Saws, Axes, Hatchets, Big knives or Tomahawks.

Saw: These are great for butchering game—ribs, sternum, pelvis, and other bones. Battoning a knife will work, and axes make a mess of things. You greatly benefit from having these for moose, but butchering trees may be different. The reality is that I haven't used these in the bush for butchering dead standing for a fire, cover, or sleep platforms. My immediate assessment, however, is that they seem like more work than the alternative. The nice thing about saws is that they are extremely light as compared to alternatives and so easy to keep sharp; they may fall apart due to poor construction, but this is true of both axes and knives too. The blade can also snap. Some guys really stand by folding saws, and I can see their use with a robust build.

Felling Axes: heavy. You need a horse or ATV to use these regularly in the bush.

Hatchets: again, heavy to carry on a march. The extra heft may help when butchering bigger trees, and these can also be used for skinning by using the blunt back to tamp the hide off. 

Big Knives: Something that tries to do everything, does nothing well, but does do everything. The Hudson's Bay Company made a knife for the boys outdoors, which was demanded and made useful. Great for batoning wood or game. Poor for chopping wood often—but I'm sure you can get used to an efficient approach. Poor for butchering, or putting an edge back on due to their often heavy girth. Every pound needs to be useful. A large knife can function both as an axe and a butcher tool for game, so it's likely a good choice, though I have never given it a good chance.

Tomahawks: these are my go-tos. Light. Mine is self-made from a circular saw. They can butcher most trees quickly. A few efficient whacks on one side and one good whack on the other, or an efficient chew-around, can make a big dead standing into firewood to last a couple of hours. Paired with a small, 1095 useful knife and a tomahawk, it is all you need for all tasks. I'm not sure why guys prefer the folding saw over the tomahawk for bush work. 

Efficient chops remove chunks, not slivers. One chops up the nexchopshen chop a few centimeters below it (or depending on the size of the log), and then splits out a chunk. When you have made your cut deep enough, which is usually to the center, you can probably crack the log in half; this is for wrist-sized logs. Wider logs are chewed narrow.

If you really needed a saw, and maybe you want to do it anyway, skill saw one into the spine of your knife. It takes work to be as good as a real saw, but it can throw a good spark from a fire rod and save other functions, like adding traction for a finger.

Let's be real, a regular knife is not as necessary in the common bush today—unless you are constantly cutting meat from hunting, in the bush, or cutting scalps—which is a rare situation. A tomahawk would be the one tool I would take, as it can be removed from the handle for butchering and returned to the handle for chopping bone or wood and will never fail due to poor construction, as there really isn't one—just a shaft shoved into a hole to get the job done.

In a long-term, hard-use situation, I would not want a hatchet, axe, saw, or the tomahawk shown above. Saw blades break, and you need a special tool to sharpen them. Axe or hatchet heads can come loose, and you need other tools to service them. The tomahawk shown above needs a drill tool to make holes in a new handle, which may be done by making a project of it. 

The tools I would opt for would be a traditional tomahawk or big full tang knife, which is what history also shows was most often used. 

At the end of the day, we use what we have. 

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