I took one elk to a butcher, and I'll never do that again. However, since here in TN after we get a deer we have to take it to the closest check station to be checked in, and the closest check station to me is also a processor, and I don't have a place to hang a deer on my property... I pay to have my deer done. I mean, I've got to drive them to the same place by law anyway, so it's just more expedient.

I'm going to go back to butchering myself next year though. Maybe by then I'll have some sort of a system worked out.