Cane knife

A cane knife is a large hand-wielded cutting tool similar to a machete.^[1] Its use is prevalent in the harvesting of sugarcane in dominant cane-growing countries such as Peru, Brazil, Colombia, Australia, South Africa, Ecuador, Cuba, Jamaica, the Philippines and parts of the United States, especially Louisiana and Florida, as well as Hawaii. ^{[citation needed]}

Typical cane knife, also used for banana plants.

Design

A typical cane knife is characterized by a hardwood handle, a full tang, a deep blade and a hook at its tip used for picking up the cut cane, although some types do not employ this feature. The blade is usually 1 millimetre (0.039 in) thick, thinner than a machete or bolo, and more than 12 inches (30 cm) long. The thin blade facilitates cutting cane quickly as the harvester slashes the cane at an angle: a thin blade slices through better than a thick blade.

Gallery

• 
  Sugar cane knife, 1800s, used by enslaved Africans to cut sugar cane in the Danish West Indies
• 
  1888 drawing of "Queen Mary" Thomas, one of the leaders of the 1878 Fireburn riot in St. Croix, holding a cane knife and torch
• 
  A sugar cane cutter in Cuba during zafra
• 
  Canecutters in Ayr, Australia c.1907
• 
  Female cane cutters in Barbados, 2011
• 
  A well-used cane knife
• 
  Old cane knife in south Louisiana, of the type that was the most common weapon in the 1811 German Coast uprising.

See also

• Kukri
• Golok
• Bolo knife