Do you notice any difference in the taste of deer?

[Laufen]

The outside temp is not regulated as a cooler would be. The deer with the hide on it would not freeze, at 30 degrees for quite some time.

It doesn't take long for the carcass to lose heat. 40 degrees is about optimum for allowing enzymes to begin breaking down connective tissue.

 

[GeauxLSU]

Wish I had a meat locker but I don't. I shoot mine, gut and skin them within 2 hours. Then I debone the meat and put it in a cooler on ice for 3-4 days while I let the melted ice drain out and add new ice as needed. What do y'all think of that method?

I have a buddy who does the same but puts his meat in zip lock bags because he says being wet is bad for the meat?

If I was doing my own that's what I'd do. Being wet is not 'bad' for the meat.
I'm fortunate in that I have a commercial beef/pork processor within minutes of my hunting land. I shoot, back the truck up, load it, and am at the processor in minutes. I don't even bother gutting them (he charges $5). From the time I pull up until it's hung gutted and hanging in the cooler is never more than 10 minutes (generally a lot less).

 

[biker_bill]

This is why some deer will taste differently than others (outside of diet of course).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PSE_meat

Well if the stinky 8 point was stressed it wasn't from dying, he took a 385 gr round right in the heart at 20 yards and dropped like a stone.

But maybe, just maybe he was stressed from fighting or chasing does..???

My experience was so bad I only take does now.
When the rancher wants beef for the house he doesn't go out and shoot his bull, he takes a 2 or 3 year old heifer.
So that's the way I've been playing it.

 

[Laufen]

Well if the stinky 8 point was stressed it wasn't from dying, he took a 385 gr round right in the heart at 20 yards and dropped like a stone.

But maybe, just maybe he was stressed from fighting or chasing does..???

My experience was so bad I only take does now.
When the rancher wants beef for the house he doesn't go out and shoot his bull, he takes a 2 or 3 year old heifer.
So that's the way I've been playing it.

Absolutely. Heat, hormones, or any type of stress prior to slaughter will definitely affect the meat. That's why boar meat is almost always made into pepperoni or an equivalent. The spices will cover the musky flavor imparted by the regular secretion of hormones.

 

[biker_bill]

Wish I had a meat locker but I don't. I shoot mine, gut and skin them within 2 hours. Then I debone the meat and put it in a cooler on ice for 3-4 days while I let the melted ice drain out and add new ice as needed. What do y'all think of that method?

I have a buddy who does the same but puts his meat in zip lock bags because he says being wet is bad for the meat?

Yea I'm not much for wetting the meat either. The color it changes to isn't that appetizing to me either.

I'll butcher them up and use those aluminum turkey pans and put them in the other fridge for several days, kind of like having a meat locker. 5 pans usually do it, each ham in one each, both shoulders in another, loin in one and everything else in the last one.

 

[BanjoJohn]

Who all commenting in this thread has ever run a deer processing facility, and killed over 100 deer?

I have.

 

[GeauxLSU]

Who all commenting in this thread has ever run a deer processing facility, and killed over 100 deer?

I have.

I think it's more about how many you've eaten vs how many you've processed.

 

[biker_bill]

Who all commenting in this thread has ever run a deer processing facility, and killed over 100 deer?

I have.

Did you ever have some come in that stunk, not gut shot stink but rut stink?

 

[BanjoJohn]

I think it's more about how many you've eaten vs how many you've processed.

Ok, how many have eaten over 100 deer that you killed and processed?

 

[Laufen]

Who all commenting in this thread has ever run a deer processing facility, and killed over 100 deer?

I have.

I worked at the US MARC (meat animal research center)in Clay Center Nebraska on several projects in conjunction with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and also at the Loeffel Meat Laboratory on east campus in Lincoln. There are a lot of variables that affect the quality of meat harvested, and it's basically the same from deer to hogs/cattle.