Legacy357

I was curious as to who butchers their own deer in here? I have only butchered 3 of my last 6 deer but i think i am just going to start to do it all myself. What kind of knives do you guys use? i was just using my buck knife to get it off the bone and then kitchen knives to hack up the rest. I recently bought a meat grinder(LEM electric one) and i would def recommend it. Another question i have is: when you are going to hang a deer overnight, what temp do you like it to be and do you put one of those game bags over to keep any possible flies off? Most of the deer i shoot is during bow season where the temp can go from 20 degrees up to 80. thanks everyone

texasaggiebowhunter

Well Ive butchered every one I have ever killed. If it is cool enough I hang them over night, if it is really cool enough I hang them for a few days. If it is hot I run cold water over them until it is cooler, then I put them in a cooler full of ice for a day or so. If it is way too hot a guy down the road has a walkin cooler I can use. The knives that I use are hand made, I also us a Russell Green River and a Cutco. I dont use gamebags I would go broke if I used one for every animal I take, and normally it is cool enough that there are no bugs. I also have a LEM grinder, make my chili and ground meat with it. I also have and electic tenderizer which i run the hindquarters through. Here is one of my handmade knives.

texasaggiebowhunter

Here is my other.

www.wilkinsknives.com

Howler

I butcher my own no matter what game it is, from elk, to whitetail to mule deer to antelope, etc. I use a couple of Old Timers knives and have an old steel to sherpen them as needed. I will use a cloth bag sometimes, I let the temp and situation dictate how I age the meat and for how long it is aged. I prefer to hang the whole deer, elk, etc. for several days at about 45 degreees, but have had them hang longer than that and I have butchered antelope with in hours of shooting it, and I haven't had any bad meat to eat. I also use my own meat grinder and meat slicer to slice jerky meat.
It is not hard to do and saves a lot of money doing it yourself, and it gives me a lot of satisfaction knowing that I did it and I got all of my meat to show for it!
Also, I don't use a meat saw for any thing.

extreme1

Yes I (or we)as a gang butcher our own deer and we love it.We get great satisfaction out of it.During regular firearm season we have 9 guys in the gang and we all know a little something about butchering.I myself and another member will do the skinning and others will butcher the deer and others will clean the bones for hamburg and others will wrap the meat as well,and so on.One of the senior members is a butcher by trade and has taught us all alot.We will have 10 deer skinned,cleaned and wrapped(no bones fat or grizzle)in about 5-6 hours,and thats joking around and having a few drinks inbetween.
We prefer to gut the deer out and have it hang for atleast 3-4 days in the sub-freezing temperature.That gives it lots of time to tender up.You know that old saying"the longer he hangs,the better it will taste"
The average temperature here in november is around 5c in the day to -0 to -10c in the evenings so we have no problems with the flies,in early october,the weather can still be pretty warm so we would just gut the deer out and take it to a meat freezer,and have hang for a couple days.
Any specialized work like making burger,sausage,pepperets or have you our butcher in the camp will take it to his shop and have it procesed within a couple days.
It is so fun doing this ourselves,we would do this on the sunday of the end of the season,its the last day the "Gang" would get together for some time.We also do our awards---Biggest buck---Biggest doe,and a "JOKE" hat we would hand out to a certain member each year.

shed33

My wife and I cut up all of our own meat, process it and then vaccum seal it. My uncles a butcher, and he has given up some nice skinning and de-boning knives.

I hang my elk and deer up to 3 weeks if its cold enough outside in my garage. I like the temps to stay below 45 for this. This usaully means sub freezing temps during the night. I have often cut up meat after hanging that I have to let thaw out a tad just to cut it up.

As for early archery season animals in Sept, I have a completely different approach due to warm temps up in the 100's somedays. I have an extra fridge that I have hollowed out and use to stand quarters up and lay out any backstaps and other meat on the racks that I immediatly bring in from the field. I let this meat cool and bleed out if needed by placing a catch pan in the bottom of the fridge. I plan on building a walk in cooler someday, but for now the old fridge works fine. I can put an entire elk in that fridge for cooling.

I have a 2 small freezers and then one large chest freezer for storing the meat once we have it vaccum sealed and freezer ready.

Good luck
Shed

adams

But do you waste the fronts?

texasaggiebowhunter

Here we go again!![:@]

adams

I'm terribly sorry. I'm bored and just couldn't help myself.

I do butcher 90% of the game I kill. I'm by no means a professional but I pick every last little bit of meat off the animal. If it's no good for a steak, It'll work as stew meat.

hunter25

Have butchered every deer I've killed (except for one) myself. Let them hang for about 2 days, then take care of business. I usually take the "scraps" up to the meat locker for burger, but last year I bought a grinder and did my own. Took a while, but I got it done.

As far as temperature goes, if it's warm (anything over 50) I constantly keep ice inside the cavity...it keeps the meat cool enough. The only time I took a deer to the locker to get processed was a few years ago when it was unseasonably warm in Nov...didn't want to mess with it.

If I happen to kill a deer when I go camping, it gets quartered then put in a cooler on ice.