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Butchering Advice

My buddy an I are going to attempt to butcher my doe from last night. We've watched tons of videos online, my favorite so far is the Netflix show Meateater. There's an entire episode on butchering a deer.

Anyone have good resources to share, tips tricks, advice, experiences, hilarious failures that I can learn from to make this first time less painful?

I'm no expert but I have been "butchering" deer for a few years now and between my deer, family and friends I cut up between 10 and 15 a year. There is nothing difficult about it, I shot my first deer and my brother and I figured it out, I'm sure you will be fine. My biggest bits of advice would be take your time, don't be in a rush. Use very sharp knives. I prefer an 8 inch boning knife. The biggest thing is don't cut yourself. My procedure goes like this. I hang the deer by the back legs and I cut the front hooves off at aprox. the elbow/knee joint with a hack saw. Then I zip up the front legs with my knife to the arm pit. I will cut from the sternum down to the throat as far as I can. I always start skinning from the rear legs down. I do this to try to minimize getting any dear hair on the meat. Once I have the skin down to the head I severe the neck as close to the head as I can get. This gets the skin away from the meat. Next step for me is to remove both front legs, Then I remove the back straps and tenderloins. I take as much meat off the ribs and neck as I can, this meat is usually hacked off and I grind it. I've tried doing the neck as a roast before and didn't care for it. Finally I cut the rear legs away from the pelvis. I trim as much meat as I can for the grinder. I will usually wrap the quarters in plastic wrap and put them in the fridge overnight. The next evening I will debone all the meat. I usually wind up grinding all the meat from the front quarters and I make steaks out of the rear quarters. The 3rd night I will grind all my scrap meat, and depending on what I want to do with it, bag it, or season it for sausages or jerky. All in all a medium size deer (100-140 lbs dressed) probably takes me 4 hours of work, Bigger deer take longer. Smaller deer are a breeze. Good luck, and enjoy the experience. Chris

First thing. Wait for 24 hours. Keep cold. If you must butcher today then take all quarters off whole and put on ice or fridge for a week. Unscented bags.

If you just must cut it up sooner, then keep the pieces as big as possible and let it sit for a week in cold conditions. (cooler with ice or fridge) or hang on a cold night under 40 deg.'s

You can also age the meat after freezing if you let it sit in the fridge for a week after it is thawed in the fridge.

Dfa, posted a good video for an easy breakdown of deer. Contact him or check prior post on meat spoil/processing.

That show meat eater is great, lots of very good recipes on there too. Best advice I can give is use a good boning knife and keep it very sharp, the less cuts you have to make the better the steaks, roasts, etc will turn out. Also don’t know if you already bled it out, but most of the time when people taste a “gamey “ flavor it’s usually because they didn’t bleed their deer out and/ or cool the meat quick enough. Just food for thought! Good luck!

I've no good advice on this, other than the sharp knife thing. From when I was 13 or 14, I worked at a local "Country Store". I did it part time through college. My day could include cutting fire wood, stocking shelves, making soup or butchering up a chicken or cow into some sort of meat dish. My boss always had a line, and it's shown true for me over the years:

Dull knives cut people, sharp knives help people.

If your knife is dull, you work harder and are more likely to slip and cut yourself. A sharp knife just slides through tissue making the job easy.

While you butcher - sharpen the knife to keep it razor like.

Thanks everyone, for taking the time to share! I'm going to start working on it tonight so it will be just over 24 hours. She's been hanging in my shed with three bags of ice in her since last night so should be nice and cold.

Only part I'm worried about is I was kind of sloppy at the end of my field dressing and got some droppings in the bottom of the cavity near the pelvis bone. Should I cut away and discard the meat in those areas that might have come in contact?

No need to Les. Wash it good. If you're still concerned then splash it with vinegar and rinse it. I hose it down. A thin trimming, only if it is an already exposed cut. (raw-meat ... if meat was without a fatty film over it such as when splitting the hams ) is enough. Wash off again after trimming exposed area and clean your knife again. Turds are not a problem if washed off. ( I once saw a survivalist eat some ) Remove hair and other potential contaminants for reducing bacteria when aging.

Good for you, Les! Butchering is a great skill to acquire. Its a "live and learn" type task. I was painfully slow in the beginning. Over the years I got a bit faster. Dare I say, I like the butchering as much as the hunting. Take your time, watch your fingers! A sharp 8 inch blade is all you need. Debone it all, follow the muscles seams... it breaks down easy.

I found this video on skinning.. some good ideas there... these guys have a good butchering, knife sharpening videos too...

Sharp knives, good cotton gloves, follow the seams. Super easy. Think of it as anatomy 101 from Medic school It's just as simple, just different anatomy mammal-vs- human. Walk in the park. Did I mention Sharp knives ? You got this. Enjoy

Scary sharp knives. Let the tip of your knife do most of the work. Let the muscle tissue guide you. Google the word "reticulin", it connects muscle to muscle. Follow where the reticulin connects muscle groups and you'll be good to go.

Upon further reasearch my terminology might be wrong. You'll find a small web of connective shit between muscles, follow that, you'll be golden.

Les, you get it done yet?

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