If you put pepper on the meat (takes a lot of pepper of course) it will keep the flies and bees away in the warmer temps.

I'm wondering if it flavors the meat too?

Hard to me to understand how someone could lose an animal to rot. We have to pack out our elk and at least this year, 2 out of 3 were in very warm weather. Getting to the animal skinning, quartering them is important and putting the quarters in game bags keeps the flys off them. We had temps in the 30's at night and 60's during the day at the cabin but the quarters in bags were hung in the shade and in the ever present wind stayed cool. Moose are a bit bigger but the same thing works for them just like elk, caribou, deer and turkey all of which I have experience with. I have hunted for over 45 years and never lost an animal due to spoilage other than one that couldn't be recovered until the next day in warm weather.

Meat care
 

Moose will spoil overnight if not cared for properly, gutting yes, skinning yes , quartering again yes but if the temp is at all warm you must also open the larger cuts [the back legs] A slice down the thigh all the way to the bone from joint to joint, will go a long way to cool the hardest parts to get cool. Ive been in on a few moose , at least one at 70 + degrees, as well as a lot of rode kills, large pieces and temps over 20 at night are a disaster on large animals. Yes we use pepper ,citric acid ,anything to help keep the critters off game bags are a requirement but even they can be torn etc allowing access.And one can only pack so much on some trips.In an ideal world we would replace a torn game bag , but reality is far different.

How I Was Taught to be A Hunter
 

Hunting is not just a shooter. Hunting is about scouting. It's about gutting a deer efficiently, keeping the meat safely and getting the liver for the next supper, if not that day.

I can see a big waste of time and money for anyone who has not studied the body of a deer or other game. The mere act of shooting becomes a total waste of energy.

pepper
 

Maine has a split week moose season that starts the last week of September. There can be some warm temps or some downright chilly temps depending on Ma Nature. The folks at Maine Fish & Game recommend 8 oz. of pepper, dusted inside and out on a moose. We've only dusted one on the 5 hunts I've been on. It didn't leave any peppery flavor. If you've got a real big moose, maybe having 2 8 oz. cans on hand would be a good idea.

I feel sorry for the guys that lost their moose to spoilage. They are a hunt of a lifetime. This story just reinforces what we all (should) know about game handling.


- Jay

ps: here's a pic of a nice cow shot by my friend Ron in New Hampshire last week. We were 8 hours from moose down until the butcher shop. Fortunately the temps were cool.

You'd think it would but I had to do it once in a pinch and it didn't leave any flavor at all. I think the only time pepper really flavors meat is when it's cooked.

This year we experienced the same weather on our elk hunt.

In the past I was big on skinning right away until one year, on a 66 degree day I shot a nice sized bull elk. We were well over a mile away from the nearest road and worse we were downhill so the hike back was pretty steep uphill effectively multplying the perceived distance. We employed the gutless method and skinned the quarters although we did leave bone in the quarters but there was lots of meat like the backstrap with no bone in them. We hung the meat for the night and temps dropped down into the 30's. The next day we rounded up some friends and went back and hauled out the elk and took us most of the day. By the time we got the elk back to the cooler to hang and process the meat hadn't spoiled but it got this tough layer on the meat. I had a lot of meat wasted because of this 1/4 to 1/2 thick layer of almost jerky'd like meat all the way around. Underneath that it was fine. (I process my own so I notice these things) Nearly every steak and roast had to be trimmed quite a bit of this hardened meat.

Since then I half or quarter the animals but I don't skin it until I have the animal in the cooler to hang or just before I get it in there. I have found the skin actually preserves the meat under it. I think the important part is to get a bag on it, get it in the shade, and hung to cool off.

This year we halved two elk, bagged them, and hung them in a shady tree for 3 days and we didn't skin them until we got them home and ready to hang in the cooler for a few days. They did great and we had very little loss of meat, maybe 10lbs. at best. 30's at night, 60's during the day. BTW they are some of the best tasting elk I've had in a while too.