1. T
here’s a growing trend of survival experts promoting their preferred sur-
vival knife. These designs reflect a lot on the person’s experiences and
philosophy and can be interesting to watch. One of the latest collabora-
tions to come about is one between the Norwegian company of Helle Knives
and Les Stroud, star of the hit shows Survivorman and Beyond Survival. The
resulting knife, the Temagami, could be said to be as much of a bushcrafting
knife as it is a survival knife, and that’s probably appropriate when you con-
sider that Les’craft is wilderness survival.
Temagami Roots
So, what is the Temagami? The Temagami is a region of northeastern Ontario,
Canada, famous for its old-growth red and white pine forests and its many
lakes. It’s an area known for its canoeing and is very popular with outdoors-
men. It’s also an area that Les Stroud spent a lot of time in as a
youth and the place where he found a knife while on one of his
outdoor excursions. Although he didn’t know it at the time, the
knife he found was a Helle, and according to the cutlery maker’s
press release, it would “prove to be the best knife that Stroud
would ever use.”
Stroud carried that found knife for years until it was later lost
and again reclaimed by the wilderness. Helle became interest-
ed in the idea of doing a knife collaboration with Stroud after
hearing the story of his lost knife and because they liked the
philosophies that he displayed with his Survivorman television
series. They wanted to design a knife that could be truly used by
outdoorsmen—one that wasn’t just a marketing gimmick.
Nordic Influence
The Helle Temagami carries a lot of Nordic influence in the design,
from its curly birch handles to its back-sewn sheath, and, of course,
its Scandinavian-ground blade. The Temagami is available in both
a laminated carbon and laminated stainless steel version. Both ap-
pear identical until you take a look at the blade stamping—or until
you leave the carbon steel one out in the weather for a while.
The Stroud Helle carries a 0.12-inch-thick, 4.3-inch-long full-tang
blade fitted with a fat, comfortable 4.6-inch-long handle. Its overall
length is 8.9 inches and the weight is only 5.6 ounces. The sheath
only weighs another 2.1 ounces. The Temagami’s curly birch han-
dle is affixed with two brass rivets and a brass-lined lanyard hole.
The handle is also coated with linseed oil to give your hand a natu-
TACTICAL KNIVES/January 201274 TACTICAL KNIVES/January 2012 75
TERRILLHOFFMANPHOTOS
The Temagami wilderness is a vast area of lakes and old-growth
pineforests.LesStroudspentmuchofhisyouthinthisareaandit
was here that he first gained experience with Helle knives.
LauraBombierPhoto
Survivorman Les Stroud teams with the Norwegian maker of his very first knife to produce a bush blade not to leave home without!Survivorman Les Stroud teams with the Norwegian maker of his very first knife to produce a bush blade not to leave home without!
by Tim Stetzer
to
HELLE and
BACK!
to
HELLE and
BACK!
to
HELLE and
BACK!
First Look!First Look!
PG 74-74 F-HELLE STROUD.indd 74-75 8/9/11 12:30:58 PM

2. TACTICAL KNIVES/January 201276 TACTICAL KNIVES/January 2012 77
Field Testing
IworkedtheTemagamiprettyheavilyonce
I got it in the field. I like this size and style of
knife, so it wasn’t hard to find things to use
it on. On a trip to the mountains, I carried
it exclusively for four days to get a good
feel for how it carries and functions on a
variety of typical field chores. The drop-
sheath proved comfortable when moving
about through the woods and climbing in
and out of vehicles. I wore it while just do-
ing chores around camp, during a couple
of geocaching trips, on some light hiking,
and while poking around down near the
fast rushing stream.
The relatively light weight and secure
sheath made the Temagami go unnoticed
until I needed it. That’s just
what I like in a belt knife: It’s
there, but not in the way. This
Helle came sharp enough
to pop hair, and the carbon
steel blade kept a good edge
throughout my usage. I used
it on boxes, cordage and for
an awful lot of whittling and
woodwork. I made some tent
stakes, split firewood, made
some fuzz sticks and carved a
couple of walking sticks. I even
carved out some rough pirate
swords for my kids out of some
thin slabs of maple peeled off
of one of the many trees that
had been downed in recent
storms near our camp.
The fat handle of the
Temagami proved very com-
fortable to use for extended
periods of time. Something
I’ve found is that while a thin
handle may feel good initial-
ly, my hand tends to cramp
up on them fairly quickly
once I get to work with a
blade. The length and fat-
ness of the Temagami’s han-
dle proved well-suited to ex-
tended carving, however. To
really test that out, I carved
a spoon out of some of the
same downed maple that I
had made my kids’ pirate swords from.
Spoon carving is a traditional bushcraft
task, and if nothing else, it puts you be-
hind the knife for a good period of time
and gives you a very good idea how it will
handle on bigger jobs like hogging away
wood, and on finer detail work required
to shape out the spoon’s bowl.
I was more than happy to work with the
Temagami throughout the weekend and
was quite happy with the long-term com-
fortofit.Theknife’sScandinavianedgeheld
up well through all of this. The only main-
tenance I did on the blade was to wipe it
down with some Ballistol occasionally and
touch it up on a loaded leather JRE Strop
ral, slip-free grip. The knife comes with a
dark brown leather, back-sewn sheath with
a hard plastic insert. It has a drop loop to
it, but is not a true dangler per se, in that
the loop doesn’t rotate or swivel. It has a
traditional look to it, though, and holds the
knife securely in place.
Initial fit was fairly tight, but it broke
in a bit with use. The sheath can be used
for either right- or left-handed carry. The
Temagami comes packaged in an attrac-
tive cardboard tube along with a small
pamphlet that tells about Helle knives
and a square cloth emblazoned with the
Helle logo. The Temagamis are handcraft-
ed, and you may see minor differences
between individual samples.
The Temagami comes packed in a sturdy cardboard
tube. Inside, you find the knife, a leather sheath and a
cleaning cloth emblazoned with the Helle logo.
TheTemagamifeaturesaScandinavianzero-groundbladejustover4inchesinlength.
At 0.12 inches thick it’s a good compromise between being lightweight and durable.
Thelinseed-oil-finishedCurlyBirchhandlesoftheTemagamiareattractiveandprac-
tical.The natural wood provides a firm grip, but doesn’t cause hot spots during use.
The thin blade and Scandinavian edge make thin curls easy. Whether
you’re just whittling or making tinder for the fire, the Temagami can
handle fine chores without issue.
The author rarely carries tent stakes with him out in the field.
Making field expedient ones is a basic chore, but one that the
Temagami handled with ease.
TheTemagami comes with a brown leather, back-sewn
sheath.Itridesbelowthebeltlineandallowsformove-
ment with the user’s body when sitting and getting in
and out of vehicles.
The Temagami is a knife well-suited for woodwork.
Whether it’s just harvesting sticks for cooking over
the fire or whittling trap components, this Helle
has it covered.
PG 74-74 F-HELLE STROUD.indd 76-77 8/9/11 12:30:59 PM

3. TACTICAL KNIVES/January 201278 TACTICAL KNIVES/January 2012 79
before with laminate steel blades, as the
outer sandwich layers of the laminate tend
to be too soft to maintain the crisp edge
needed to work with a ferro rod. I don’t
consider this a deal breaker; I just like to
know ahead of time that I need a separate
striker for my ferro rod. Having the notches
on the spine certainly seems to indicate
that it should work, but I didn’t have any
luck. I even tried a couple different manu-
facturers’ferro rods in case it preferred one
type of rod composition over another, but
with no luck. I also tried the spine of the
stainless laminate Temagami as well, but it
wasn’t a productive spark maker either.
Before I hear the hue and cry that stain-
less steel won’t work with a ferro rod, do me
a favor and go try a piece of broken glass or
even a hard, sharp-edged rock with your
rods. A lot of folks assume you need carbon
steel to strike a ferro rod, but, in fact, all you
need is a hard, crisp edge. It doesn’t have to
be metal at all; a ferro rod is not the same as
using flint and steel. The key is a hard edge
and the spines of the Helle knife appears to
be soft, so that’s where the issue lies. That
isn’t a bad thing, and probably makes for
a more durable blade, but it does limit the
use of the spine notches for fire starting.
If you’re a fan of Les Stroud and are inter-
ested in trying out the knife style that he
prefers, then it’s well worth checking out
the Temagami. Even if you aren’t a follower
of his shows but are interested in a quality,
practical field knife, then you’re still well-
advised to check the Temagami out. With
a suggested retail price of $199, the Helle
Temagami isn’t the least expensive sur-
vival guru blade on the market, but it also
stands out for being a classical, handcrafted
design of traditional materials. It’s a solidly
built blade designed to allow you to perfect
your own craft while out in the wild.
Bat towards the end of my testing. The
carbon Temagami was starting to develop
some patina from use, but I consider this
character in a knife and didn’t do anything
to try and get rid of it or to polish it up.
Fire Making
While the Temagami worked just fine for
harvesting, splitting, and prepping wood
and tinder for the fire, the one thing I
found deficient was in the fire making it-
self. There is a set of grooves positioned on
the forward half of the spine of the knife
that is theoretically to be used to facilitate
striking a ferro rod. In practice, I found that
I could only get minimal sparks off of the
spine of the Temagami. In fact, the crisp
edge of the spine showed some roll and
wear marks where I tried using the steel,
and the minimal initial sparking I got soon
faded to almost none. Now, I’ve seen this
While the author is no master spoon carver, he found
the Helle Temagami a good crafting knife for this
type of project. It provided a good combination of
deep biting cuts to shape the wood, and then fine
precision work when it came time to round out the
curves and shape the bowl.
The author used the Temagami to rough out a set of
pirate swords out of a downed maple tree. The knife
was a pleasure to work with, especially when it came
to making something for the kids.
MORE INFORMATIONMORE INFORMATION
Les Stroud
www.lesstroud.ca
Helle
www.helle.com
TK
LauraBombierPhoto
PG 74-74 F-HELLE STROUD.indd 78-79 8/9/11 12:31:00 PM