I've been camping and practicing survival/bushcraft skills for almost 20 years. For most of this time I've had a strong preference for Cold Steel tomahawks over conventional hatchet patterns as a primary woods tool. The advantages of this axe style don't seem to be well understood in the bushcraft community, or at least aren't widely discussed. Let me elaborate on why I keep coming back to these axes:

> They are more effective for chopping dry, springy, unsupported, uncooperative limbs off of fallen trees. This is because the lighter head combined with the longer haft allows for greater impact velocity for a given amount of effort, which combined with the thinner bit makes it much easier for the axe to bite rather than bounce (imagine trying to cut a single blade of grass with a 5# felling axe). This is very important because this type of wood is my #1 source for predried kindling and cooking wood and actually compromises about 90% of my wood gathering needs. For the same reasons, this axe style is more efficient for gathering saplings for shelter poles, fortifications, and other improvised camp structures.

> They bite the deepest in any tree or wood for a given overall weight, again because of the light head/long haft dynamic. My favorite, the Cold Steel Pipe Hawk, has a head weighing 16 ounces and weighs 25 ounces with an 18" haft. You cannot possibly find any other 25 ounce axe that will bite as deeply. I just find tomahawks more efficient overall.