Hatchet

The hatchet is the tool used in Woodcutting to chop trees. (Prior to 1 April 2009, a hatchet was called an axe; all woodcutting axes were since renamed to hatchets to clear up ambiguity between other items such as pickaxes, battleaxes, and thrownaxes.)

A hatchet is a melee weapon, available in all varieties of metal except white, although its power and speed are less favourable than many other weapons. Hatchets can be used to slash webs. A bronze hatchet spawns on the wood stump at the chicken farm in the north east section of Lumbridge. All hatchets except for the crystal hatchet, the dragon hatchet, the black hatchet, the inferno adze, and the sacred clay hatchet, can be smithed using the Smithing skill.

All hatchets (except the blessed, sacred clay, and black hatchets) can now be added to the toolbelt. This saves inventory space while woodcutting, without needing to be equipped. However once a hatchet is added it cannot be removed.

Types of hatchets
The level required to wield a hatchet is different than the level required to use a hatchet to chop trees. Wielding is governed by Attack level while chopping trees is governed by Woodcutting level. For example, a player with level 1 Attack and level 61 Woodcutting can use a dragon hatchet to chop trees, but not wield it as their Attack level is not high enough.


 * Also requires 92 Firemaking to use.

Dungeoneering hatchets
These hatchets could only be obtained and used during Dungeoneering.

Trivia

 * When the woodcutting animation was changed, only the sacred clay hatchet retained the old woodcutting animation.
 * Axes were renamed as 'Hatchets' on 1 April 2009 to avoid confusion, but this temporarily caused some scams as people said that a hatchet was a rare item.
 * Before the introduction of hatchets, the Broken axe random event was removed and all remaining broken pieces were removed from the game.
 * Interestingly, hatchets can be made using the Smithing skill with only the metal bar and a hammer, there is no wood involved in the production and thus the origin of the hatchet's handle remains a mystery.
 * After the Evolution of Combat update, if players were woodcutting with a sheathed hatchet, it would appear in their hand but also remain sheathed on their back at the same time, giving the appearance of having two hatchets equipped. This also happened when mining with a sheathed pickaxe. This was fixed on 13 May 2013, causing them to be unsheathed when they are being used for woodcutting, and another update on 17 June caused them to be sheathed again after use.

Hatchet Hatchet