deer

I will make it a tractor topic by saying I work at a car race track in PA running lots of differnt mowing equipment .. now that said here's the question we have been seeing a few deer on track which is not good on a race track we have been able to chase most of them out of a couple of gates but now have a couple that just wont go so I have been task to remove by any means ( lead poisioning) I wont shoot them and not use the meat. are they safe to eat now I people keep ones they hit on the road.. what would be your suggestions to keeping the meat so I could get it butchered? by a friend of course temps been warm here 70s and 80s thanks for any help

We Cunnermen in the Poconos always said when the strawberries are in blossom. After they drop they youngins.

No reason you cant eat them this time of year.

You need to cool the carcass immediately, which means gutting them as soon as you drop them.
Throw a couple bags of ice in the rib cage.
Then haul them to your buddy to process ASAP.

Finally, enjoy eating.

Rick

Why would you cool the rib cage? there is no meat there. Get the hide off & get the hams cold in a refrigerator.

been 80 here in bow season lots of times.
routine is still the same.....just need to be faster.
clean as a whistle field dressing, get the hide off as soon as possible, cut it up.

Since it's fine to eat a smelly, adrenaline soaked, battle scarred, looks like a mangy rat, buck at the peak of the rut, when he has been P'n on himself for days...I imagine now would be fine too.

interesting though....the Native Americans I know, that hunt whenever they want to, say they take the bulk of their deer about the same time period we do.

If you can get the carcass hung and meat off it, and into the fridge, that will be best. It should take an hour or so, you can easily do that with a sharp fillet knife or meat cutters knife. Then remove a portion at a time for trimming, removing silver skin, sinew, fat etc.

In these warm temperatures you cannot waste any time, get some help lined up and have them ready to cut in a suitable place, cooler the better, before you shoot.

In these warm temperatures, be cognizant that the fat on them will be slippery and slimey, clean that off the knife or knives before you start trimming or cutting and it will be often. You can trim a backstrap in place or on the table, one side of the knife will be in meat, the other in fat and you don't want to reverse the side so that you are smearing fat into the cuts of meat. My rationale is that I've always done it that way and I have never had any game taste in the meat. Its so much easier when the carcass is skinned and allowed to cool off, the fat dries and hardens up, easier to deal with and not so viscous so as to smear. I just use a dry paper towel to clean the knife. I can appreciate aging, but it has to be controlled, certain temperature and humidity, so unless you have access to a walk in cooler or a place that can do this, its just best to immediately field dress, skin and start taking meat off the carcass, trim/cut and freeze. Thin food storage bags, (twist and tie) squash the air out, then place those in a larger ziplock, squash the air out, it will last more than a year in a freezer with no burn, one box of the storage bags and a few large ziplocs will go a long way actually.

How I heard it was that deer are good to eat in any month with an R in it. If deer are hanging around your track, it is because you have something there that they like to eat or the population is too high and they have no where else to go. When deer are a safety hazard, do what you need to do and do not worry about eating them. You are not a hunter in this situation, you are animal control only.

In a controlled environment meat can hang for two weeks. As the temp. is higher the time they can hang is shorter. With the hide off, one day is still safe. A friend said that one year, the hunters were taking their deer to a meat locker and they were stacked in the freezer with the hides on. The deer spoiled because they never cooled down. Air flow in important.
SDE

If you and this friend are going to butcher the deer in warm weather, just make sure you do it immediately after shooting them and hang them in the coolest place you can find while doing the job. Do you have a local butcher shop with a cooler? Might be worth the few bucks a butcher charges to cut up the deer for you and then take the meat home and package it yourself if money is a factor. Never met a deer I wouldn't eat regardless of the time of year.

i wouldn't suggest shooting one at the track and taking it to a butcher,..game warden might not take kindly to that..but you can use them all year. i used to hear that about rabbits, used several that i picked out of the garden

Did you post that you plan to poach them?

Know how the game wardens in PA operate you'll most likely be the one in the cooler

The farm we used to have had a terrible deer problem and we get crop damage permits to hunt them all summer long. I do not hunt but a friend would fill the permits for me and give me all the free meat we wanted. In hot weather he would gut them right away and take a garden hose and wash out the insides to help cool them and he would then dump a bag of ice in them to keep them cold until he got home to his cooler.I sure do miss the taste corn and alfalfa fed deer shot during the summer.The permits were from the middle of July to Jan and for anterless deer only. you could not believe the taste difference between a summer deer and one shot in Dec or Jan. Tom

You did it the right way, no poaching.

What was the taste difference?

Much better taste almost like beef. My wife would fry the tenderloin and you could cut it with a fork.My motherinlaw said she would not eat deer but we fed it to her and she didn't even know it. For several years there were close to 50 deer a year harvested off our farm they did alot of crop damage. Tom

I do not like the gamey taste of deer, have never had a non-winter harvested deer. The point is probably mute, because I do not think the Iowa DNR has ever issued non-season permits.

Field dress immediately. Hang from tree, tractor loader or beam in shop and skin it immediately. Bone all the meat off immediately and place in cooler 1/4 full of ice. Cut, trim and wrap and freeze in a day or two.

The reason I am giving you a hard time is that unless you get a permit for the deer, you are performing an illegal act. It sounds like your boss is condoning it, bet he will forget that he asked you to do this real quick if you get caught. You should NEVER perform an illegal act in your job, and a boss should NEVER request or condone it. It starts at one place and it is easy to create a pattern of doing it.

Besides what others have said, you could rent a refrigerated trailer to cool them in.

That's about the only place that will hold ice. Unless you are going to ride in the back of the truck and hold the ice bags on it.

Yes, skinning would help. But since he said he was taking it to a buddy, I would transport it with the hide on.

Should of said they are getting permits to shoot not poaching I wouldnt do that