Hey gotta tell you guys a short experience. In South Africa where I work there are plentiful thorn trees. Some are almost predatory.
I wear Gordens boots, they are made in South Africa for the bush. They have actual recycled tire tread for the soles kinda odd, but they protect your feet from the thorns really well. Even though I get punctures frequently in the truck tires.
Anyway, I was sneaking in on a white rhino with a client doing a green dart hunt when I had a big acacia thorn spear straight into the ball of my foot through the sole of these Gordens thorn proof boots! There is no shortage of tender painful regions on a human body. However the ball of your foot being punctured is just slightly less the a poke in the eye and a cracked tooth.
The thorn was flush with the sole or deeper, and embedded into my foot. I was pinned into my boot. It was not coming off and I was not going to walk on it. So I had my client use my leatherman pliers which I carry with me to grab the base of the thorn and pull it out. It took a bit of digging as it was broken off flush with the sole.
That multi tool really saved or at a minimum allowed this hunt to carry on to be successful. It was still quite difficult to go forth, but would have been brutal to continue with that 3" thorn through the ball of my foot!
I like the multi tools for some peculiar reason now.
