Knife for squirrels

[Rick McGee]

That sounds alot like a bowfishing tip. Might work good for you, but if you hit a tree reasonable square you'll probably have to just unscrew the shaft and put another head on (if the shaft survives).
I heard of one guy that used valve stems from car rims. Just remove the threaded insert at the head end and jam the valve stem in. I'm sure this is dependent on shaft size. Judo tips are another option.
As a squirrel hunting addict, I think your design should work well. It don't take much knife to clean a squirrel. I use a small old timer folder with 3 blades from 3/4 inch to 1 1/4 inch. Matter of fact I've used that very same knife to field dress a whitetail ( my buck 112 proved too dull). Indian says "White man carry too much knife".
The knife you showed could work well for field dressing most anything up thru deer sized game, maybe bigger. Keep in mind that's field dressing, not quartering. It might even do that job, but it would be much easier going with a bit larger blade. I'm not, however, a fan of guardless knives for field work. Handles can get real slippery with bloody hands.
As for skinning, I never noticed much difference between fox and gray squirrels. As long as the carcass is still warm they skin pretty easy. If you wait till it cools, then it gets to be more of a challenge.There are lots of tutorials on line on how to skin a squirrel. At least one method can be done in 30-45 secs with just a little practice. Not much knifework required.

[Eli Jensen]

I think I will be adding a small U-guard

[ncrobb]

WynnKnives is right, I always just pinched up the skin on the back and cut it enough to get my pointer finger of each hand into it and the hide pulls off...thus the saying "looks like a skint squirrell".

[Eli Jensen]

Well if I don't need a knife for it, there goes half the fun . . . lol

[WynnKnives]

Well you will still need a knife to begin skinning and to field dress it... which in itself for me would be a good enough reason to make a knife. :P

[Eli Jensen]

Sounds good to me! Now . . . what class should I forgo homework so that I will have time . . . ?

[Rick McGee]

None !! You're gonna need that education to support your knife hobby.

[Gary Mulkey]

Eli,

Though it has been many years ago, I used to do a lot of small game bow hunting (including squirrel) and found that broadheads didn't work that well. The best combination that I found was a strong wooden shaft (I preferred white ash) and the large slip on rubber blunts. The reason that I used the white ash is that they are almost indestructable while still light weight enough. The rubber blunts will shock the squirrel sufficiently for you to retrieve then. I had many run off with a small broadhead or metal blunt running through them (or get pinned to the tree) as well as having many arrows getting stuck in a tree and unretrievable.

As far as a knife design goes, any small clip point blade will be all that you need.

Good luck & happy hunting.

Gary