For a lot of years I’ve used nothing but a Gerber Gatormate to deal with animals. Gut, gutless, skin, quarter, debone, etc,, with no complaints at all. Dozens and dozens of big game animals. Last year I realized that for some reason I didn’t have a knife fetish and thought I better change that. This year I carried a Benchmade Altitude knife. It is a fixed blade minimalist design, with only two small scales on the thin handle for grip. Carried first on our sheep hunt but did not have any success, but last week I used it to debone a Caribou bull and I was very happy with it. At first I thought the slim handle might be a problem for this work but I was very surprised how good and secure it felt in my hand. I was working with my son and teaching him as we went, but did wind up doing most of it with this knife. It also held an edge very well and I didn’t have to touch it up at all during the work. I’ll definitely be keeping this one.
https://imgur.com/a/FIFa6E4

I also have a Small Northern Hunter made by LT. Wright that I’m going to use on anything else I shoot this year to try it out.