I have a question about field dressing and butchering a deer in our region. Here in KS we can go muzzleloading September 11-24. If I am so lucky as to get one, how do I go about field dressing it and letting it cool when it could be 80-100 degrees when I shoot it and 60-70 degrees at night when I want to hang it? I don't have access to a meat locker and I want to butcher it myself to save some money. But I don't want the meat to rot because it is so warm right now. In December I don't have this problem. I was wondering what you guys in this area do about my question. Thanks
I try to butcher that day/night, Sometimes I've been up until 2:00 a.m. work was a bitch the next day, but at least I didn't have the thoughts of my delicious venison spoiling.
Honestly I don't have this problem since my father in law owns a walk in cooler. However, a cheap solution would be to find an old refrigerator that works (or a cheaper new one), yank out the racks and bottom drawers and build a small wood frame that (fits when the door is closed) on the bottom that will hold the weight. You may not need to do this depending on the model you get.
Place one of the racks taken from inside over the frame. Then skin your deer, quarter it and place the parts on the rack you made and shut the door. You will want the rack above the bottom of the fridge and something on the bottom to catch the blood. Place a thermometer inside and keep it at 34 degrees. You'll be out some initial cost, but if you do any number of deer this way it will pay for itself. The only real downside is that you can only store one decent deer or maybe two smaller ones this way.
Although if you needed more room room, you could always cut out the loins and tenderloins (if you leave them in), the meat of the neck, and the front legs off the chest. You could likely get a few in like this.
I use a 60 quart cooler and quarter the dder up and place it in the cooler. Fill the balance with ice and some salt drain the water off and add more ice the meat will bleed out into the water. I usually leave mine in the cooler and butcher after about three days
If you hunt out in the sticks like i do and dont have anywhere for a fridge or freezer what we do is field dress it then put ice bags inside the body cavity. that way the meat doesnt spoil then we butcher it that night or the next day.
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RE: Field dressing
I have a old chest freezer that dosn't work ,most of the year I use it for dry storage and a work bench . Come deer season I clean it out , If I score when it is warm , I can put a deer or 2 in it with 3 -5 bags of ice . Last year I shot a deer on Wen night and could not cut her up till sat , just added 1 or 2 dags of ice a day . Just like hanging.
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Just to add on: I am one of the lazy guys who would rather wait until some time later to skin and butcher my deer. But in all honesty, I have been in situations like yours.
BEST thing to do is skin it out right away while the deer is still warm. Hide comes off real easy. Then, with a knife you can quarter the deer up right away. Unless you like saving the rib meat, this will give you all of your venison (remembering of course to get the tenderloins and backstraps). You then have two choices. If you have no time but have that refrigerator you mentioned, you can wrap the quarters as is and put them in the frige. You can then cut the meat off of the bone when you have time. OR, if you have the time, cut the meat off right away and put into ziplock bags.
Once you have done it a few times, you can get the whole deer done pretty quickly. It usually takes me a couple hours including skinning and boning to get a deer done.
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We built a small shed and use an old air conditioner to keep it cool.We can hang 6 deer in there easy and it stays cold enough in there for the meat not to spoil.It comes in handy during bow and muzzleloader seasons.
Fill the body cavity with a couple of bags of ice. It will help to drop the body temp. quick. I'd butcher it as soon as you could, though, with the weather being so hot.
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