If you really don't want to do it yourself, your best bet is to hang it from a tree or something similar by the neck, and rinse out any feces/urine/other contamination in the cavity with a garden hose. Don't use warm/hot water. Next you need to cool it down. If you don't live somewhere that has an outdoor temp consistently under 38* you can pack it with bags of ice inside, and cover with ice bags on top. Do it in such a way that the water from the melting ice drains out instead of collecting inside the body cavity. Most processors leave deer hanging in their coolers for a week or so with no ill effects, especially in states like WI where there are a shitload of deer killed in a very short season. Most seasons up there it's also cold enough that you'll see a lot of deer camps with several deer hanging in the trees all week, then they butcher them all at the end of the season. Cooling it down quickly is the key to keeping it from getting gamy. Quartering it right away is the most efficient method, because smaller pieces cool faster.
This is the same thing I was taught... we field dress them as soon as they're dead and get the blood out and carcass cooled down fast. Propping the ribcage open with a stick will help.
Absolutely. We've even got a little stream that runs beside our meat pole at the hunt camp, and usually leave the deer in the cold running water until it's nice and cold all the way through. The running water also does a good job of cleaning away the residue. Mind you, it's usually below freezing during our hunts, so they're frozen solid by the morning. Our butcher's biggest beef is that he has to wait a while to let the things thaw out before he can do anything with them.
Huddleston 12rof stocker trout swimbait falls 12 inches per second (rate of fall) Thing look awsome swimming but sucks bad to lose at 25 a pop
My first hunting trip was awesome. So many stories, but I'll stick to the highlights. Black Friday - Goose/Duck Hunting Nothing was flying and between 9 of us we only ended up with two geese and a mallard. I put down the first goose on my first shot. That was pretty cool. I wish there were more that came in, but I had a great time learning a ton of stuff from our guide (my Dad's best friend). Saturday - Opening Day For Deer Since it was my first time out, my Dad wanted to hang with me for at least the first morning, so we sat in an unused duck blind along the woodline looking out into a soy bean field. About 20 minutes before sunrise, we see a buck coming across the field from a marsh. He was roughly 80 yards away, but lined up directly on the horizon with the light from the sunrise behind him. It made it tough to see him well enough to make a proper shot. I waited until he walked a few more yards forward and then took the shot before he walked into some high grass. I under shot him and he ran right at another guy sitting at the other end of the field in a tree stand. At about 40 yards and with the light in his favor, he put the buck down easily. Shortly after, a doe comes out of the woods about 30 yards from me. I line up the shot, squeeze the trigger, and click. When I had shot at the first buck, I ejected the shell, but didn't pump far enough back to grab another from the tube. Rookie mistake. I was furious. I would've absolutely had her. I leaned down and told my dad to take her before she ran off. He shot and hit her, but when we tracked her later, the blood trail went dead and we gave up after about an hour. In the afternoon, I was up in a tree stand, a much better situation since I got a great view of the land. I was situated in the first row of trees with about 100 yards of woods at my back that led into a marsh, and about 500 yards of soy bean field in front of me. At about 4:45, a buck comes through the woods and turns to walk right in front of my stand, no more than 20 yards away. Fucking perfect broadside. I couldn't ask for a better shot. He was going at a steady trot, but nothing too quick. As I'm about to pull the trigger, he freaks, bucks, and takes off. I had no idea what spooked him since I was downwind at the time and he probably didn't scent me. My first shot grazed his belly as he bucked, my second shot grazed his chest, and my third carved a canal through the bridge of his nose. I was fucking pissed. He was later put down by the same guy who put down the first buck in the morning when he caught him booking it through the woods right at his stand. Seriously confused, I later got down out of my stand to see if I could find out what spooked him. Right where he suddenly bucked, I found a 5 foot black snake. A big, pissed off, tail shaking motherfucker, too. I had a few dove loads in my bag, so I blew his head apart. All in all, in the first day, our group killed 7. The next three days Saw a couple deer, but never had a shot. Our group killed 2 more on that farm. On Tuesday, the day I went home, they decided to switch it up and hunt different properties. So, I killed 1 goose and a big black snake. Even though I'm pissed about how poorly I shot and the mistakes I made, I had a great time and I'm hooked for life.
Here's a hunting report: Teal are still in North Dakota and Canada, apparently shunning the whole photo period migration and adopting an "eat corn and wait this thing out" mentality. From what I hear, the mallards are wearing bathing suits and drinking out of coconut glasses. Of the four gadwalls in Mississippi last weekend, two got shot and the other two are hauling ass to parts unknown. We did hunt a flooded timber Wood Duck hole that was slap full of ducks, except they all showed up about five minutes before LST, freaked out and left. The dog was seriously confused, as it sounded like someone was throwing screaming tennis balls into the water from the treetops. To summarize- three days, one duck.
If a buck doesn't know where you are and you want him to stop, typically a short high-pitched whistle will make them stop dead in their tracks and look right at you. This gives you a one or two second window to take your shot. Shit happens man.
On another messageboard this guy posted a story, with some crazy pictures, about hunting feral pigs on his brother's rice farm. He started with guns but in his words it got too easy, so he started killing them with a spear. I'm not saying the way he goes about it is good, or bad, but god damn it's crazy. On a side note a very unhappy PETA member picked up on it so they saved it on their server. I'm not experienced with hunting, but is this normal? http://www.peta.org/test/pigs/showthread.php.htm
Quotes from the guy... "Ultra violence baby. I didn't realize till I looked at the pic that I had blood spatter on my face." "I'm pretty sure I caught a little air and I ould hear a jumbily sound of bones breaking against metal and pigs squealing. I didn't even look back because there were still more pigs ahead but in that sweet moment of ultra violence I mortally wounded 8 pigs." You can't convince me he's not fucking nuts. "My brother took the best pigs of the bunch or meat and I hated to just waste the rest of them. So I decided that if I id something artsy with them, it wouldn't be a total waste." He's also a douchebag for not dressing out and eating every single pig he killed. I really do not like to see waste like this. To answer your question, no this is not what hunting is like. Killing pigs in the woods with a spear and getting jacked about blood spattered on your face and calling it all "ultra violence" is this guys messed up Lord of the Flies fantasy and not at all like any hunting I've done or seen. Yeah we kill animals when we're hunting but it's done in a responsible way and the point isn't about just killing shit. On a side note, Jared Allen himself with a spear: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oibNvAbtpc
That guy is crazy as shit. I wouldn't try killing wild pigs with a spear, those fuckers are little balls of pure muscle, and fucking mean. I'll get close enough to hit them with a rifle or a big revolver, but that's it. Even guys that put out snares and traps are smart enough to stand back and shoot them. Hunting isn't about violence and killing, it's about getting out and experiencing nature, and respecting nature and the animals enough to take the animals cleanly with as little suffering as possible, and not wasting the meat. The only excuse for hunting something and not eating the meat is if it's a varmint (coyote, prairie dogs, etc) that aren't good for food, but hurt or kill livestock (prairie dog holes break a lot of cow legs). In this case, since the pigs are ruining his brothers crops, I could even give him a pass on not eating all of the meat. But killing them with a spear? That's just being a backwards redneck (also notice the bare feet). Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if the whole story was bullshit. He very well could have shot all those pigs with a rifle, and just speared them where the bullet entered for the pictures. Something is not right with that guy. Ask any real hunters about this guy, and the vast majority will call him an asshole. This is even worse than the guys who go out trophy hunting, and take just the head of the deer/elk/moose. Even if he can't eat or store all that meat, you can usually donate it to a food pantry. My father-in-law just gets them all ground up into sausage, and feeds it to his dogs.
Growing up, my dad and his best friend each had a beagle. Great dogs. They were even better hunting dogs. Some of my best hunting experiences were with those two dogs hunting rabbits. It was always exciting when they catch a trail and their barking starts moving towards where you're set up. Well, those dogs died, probably about 10 years ago now. He couldn't convince my step mom to get another beagle, so that was the end of that. We still go out every once in a while to try to kick up a few bunnies and it's fun, but not the same. Duck and Geese are more what we typically hunt these days. My dad found a guy who raises beagles and also sets up hunts of up to three people to hunt with a couple of his dogs. He's trying to set this up for when me and my brother in law will both be in town for Christmas. My brother in law has gone on a couple trips with us hunting, but has never been out with dogs. It'll be exciting. I really hope he can set this up. Plus, I could really go for a rabbit stew.
Just to clarify something for all of y'all. Pigs are feral, incredibly destructive (they can actually rut up a dirt road), and a male over 100 lbs. or so is not good to eat. At all. You know what happens when you shoot a big boar hog? He nuts himself. About three ounces worth, and that shit stinks to high heaven. Guess what the meat tastes like? Pig splooge. The sows are okay to eat up until about 200 lbs, but I wouldn't bother with one larger than that. Further, they're amazingly prolific and a few hogs become a massive problem in just a few short months. In many southern states there is no limit, no season, and very few weapons restrictions. We shot pickup truck loads of hogs in Central Florida and they just kept coming back. To quote a rancher friend who had a pile of hogs in his swamp- "If it were up to me, I'd bring in some fast movers and napalm the whole damn swamp if it killed every last one of those fuckers." Was spear guy violent? Yeah. Crazy? Absolutely. If it were me, though, I'd hunt them with a semi-auto rifle and IR scope at night. Get far enough away and you can kill a half a dozen before they wise up.
Which, living in Texas, I understand, and said I could forgive him for not eating the meat. If I were in that position, I'd be hunting them with a scoped rifle at night also. Hell, you don't even need an IR scope, just a spotlight. Same way we get rid of coyotes at the ranch, and used to get rid of muskrats in the cranberry bogs when I lived in WI. For what it's worth, after watching that youtube video of Jared Allen spear hunting Elk, I'm still undecided on hunting with a spear for sport. Out of necessity in a survival situation? Sure. Just for sport? I'm not sure that most people would have the skill or strength to pull it off with a clean kill.
Man, let me tell you, killing something with a spear is a fucking rush. I've speared a five and a half foot alligator gar from about 10 feet away while standing on the bow of a duck boat, and that may be the only time in my life where I will ever know the experience of being He-Man and King Leonidas combined. Now, would I stand my ground with a spear while a 200lb boar charges me? Meh, probably not. It depends on how drunk you get me. But yeah, those friggin' hogs are vermin of the highest order and everyone of them deserve to die. I'll eat some of them, but it goes back to what both of you have said.
The spear may not be the fastest kill if you aren't hitting the vitals, but if you're only concerned about the fastest kill, I'd think everyone would be hunting with .50s. This may not be a pleasant way to take them out, but judging by the video posted in that thread he did indeed kill them with that spear, contrary to the opinion of one of the posters here. The spear isn't the fastest kill, and he claims to have accelerated the death by holding their heads under water. Again, not that nice a thing to do, but he's just killed a shit-ton of vermin with a pointy stick. That probably takes skill, or at the very least a high level of stupidity. As for the spear itself: that looks like a pretty broad blade, any hole made with that thing should bleed profusely, and judging by the size of it, it should get pretty good penetration into the critter. Plus, y'know, the whole "pest control" and "cost-effective" bit. Why spend money on rounds when he can spend them on beer?
My son got his first deer in October of this year with my muzzleloader. He shot a young 6 point that weighed 119 lbs. I took one doe the next weekend. Now I am bow only until the WMA I hunt on opens its rifle season.
Just got back from a hunt and we were fortunate enough to be able to stay with some cowboys who live in this ranch house, it is pretty cool- all solar powered After 3 days of cold ass weather hunting a little south of the Grand Canyon we finally found the cow elk, the herd we found would not let us get within a mile of them but 5 hours later I got a shot, a little work to find her in a canyon but there is meat in the freezer tonight.
I think a good list of "wild game" recipes are in order. List the cut of meat and all other pertinent ingredients/ instructions.
Bradford Angier's written a book on that, I'll see if I can find it when I head home for winter break.