With the end of fall comes a surplus of pumpkins, so I figured I’d put them to use the only logical way—by testing a stack of Cold Steel gear to see what’s actually the best “pumpkin slayer.” I grabbed 10 different Cold Steel items, assigned each one its own pumpkin, and rated them out of 10 based on how effective they were at straight-up destruction. I started small with the Micro Recon 1 (spoiler: it was rough), worked through bigger folders and fixed blades, and then moved into the heavier stuff where things get a lot more interesting. The little blades just don’t have the reach or weight for clean cuts—my hand ends up too close and the pumpkin doesn’t split the way you want. Once I got into longer, heavier blades like the Marauder and the Frontier Bowie, the scores climbed fast because they can actually span the pumpkin. The Special Forces Shovel was a monster (and you can clean up after), but the real winner wasn’t a surprise: the Cold Steel Katana Machete was an easy 10/10. If your goal is slicing pumpkins clean, that’s the tool for the job—simple as that.