Forgive my ignorance, but I’ve read that kichen shears can’t be used to cut through bones because they have shorter straight blades and are not heavy duty. Is that wrong? I've never used either, to be honest. I’m 68 and got through all my kitchen needs with regular scissors and sharp knives. So, I need help choosing. I want heavy duty shears for cutting some very hard jerky treats for my dog! Crazy huh? Breaking the treats to bite size pieces tears the skin on my fingers, and it HURTS. And the handles on the shears that came with my knife sets are HORRIBLE! On neither pair, I can even get all four fingers in the opening. Only three fit, and it is extremely uncomfortable to use them. One pair has oval openings for the finders and one has rectangular openings. And BOTH pairs cut poorly and hurt to use. HELP, please. BTW, it's not arthritis. Causing the discomfort. The handle openings dig into my skin!

I agree with pierino that a good pair of kitchen shears, with a nice short blade and large handholds, worked perfectly for me when spatchcocking my turkey earlier this week. I probably would have used my ultra sharp boning knife (of 1970's vintage, and a legacy from my in-laws' packing company) had the scissors not worked as well as they did. The shears were a relatively new acquisition, bought at a hardware store in Chinatown; I wanted to test them out, and they worked beautifully. It's good to know about the disassembling feature of standard poultry shears. I also echo pierino's comment on the usefulness of a boning knife. I can't imagine a kitchen without one. ;o)

Poultry shears have a curve, almost a crescent shape, to the bottom lip. Also they usually disassemble for safe cleaning. You will use them for things like removing the back bone from poultry and cracking through rib attachments so the shape of the scissor is helpful. But a sturdy pair of kitchen scissors will do the job for you too. Depending on your budget adding a flexible boning knife would be more useful than owning both types of shears (unless you are a knife guy like me).