Variety of wild game you eat and how you keep it

[Thankful Otter]

Our weekly meals will consist of caribou, moose, duck, geese, snowshoe hare, a variety of fish ( Trout, Pike, Char, Inconnu , others ). and occasionally seal, muskox, and other mammals. But we only eat what he have hunted when we are at home

My three questions

1. do any or some of you only eat what you hunt when you are at home and if so what does that consist of ( deer, fish, small game, or ? )

2. we will be purchasing a new walk in freezer and would appreciate knowing what freezers you recommend.

3. I noticed some of you love to bird hunt and some love to fish---do any of you rabbit hunt ? We probably have a snowshoe hare dinner at least once every two weeks and always have some in the freezer.

 

[Anonymous]

Great questions!

1) My family eats something like 90% or so of meat we've harvested- caribou, moose, ducks, grouse, salmon, halibut, trout, ptarmigan, hares, rockfish. We eat something we harvest every day. We do purchase bacon or pork sausage about once a week, but we rarely purchase other meat- occasionally chicken or turkey and very rarely we buy a beef steak for the grill.

2) We bought a the largest chest freezer we could find- 35 cu ft or so and installed it in an outbuilding. It doesn't even run in the winter. Every few days the wife goes and "shops the freezer" and transfers stuff to the freezer above the fridge for immediate use.

3) I love to rabbit hunt. Unfortunately, I'm the only one who really enjoys them so that dampens my hunting a bit. I still like to keep a few in the freezer though. I'll make one when Mrs. Hodgeman is out of town.

 

[Guy Miner]

1. On a "good hunting" year, we eat a lot of venison and other game meat. Still, I'll buy pork, beef & chicken at the store. Just not nearly as much if I'm having a good year. This has been a good year, real good: bear, antelope, mule deer and pheasant so far... :grin:

2. No walk-in freezer.

3. I've eaten rabbit, but it was a long time ago. Not sure anyone else in my family has done so. Quite a few cottontail around, so maybe I should take up hunting for them.

Guy

 

[truck driver]

When I manage to score on a white tail we eat it along with gray squirrel, rabbit various types of fish which I catch and buy. We do supplement this with beef ,pork , turkey and chicken. I once had two freezers now only a upright I kept full of fish, deer and veggies along with beef,pork and chicken. As my family grew and left home I need less space for storage since I needed less to sustain my wife and I.

 

[wisconsinteacher]

We eat venison, wild turkey, and a lot of fish from the local lakes (pike and panfish). We mix our deer trimmings with fatty beef to make hamburger. In 10 years of marriage, we have never bought hamburger from the store.

The only meat we buy is chicken, pork butt, bacon and shrimp.

As far as freezers, we have one large upright, 2 fridge/freezer combos and a small chest freezer. I would like to get one more large upright and stop using the small chest.

 

[Elkman]

Deer, fish and elk. All cared for and packaged by my wife and I. I have tried to build my own walk in cooler, with little success, so in warm weather it's a challenge to keep it cool. We do have a large chest freezer that holds a bunch.

 

[Europe]

1. I miss living off of the land actually. just like I miss hunting. But, yes, we bought very very small amounts of meat when we were raising a family. Deer, Elk and Buffalo was our big game dinners, fish ( a little different than your's cheyenne and Hodgeman, we had Catfish, buffalo, Carp, Bass, Trout ) A lot of fowl ( quail, chukar, grouse, pheasant, duck, geese, crane ). We did eat both rabbit and squirrel, as well as Turkey and Ferel hogs. Of course when we traveled we were able to bring back the meat from animals that was not normal for us to hunt. We always brought back the moose meat, and always enjoyed it.

2. I am guessing this is a community project. We never had a walk in, so can't help on that on.

3. Yes, actually enjoyed hunting Rabbits and Squirrels. It was the first thing the children and then the grandchildren hunted. I am surprised from reading your responses that more fellows don't hunt them.

 

[Thebear_78]

Like Hodgeman my family eats 90% of wild game meat. Moose, caribou, bear, salmon and halibut are our main food sources.

During good rabbit number years we eat a fair share of hare. Generally either ground into sausage or cooked off the bone and made into pot pies.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[SJB358]

I eat all I can take in the Fall. Elk, deer, turkey, and rabbits.

I try and buy some homeraised beef and pork from family as well.

Usually the wild game lasts long enough to get through the fall.

 

[IdahoCTD]

We eat mostly elk for wild game. I give away my deer and antelope when I kill them to my dads neighbor. He loves the stuff but I much prefer elk or moose. I generally have plenty of elk so I don't worry about needing the deer or antelope to fill the freezer. We do buy chicken, pork, shrimp, and a bit of Tri-tip now and then. A good beef steak is hard to beat every once and a while. I haven't done a ton of bird hunting in recent years, except ducks, but when I do I really like Chuckar, Huns, and grouse. Pheasants are fun to hunt but they tend to be dry and a bit gamey. Quail are good too. Because of the limitation on my diet right now I can't really use a bunch of ingredients to "mellow" out the taste of some of the game I eat. Therefore I have been eating mostly pork, chicken, and elk.

If I was going to build a walk in I would use those big aluminum sided insulated panels. They are about 8" thick. The guy I have powder coat stuff uses them for his powder coating oven.

We saw quite a few snowshoe hares when we were up elk hunting a couple weeks ago but I've never eaten one. As a kid, in California, we use to shoot the big grey squirrels in the Sierra Nevada mountains for my friends grandpa. I've never eaten one though.

 

[Blkram]

1) We do eat mostly what we harvest at home; Buffalo, elk, moose, deer, antelope, caribou, bear, grouse and trout. We also take wild game with us when visiting friends and family for meals away from home, so they can enjoy it too. This year, is the first that I have bought ribeye's for eating at home ( a nice bit of variety!) having only previously done so when visiting friends away from home.

2) sorry, no experience with a walk in freezer, and on,y ones I've seen have been at the butcher's and do not recall make or model

3) since my wife doesn't even want to witness bunnies being harvested or in the freezer (had a pet rabbit as a young child) and DrMike is very allergic to hares/rabbits, what bunnies I've harvested over the past number of years have been given to an uncle who loves rabbit stew.

 

[hunternyny]

We always eat what we harvest but we don't come anywhere close here in NY to harvesting what some of you fellows harvest. I admit to being envious of you fellows in Canada and Alaska and it looks like Idahoctd does very well in Idaho. We hunted rabbits and squirrels when I was young but have not done so in many a year.

Blkram, Hodgeman, Bear78, and Cheyenne, do you sell the big game hides also and do you also trap ? If so what animals that you trap do you or could you eat ?

 

[Thankful Otter]

We do trap and sell pelts. The season just started and will run through the winter. We can trap as many as 14 different species here and the only ones we eat semi regularly is Beaver. The fur trade is a big industry in Canada, although most are from farms, not from the wild. Trapping is another reason I catch so much flak ( Trapper, Hunter, Female, Indian, Conservative) I don't get invites to a lot of feminists meetings. Scotty and Tom's daughter's will receive something in the spring that will have come from our trap lines.

 

[Anonymous]

Blkram, Hodgeman, Bear78, and Cheyenne, do you sell the big game hides also and do you also trap ? If so what animals that you trap do you or could you eat ?

I don't sell any hides, there is a market for caribou/moose capes but I generally don't ever recover a hide. I'm usually racing dark or weather or bugs to spend a lot of time on hide prep.

I don't trap much- mostly just to get out and about in the winter. I have tried beaver, not my favorite but lynx is quite good eating but kind of a rare catch. Most commonly trapped animals- fox, coyote and marten are not really eaten much that I'm aware of. I know I'd have to be really hungry to even consider it.

 

[Thebear_78]

I forgot to mention that we can quite a bit of meat to save on freezer space.

The canned meat is very versatile for lots of recipes


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Europe]

1) We do eat mostly what we harvest at home; Buffalo, elk, moose, deer, antelope, caribou, bear, grouse and trout.

--- We also take wild game with us when visiting friends and family for meals away from home, so they can enjoy it too. ----

How nice is that !!!!! I bet Dr Mike and his family has enjoyed one of these meals.

Hodgeman, Lynx, interesting. What was it like ? How did you fix it ?

Bear78, we use to do the same thing. We canned a lot, at one time.

Cheyenne, I am betting that your feelings are never hurt when your excluded from a feminist meeting.

Elk man, for a short period of time when we were in the middle of feeding a family we rented space from a local company that processed wild game, as well as domestic animals.

 

[Anonymous]

Hodgeman, Lynx, interesting. What was it like ? How did you fix it ?.

I've had it in stir fry and just fried in a skillet after rolling in flour.

This will sound weird, or perhaps glib.... but it's oddly "chicken-like". Much more similar to chicken than anything else I've eaten that supposedly tasted like chicken. I could probably use my imagination and arrive at pork as well depending on the dish

Not really super flavorful- very mild, light colored and fine grained meat.

A buddy of mine swears it's the best game meat in all of AK and he hunts hard for them.

 

[Blkram]

Being a sustenance hunter, under our rules, I am not allowed to sell or trade the hides, horns or any other part of the animal harvested for sustenance or ceremonial purposes. When I have requests from family for hides to tan for moccasins, vests, jackets or drums, I will provide the appropriate hides to those family members for the intended purpose.

As my uncle is currently running the family trap line, I do not trap at this time, as it supplements his family's income.

When I was a small child we did subsist on beaver and muskrat that was trapped by my grandfather. Perhaps others, I do not recall, but am told by my parents that these were regular menu items for our family.

 

[filmjunkie4ever]

Walk-ins are your friend! I only wish that they sold subsistence permits here in Oregon, alas, one more of my dreams shot down.

1) I eat game as often as possible as it truly is (in a dead heat with a Medium Rare Charbroiled Ribeye) the best meat out there. I usually end up with some deer and elk each year; I typically hunt grouse, sometimes doves and quail. A friend has a boat in AK and we usually barter for some smoked salmon he brings down each year. I catch trout, bass and occasionally catfish in local bodies of water. My father makes jerky in a smokehouse that I built him in woodshop in middle school more than a few years ago, and sausage and salami are a treat we enjoy every other year. We grind the venison meat into burger, cut it into steaks and roasts, and keep some for stew meat.

2) I do not personally own or have current access to a walk in but they really are great for storing unprocessed game. The best one I ever used was a converted freezer van. It was setup with hooks that were attached to a type of caster that rolled on a track but the hooks were detachable. You simply picked up the carcass and applied the gambrel, and then hooked the eye of the gambrel on the rollerhook and rolled it back into the van on the ceiling track just like they do at commercial butcher shops.

3) I love to hunt rabbits but I always wait until there has been snow on the ground a while as the cottontails we get down here in the PNW are sometimes ridden with parasites. These parasites freeze is my understanding. Like with grouse, I simply keep a .22 L.R. (rifle or handgun) in the rig so that when the opportunities arise, I can shoot dinner.

Good luck with all of your endeavors. Thanks for sharing!

Dale

 

[mjcmichigan]

Hi Cheyenne!
1) Last year, 4 deer, 30 pheasants, 30 squirrels, salmon, walleye, and Turkey. Been 6 years for bear....getting a tag is harder than getting the bear. Supplement with grocery store meat. I need to rabbit hunt.
2) have a vertical freeZer set at -18f. Takes meat two days to thaw..sometimes three. Walk in sounds like a great idea!,
3) no rabbits...around us a dog would help.

Question for you... did you get the freezer yet?

P.s.have a trapping friend that keeps two 60'set lines, walks one in the morning(before sun up) and the other after work. He's so passionate, they eat it all. Beaver is his favorite!

What's you favorite?


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk