The Morrow Guide to Knots

Excellent general knot book for climbing, hiking, & sailing, March 21, 2002

This review is from: The Morrow Guide to Knots: for Sailing, Fishing, Camping, Climbing (Paperback)
Like many people, I just want to learn to tie a dozen or so knots that will be useful to know in particular situations. I do a lot of hiking and I own horses, so getting to know some good knots beside the "double granny" would be a useful thing. I first checked my university library and checked out several books including Ashley and Eric Fry among others. Ashley is a great book but a bit too much information and not the book for learning HOW to tie knots. Fry's book is similar to the format of this book, but a good majority of the "knots" are actually splices and eyes (unwinding fiber rope to form an eye onto itself or splicing 2 lines together) and decorative-type knots for macrame - neither thing I need to know right now.

The Morrow book is a good, general knot book for climbing, camping and sailing. Often there are several different ways shown to tie the same knot depending on the situation (line under strain, two handed, one handed, around a post, dropped on a post) or differently by another method. Illustrations are step-by-step and easy to follow with color coded rope. Inexplicably, some knots are shown tied with green and red rope, so color-blind people beware. Also, upon preliminary examination I noted that the tautline hitch (invaluable to keep a tent guyline taut) is missing. But between this book and some web resources, you will be all set. So, grab about 10 ft of a couple different diameter 6mm or smaller scraps (if no scraps, they are about a buck each) from your local outdoor store, keep them handy, and practice, practice, practice!