and only deer I took was a yearling buck in 1996. This was my only deer hunt ever. The venison was tough as shoe leather and gamey as hell. It would have been better if ground up with beef tallow and put in stroganoff or something. The butcher I found then didn't want to get his meat grinder "dirty" when I asked him about it. He was just a butcher and not a dedicated wild game processor. I largely put off deer hunting for years because of the perceived high cost of guided hunts and I never was sure I wanted to try to gut my own deer in the field. But nowadays there are a lot of how-to hunting videos online for the DIY hunter to learn how to do things so I feel more confident. I didn't even have a PC in '90's let alone the Internet. I didn't get my first Windows PC until 2005 and had been using a Smith Corona typewriter before that. I will have to try for a DIY doe on public lands in Oklahoma as soon as I find my dream rifle The biggest expense would be a wild game processor. Ground with 10% beef tallow. There is a reason they castrate male beef. A man I knew in Idaho shot a cow for better meat on the table. He had a cow tag.

Here is a doe-gutting video:

I like this man's clean gutting method with the carcass hanging with no blood or mess. I would have jugs of water and a pail in the truck to flush the cavity and bags of ice to put in the cavity while the deer is driven to the processor. I'd let the processor do the rest. I think I would save the liver and heart to cook for my dogs.