Silver Stag WTS2.5C Trapper, by Thomas Christianson

1. Good things come in small packages: A fine watch, a Faberge egg, or a new baby are all precious gifts.

The Silver Stag WTS2.5C Trapper is another good thing that comes in a small package. With a 2.5 inch, full-tang, hollow-ground D2 blade, and a cocobolo handle, the knife is an ideal size and shape for skinning, caping and game processing. With the textured mill scale which is left on the flat of the blade, the mirror polish of the bevel, the rich glow of the cocobolo handle, and the accent of the brass pins, the knife is also a work of art.

Silver Stag has a way of producing knives that are almost too beautiful to use. But I sure used this one a lot. I carried it long enough to stain the included high-quality-leather sheath dark with sweat on the side facing my body and to blacken that sheath with ground-in dirt on the side facing away from my body.

Made in the USA in Blaine, Washington, the Trapper Slab TS2.5 version cost $146 at www.silverstag.com at the time of this writing. That is a fantastic price for an American-made, heirloom-quality, semi-custom knife. If you do a lot of skinning, caping, and game processing, this may be the knife for you.

Background

Back in February of 2023, SurvivalBlog published my review of the Silver Stag Lion.

I have reviewed many knives during my time as Field Gear Editor for SurvivalBlog. Most of those I have subsequently passed on as gifts to friends and family members. But I have selfishly kept a small handful of knives for myself. The knives that I have kept are the best of the best. The Lion is one of that small handful that are the very best. It is an excellent tool and a beautiful work of art. I feel privileged to own it.

So when I had the chance to test another Silver Stag knife, I jumped at the opportunity. Not too long afterward, a USPS Priority Mail Flat Rate Padded Envelope arrived in my mailbox. It was shipped from Smith & Partners LLC, 328 Martin St., Blaine, WA 98230. Their phone number is (360) 332-4380. Their e-mail address is [email protected] .

First Impressions

It seems like every knife that Silver Stag turns out is a masterpiece. The Trapper is no exception.

The textured mill scale makes a nice contrast to the polished gleam of the bevel. The equally polished cocobolo wooden handle seems to cast a warm glow of reflective light. The bronze pins provide a rich contrast to both the steel and the wood.

The high-quality leather sheath can be worn either vertically or horizontally. A clever leather thong serves as a retention strap. The thong ends with an antler tip fob.

The shorter blade may make the Trapper legal to carry in some jurisdictions that have restrictions on the carry of certain sheath knives. Smaller blades are also often more effective than larger blades for precision work. There is a reason that doctors perform surgery with a scalpel rather than a butcher knife.

The knife comes with both a one-year warranty and a limited lifetime warranty. I am not sure about the terms of those two warranties or how those terms interact with each other.

Testing

I found the Trapper to be extremely comfortable on my belt because of its small size. I could sit in a chair or drive a car without the knife getting in the way or jabbing me in the side with its handle.

I love D2 steel in general. It is sharp, strong, and reasonably corrosion-resistant. Silver Stag brings out the full potential of that alloy better than anyone else I know. The blade came unusually sharp, and retained its edge unusually well.

Over the course of the following months, I used the knife for a wide variety of tasks:
∙ cutting a length of twine to bind a bundle of nylon drawstring bags together.
∙ cutting the frayed ends of a nylon rope prior to melting the end of the rope to prevent unraveling. The blade sliced through the tough nylon fibers unusually well.
∙ cutting lengths of twine to tie up bundles of firewood for a camping trip.
∙ cutting away packing materials that were wrapped around a piece of log siding during shipment.
∙ cutting the selvedge on a stain rag so that I could rip the rag in two.
∙ cutting paracord to the correct length for making a loop. I used the loop to hang an extension cord on the wall in the pole barn.

The knife performed these and a host of other tasks well.

One weakness of the design was the thong. Over time, it did not secure the knife inside the sheath as well as I might have wished. Eventually, the knife came to fall out of the sheath several times even when it was being carried vertically on the belt. Such a beautiful knife needs to be better secured to prevent its loss. I recommend some sort of modification to the thong to make it secure the knife more effectively.

Old MacDonald Had a Farm

As I mentioned above, I carried and used the knife a lot. During the time that I carried the knife, I used it for a host of different tasks, but never for the task that was its true destiny: I never got around to skinning a mammal with the knife. I was carrying a knife that would have been ideal for a professional hunting guide, and I was using it for tasks that could have been accomplished almost as well with pretty much any everyday carry (EDC) knife.

I eventually decided that I was not doing the knife justice, and that I needed to turn it over to someone who could test it to its full potential. I made some inquiries among my friends. A farm family mentioned that they might be able to help me out. They had recently skinned a half dozen sheep, and anticipated that they might have other opportunities to more thoroughly test the knife in the near future. So I turned the Trapper over to them.

Months passed. The family faced some significant trauma in their lives. In the ensuing turmoil, the farm boys just never quite got around to using the knife for its intended purpose. Eventually, one of them tried it on cleaning fish, and reported that it worked well for that task. But they never did skin any mammals.

Finally, after about six months, they returned the knife to me.

Peter Rabbit

I was back to square one. I just don’t do all that much skinning. I was still not doing full justice to the knife. More months passed.

And then a day finally came when I needed to skin a rabbit. At last the knife finally began to fulfill its true destiny.

Rabbits are relatively easy to skin, but using an ideally designed knife like the Trapper made the job even easier. The knife was the right shape, the right size, and beautifully sharp for the task.

I must admit that I do little enough skinning that I was awkward at the task. But the knife did its part beautifully. I have never used a knife more ideally suited to the task of skinning game.

Cocobolo Wood and Antler Sheds

The handle of the version of the Trapper that I tested was made of cocobolo wood. Cocobolo is taken from the heartwood of a type of Central American hardwood. The wood is often so dense that it will not float in water. The wood is quite hard, and can be polished to a lustrous finish. Its high oil content makes it stand up well to handling and makes it quite water resistant.

Most Silver Stag knives use shed antler material for their handles rather than cocobolo wood. In fact, the TS2.5 Trapper Slab knives that are currently available at www.SilverStag.com use shed antler material for their handles. Cocobolo is very nice, but I actually find shed antler material to be even more aesthetically pleasing. The natural texture of shed antler material provides an excellent grip. Each antler is unique, like a fingerprint. This makes each handle equally unique. If you have ever seen two bucks fighting, you also know that antler material is tough. That toughness makes antler material handles quite durable.

Conclusion

The Silver Stag WRS2.5 Trapper Slab is an outstanding knife. It is beautiful, sharp, tough, and highly functional. It is made in the USA.

If you do a lot of skinning, caping, and game processing, this may be the ideal knife for you.

Disclaimer

Silver Stag was kind enough to provide me with a sample of their WTS2.5 Trapper knife for testing and evaluation. They had previously provided me with a sample of their Lion Folding Knife for an earlier review. I tried not to allow their kindness to interfere with my objectivity in this review, and I believe that I have succeeded. I did not receive any other financial or other inducement to mention any vendor, product, or service in this article.