do not have a chopper lying around, as may be the case if you’ve forgotten to take a chopper camping, for instance.
Disadvantages of Batoning
Under certain conditions, such as in the case of batoning wet logs, batoning can be somewhat difficult. Batoning can also sometimes damage or even break the tool being struck. Thus, some caution must be taken when batoning. To reduce difficulties and knife breakage, proper batoning technique should be used (see the section below on proper batoning technique).
Why Knives Break When Batoning
In most cases, knives break when batoning because they are being batoned at an angle. If they are placed and batoned straight, the knife is far less likely to break. Batoning with the wrong baton (like a rock or brick for instance) will obviously also cause damage to the knife, which is why wood should really be the only thing used as a baton when batoning. If proper batoning technique is used, however, this can all be avoided, or at least mitigated dramatically.
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Ideal Baton
A piece of wood is the best tool to use for a baton. Rocks, bricks, and other extremely hard objects will work, but they will severely damage the spine of the knife you are using to baton. The best piece of wood to use is a piece of hardwood. If you would like to make a more comfortable batoning tool, say if you’re going to be batoning a lot of wood, shape your piece of wood to look something like a short baseball bat: debark it, and thin out a handle, then shave it down until it is smooth to the grip. The goal is to make a batoning tool with a wider hitting surface, and a thinner handle surface.
Ideal Batoning Knife
Batoning can be done with nearly any fixed blade knife, so long as the blade is strong enough to be able to stand repeated batoning. Knives with full tangs (where the metal from the knife extends past the blade and through the entire handle) are stronger and because of that will work better for batoning, as they are less likely to be damaged or break.
The size of the ideal batoning knife depends on the width of the piece of wood you are attempting to go through. The edge of the blade of the batoning knife should be approximately 2-3 inches longer than the diameter of the wood you are trying to baton. That being said, if you’re looking for a single versatile batoning knife to use, you may want to stick to a longer blade. It is obviously possible to baton smaller pieces of wood with a longer blade, although it might be a bit tricky, but you will not be able to baton thicker pieces of wood with a shorter blade.
The thickness of the knife’s blade doesn’t make as much of a difference in batoning as the length of the blade. That being said, batoning is easier with a thicker blade, if you do have the choice.
Rigid knife handles will very often create uncomfortable vibrations when struck with a baton, but handles that are completely encased in a synthetic material (like rubber), will normally absorb the shocks reasonably well. Thus, the ideal batoning knife will also have a synthetic material handle. If the knife you intend to use does not have a synthetic material handle, to reduce the felt vibrations, handles can be covered with synthetic material like bicycle inner tube.
Mora 2010 Bushcraft Forest Fixed Blade Outdoor Knife – Amazon / Blade HQ
Batoning Knife Recommendations
1. ESEE Junglas
No surprises with my first recommendation. Top notch pretty much everything (steel, manufacturing, heat treat, etc.), and since you’re going to beating on it with a log, it stands to reason to pick something with probably the best warranty in the business.
Availability: Amazon • Blade HQ • eBay
2. Ka-Bar Becker BK-9
My opinion, this is the poor man’s Junglas. Very good everything with an interesting tactical twist. Something to note: it is a clip point, so your baton will get chewed up.
Availability: Amazon • Blade HQ • eBay
3. Cold Steel SRK
This is probably one of the toughest knives relative to size one can buy. Very nice construction, decent steel, and solid all-round performance.
4. Ontario Spec Marine Raider Bowie
Bang-for-buck if you want a big knife at a low price, this is it. The clip point is very, very aggressive, and thus will completely destroy your baton eventually, however, I have used this knife to baton amongst pretty much everything, and it’s still standing. Ridiculous value for money.
Availability: Amazon • Blade HQ • eBay
Read our review of the Ontario SP10 Marine Raider Bowie
5. Schrade SCHF37
Finally, the poor, poor man’s tough knife. Full tang, good steel, with decent ergonomics. I bought the Schrade SCHF9 and was extremely impressed with its in-hand feel, especially relative to its cost. This knife has identical ergonomics, but without the recurve, which makes it a superior option for batoning.
Availability: Amazon • Blade HQ • eBay
Gerber Bear Grylls Ultimate Survival Knife with Sheath – Amazon / Blade HQ
Proper Batoning Technique
When batoning, there are many ways to mitigate damage and potential breakage to your knife. Use these guidelines to attain proper batoning technique:
- Center the knife in the middle of the piece of wood you are trying to split.
- Place the knife straight down, and not at an angle, when getting ready to baton (this is very important to mitigate damage or breakage to the knife). Hit the center of the knife with the baton until the knife is properly lodged in the wood, then proceed to the next step.
- Baton on the blade end of the knife, but do not hit the very tip of the blade when batoning, as the tip of the knife is usually relatively weak and susceptible to breakage. The metal of the knife should protrude from the wood far enough so that you can hit, not the tip, but a part of the spine that is strong enough to take the batoning.
- Readjust the knife, correcting the blade orientation by making the knife straight again, if it happens to shift to an angle after having been batoned for some time. Make gentle, corrective taps to the handle end of the knife when batoning whenever the blade begins to stray from it’s original downward alignment. Do not hit the handle as hard as you would hit the blade end of the knife, as the force may cause the knife to break or be damaged, but feel free to make light hits to the handle end when you feel it is appropriate.
L.T. Wright Genesis Black Handled Survival Knife
Troubleshooting Difficulties with Batoning
Other than using proper batoning technique, the following is a list of adjustments you can make to have an easier time batoning. Try using one or more than one if a particular piece of wood is giving you a hard time.
- Baton with the grain of the wood, not against it.
- If possible, baton around and not through knots in the wood, as knots create sometimes extreme resistance and can, in certain situations, damage the edge of the knife.
- If the log already has a crack, take advantage of it, as mother nature has already done most of the work for you. Align the knife on top of the crack and go through as you would normally.
- Move the piece of wood you are trying to baton to rest on the hardest surface you can find. Ideal surfaces include large rocks, a second log, or, in more urban settings, concrete.
- Use a more appropriate knife (see the Ideal Batoning Knife section above).
- If you simply cannot baton through a particular piece of wood, try batoning a smaller one (in terms of it’s diameter or radus), as batoning becomes easier with thinner pieces of wood.
- Hardwood is of course much more difficult to baton through than softwood (like balsa). Adjust expectations accordingly in terms of expansion of energy, and if it doesn’t matter whether you have hardwood or softwood, switch to batoning a softwood instead.
Hultafors Craftmans Heavy-Duty GK Fixed Blade Knife – Amazon
Your Thoughts on Batoning?
Do you baton instead of chopping through wood? Have you ever damaged a knife while batoning?
Share your opinions & experiences with us in the comments.
This comment is pretty much OT, but yew trees were mentioned in one of the comments as possibly being more durable than an iron fence post. Accordingly, I want to learn more about them and whether they can be grown in the US. My questions:
* I see (I did some googling) that some varieties of yew are / can be grown in the US, e.g., the Pacific yew, and that some of them are hardy in zones 6, 7, and 8 (I’m in zone 6, so I should be able to grow them). Does somebody know if the yews available in the US are the same or as durable as the UK ones mentioned?
* I see some mention about them being poisonous — any details about this — see below:
* I have thoughts about planting some at the corners of my garden (and at intervals along the fence line) to serve as fence posts:
* Should I be concerned about the poison in any way, like either interfering with the growth of edible plants (like a black walnut does), or somehow actually poisoning the food harvested?
* I’m thinking about planting them, letting them grow to the size I’d want for fence posts, and then, in essence, killing them and leaving them in place. One question is whether they would make durable fence posts while rooted, or it would be better to cut a post from the above ground wood and dig a post hole. Any thoughts?
Those are some great questions and I hope someone chimes in with expert answers, that said, isn’t it possible to buy some reclaimed hardwood (oak for instance) and use it as posts with a concrete setting? Faster than waiting for a tree to grow ;) That said, the costs may be high so if you have a lot of ground to cover, your plant and build approach may work out better. Keep me updated if you figure out a valid solution!
terrific. Here we have a video presented on how to void your warranty on the knife, teaching you to do something no self respecting knowledgeable person would ever do (I am 65 and not once was I unable to find dry wood to the extent that I had to baton it and that includes Vietnam and living in the Pacific Northwest for a long time), and why? It just amazes me. What are you guys doing? Going “Look, I’m stupid but I can really blast a knife through this wood! Look at me”. Sheesh
Never had to use a warranty on a knife & if a fixed blade can handle batoning then I trust it with everything else. Beyond that, its fun to do. ;) Take a breather and demolish some logs mate.
Have you never needed to make kindling for a fire during a cold, rainy day? Obviously this isn’t necessary for a backyard bonfire, but when I’m backpacking for a week, I like having a fire for two reasons: it’s cozy and if my pocket rocket runs out of fuel or breaks, I can still cook my freeze dried meals without scouring the land for dry wood.
Additionally, but probably not applicable to most, when I winter pack, I bring a small titanium tent stove in case the temps get very bad. My stove is only 8″ diameter x 12″ long, so I need some seriously small wood to fit in there, but little sticks are annoying to find and generally soaked all the way through, so I find a nice 4″ diameter log or branch, cut it to length with my saw and baton it into 2″ pieces for the stove. The smaller diameter pieces burn hotter and faster to get the stove ripping until I can add the larger 4″ diameter pieces.
All that being said, this is another trick in the bag of tricks and doesn’t need to be deployed every time I’m out in the bush. Also, I have never broken a knife while batoning and I don’t use expensive knives for the bush.
I have a bk7 knife, and a rubber mallet. Is it ill advised to baton using that combo?
Not sure if its advisable but I dare say it should be fine. ;)
I agree with Jumbo above, I think to a large extent battonning is just a fad and topic of discussion for internet “bushcraft” wannabees. Having said that, I do but appreciate the fact that in some situations a person should know that you might be able access dry wood by batonning/or splitting otherwise wet wood. They should also know where to look for dry wood, including dead limbs on standing trees and “leaners.”
But I have been an outdoorsman for almost 60 years and spent hundreds of nights camping in all types or weather (mostly in southeast US but many other places.) I have made and tended thousands of campfires, virtually my whole life. I have never, not once, ever used a knife to baton a piece of wood. Never. Not once. No reason to. If I ever split wood, I use an axe or hatchet. Duh.
Then again, bushcrafting is about making something out of nothing, and being able to process all your wood with a knife and not needing an axe or a hatchet is one of the more useful skills to have out there, especially if you don’t want to spend the extra money or want to save some pounds on your kit. Skills > gear I would say
Not everyone carries an axe or hatchet- people who focus on ultralight weight excursions or who want to go as barebones as possible may depend on only a single tool. I don’t think Cody Lundin is an “internet bushcraft wannabee” and yet he has a very barebones set up that he uses to great effect. This bias towards stripped equipment down to the barebones may or may not be a fad but I think it does teach interesting lessons and frankly, I think its here to stay.
I have fully kitted out BoB’s but I do enjoy gallivanting in the woods with as little as I can safely get away with. As long as people are going out, learning new skills and having fun- I think we should hold back on the judgements. ;)
I winter camp and have a very small wood stove in my tent that requires small pieces of wood. so ..I just use a crappy knife and baton like a mad man!!…no big deal I am safe if I ruin the knife wow then I will go got good will and buy another. and I have to do it to get quality pieces to burn..so what about that?
I use my ESSE 6 for all manner of wood processing, from felling 5″ trees to making feather sticks when it’s miserable and wet out. I’m in Maine, so the white pines give excellent tinder, but splitting branches and smaller segments for fires is much easier with a well shaped baton and a few well placed thwacks. I’ve split lots of apple wood with my ESSE 6 and that’s with a lot of beating on the last quarter inch or so of blade when splitting larger logs. Batoning lets you use what you have to enhance your situation; an axe is always better, but also heavy and not always on your hip. A good knife is invaluable; you might not be a king, but you can certainly more than just survive with quality tools and some practiced technique.
Agreed, I have an ESEE-4, great knife with excellent performance, always wanted an ESEE-6 but I am not sure where it would fit in my kit (bigger than most of my EDC fixed blades but not really a chopper either), do you have yours as a companion to a larger knife or as a sole blade?
my son is a soldier. I presented him with Fallkniven A1 as a graduation gift when he passed RASP he has used his blade numerous times Batoning. Need for sharpening has been a rare occasion for him, digging, notching, batoning, stabbing and cutting various materials are common activities for him. He swears by his knife, and others in his battalion now own Fallkniven A1 knives.
I offer this for your consideration.
Nothing but love for Fallkniven steel- great knives. Sadly, due to the skyrocketing price, I have yet to snag one up to review. :(
One day!
I found this article to be comical. I would use an old fashioned shingle fro. They were developed for small scale wood splitting. They are easy to make from an old automobile leaf spring. They are thin enough to cut through using a. Baton but, are heavy enough to take whacks from a hammer.
A purpose designed tool will (in most cases) be superior, but a lot of people, myself included will absolutely not carry an extra tool in the bush when a solid knife will perform to almost the same standard. Pack weight is a real concern for me, especially after spending 5 years in Canada and realising how brutal trudging through snow really is.
Thanks for dropping by J.M
Battening for survival is absolute bullshit. Guys that practice this either stay in state parks or carry chainsaws. I live in Central British Columbia where they’re are plenty of places that are truly wild and easy to get lost in. I have never in my life seen cut logs or cordwood laying around in the bush unless someone else camped there and packed in a chain saw. Out in the wild, firewood is best collected from deadfall and cut quickly and safely with a lightweight pack saw. Since a lot of these deadfall trees are up to 5 or 6 inches tapering down to nothing, there is absolutely no reason to chop wood. As the wood gets thinner and thinner, the smaller pieces and twigs are excellent kindling, as are pine cones with pitch rubbed into them, as well as birch bark. God does not leave cut logs laying around in the bush for wannabe macho guys to show off their battening skills so unless you are in a tame park. All you chopping and batoning goombas are in a dream world! Pack saw is lighter safer and much more efficient than swinging an axe or wrecking a good knife that is far better suited for what it is intended for. Unfortunately we live in a world where people want to put square pegs in round holes and claim they are a perfect fit (Bruce Jenner for example). Using a knife for splitting wood is ridiculous, dangerous and can really screw up any knife. If you have a knife so big it can split wood, it is useless as a knife to clean a fish, skin or dress game or simply carving. It seems there are too many guys more concerned about being mister macho man, hence oversized 4 X 4 trucks and loud pipes. I guess they make yer man parts bigger!
If you were truly in a survival situation you take every precaution to totally avoid injury and to reduce any other liabilities as even a simple cut could lead to death (bold poisoning) or totally jeopardizing you chances to save yourself. Every time I go in the bush, I have the following items in my pack: a 5 inch Buck 105, a 10 inch bucksaw (3 ounces), a lifestraw, space blanket, small tarp and 100 ft of cordage plus a small bright flashlight and at least 2 means of making fire. I have seen idiots ridiculing another guy for being a wing because he was prepared. Here in BC it is so easy to get lost as this place has 370,000 square miles and almost all of it is forested mountains. Vancouver is a big city but outside of a few major highways, there is all the wilderness you could dream of.
When you are deep in a wild area there is no one to show off to and no need to put on the macho act as nature really doesn’t give a rats ass.
Forget battening and carry a pack saw.
Logical bush guy.
Howdy Jumbo-
With a decently large chopper, its trivial to chop down trees into logs and then baton them for storage on a drying rack. The idea for batoning is to get to the dry stuff in the middle- its a technique that has been around for centuries and its hardly a modern phenomenon.
Concerning safety, I have never damaged a knife batoning regardless of the wood (hardwoods are not an issue in my experience- then again, nothing wrong with taking it slow and batoning chunks off instead of going down the middle) or the knife in question. I have batoned with Mora’s and won’t hesitate to do it again.
Perfectly safe with proper technique and precautions.
Nothing to do with showing off or whatever your offtopic penis/square peg transvestite/trucks/macho whatever rant was. Just a different technique that has been practised for many years. I get that you have a different opinion from me (and others) but that doesn’t mean you can throw around ad hominem attacks about what we do just because you don’t like it.
I don’t know where people get this idea that knives are these fragile little tools and if you look at them the wrong way they will disintegrate. Grab your Bushcraft knife, hammer it into a tree stump and then stand on it. Pretty sure it will be fine-
As for me, after living on 3 continents I am still kicking so don’t worry about me or my safety. I’ll be fine- but thanks for your concern Jumbo, I appreciate it!
I think the optimal word is survival which by its very definition involuntarily necessary -meaning no opportunity or forethought to pack the proper tool for the job every time you leave the house. In a survival situation anything goes and batoning has its place like anything else required to survive. And I’m by sure what merit dropping the name of where you live gives, but northern Alberta here so there you go.
I have a friend who lives in Edmonton- one year it was so cold, icicles formed around his window….on the inside
Brutal.
Yup, social skills are the first thing to go when you’re lost in that much wilderness.
I use a hand saw to cut to fire length. Then stand the often uneven ended wood straight up and hold it in place with the knife and tap on the spine a few times to start it. When the spine is flush I move to the tip end and the blade wedges through. Edge life is longer than when making feathers because there’s very little cutting going on and all wedging happening.
Logs indeed are not just laying around perfectly cut like in the backyard at the homestead where I use an axe. I do know how to cut branches to length, I’m not making a bon fire.
In the woods I cut to length, hold them in place and split. Pretty obvious you spend little time in the woods no matter how you think then type you think you know how it’s done.
I love my Bahco laplander, its a great saw and perfect for getting your small logs to the right shape & size.
Amen, it is great to see another knowledgable outdoors guy.
Wish I had read this article before damaging my machete with a piece of rock (while trying to baton, of course). :P
Live and learn, right Jacob?
Hi folks. I really enjoyed reading the article on batoning; thank you!
As a woodcarver, I often use the technique to accurately split away smaller pieces of wood from a small seasoned block of suitable timber, to make pendants etc. It means you waste less effort and timber carving away to get to a flatter form. Sometimes an axe is just too big for such blocks to use one conveniently.
I did notice one thing though- balsa is a hardwood! Even though it’s really soft to work with. The names ‘hardwood’ and ‘softwood’ refer to trees based upon differences in the cellular structures of the timbers and not their actual hardness or otherwise.
In the UK, yew trees (Taxus baccata) are softwoods, but seasoned yew timber is tough stuff and a fencepost made from it is reputed to outlast an iron post in the ground outdoors.
Whoever came up with the names ‘hard’ and ‘soft woods must have been a bit of a joker though…
All the best,
Alistair
Good to know Alistair, I agree that the joker who came up with the name needs a proper slap around the face! ;)
Maybe we should rename them based on material properties aye?
Thanks for dropping by!
Good article. The only thing I would add would be the use of wedges when batoning. If one carves a couple of decent size wedges before beginning to baton, it can allow one to get through larger pieces of wood with a small knife. Once the knife is batoned down to it’s depth, a wedge can be batoned in to increase the width of the split started by the knife and free up the knife. The use of another wedge or two can complete the job of splitting larger pieces after one has used the knife to begin the split. This way, the knife doesn’t remain stuck and have to be pulled and pried to get it loose again.
Funny you mention that as I spent the past week splitting wood with a maul & steel wedges. I will do a follow up article about other techniques including wedges as they are crazy useful.
In my experience, splitting wood with metal wedges and hammers is easier if you cut an X or two into one end of the log. Make the cuts a couple inches deep, and as long as you aren’t on a knot or twisted grain, the wood will come apart very easily. I just spent several hours today doing that. It’s good exercise. :)
Thats an excellent insight, admittedly I don’t have much experience with axes and hatchets- I am far more comfortable with machetes and choppers but I can definitely see the advantages of using a wedge for splitting wood- a (relatively) thin edge will never be able to compete with a thick slab of steel designed purely to pry apart fibrous material.
My biggest concern with axes has always been the fear of it wedging itself into my shins should I undershot my swing- I understand that this is purely due to my lack of experience though.
Concerning appropriate knives for batoning:
According to my experience I consider the risk of complete fracturing a blade much less than separating of flake shaped particles along the edge of too thin a blade. What minimal angle of the blade can be considered as relative safe?
The edge only mates with the wood during the initial bites, after that its a wedge effect. The durability of the edge varies based on steel choice (level of ductility) and grind (a carbon steel scandi is unlikely to chip, regardless of how thin the stock is).
I would suggest 15DPS as a multipurpose edge angle, if you are worried you can always add a secondary convex bevel to the edge which will reinforce it significantly.
A convex edge is a good bit better for batoning than a flat-ground one. In fact, its a good bit better for nearly everything!
Three major brands that come with convex edges are Blackjack, Bark River and Fallkniven.
Aye, gotta love convex blades, especially for rougher work. Must say though, I find a scandi grind to be superior for woodworking.
I was going to comment the exact thing. I think the wedging make baton splitting much easier on equipment and body.
Definitely. You don’t always have a wedge on you though & for kindling and smaller branches I wouldn’t bother (personally).
Thanks for dropping by Billy!