hiding my scent - Not sure I am a believer ---- You

[ignerntbend]

It's really all about cooling and aging. People have many thousands of years of experience with meat handling. You have to handle a deer the same way you handle a beef. Cool it, age it. Let it hang long enough to let the enzymes in the muscles break down. Old deer can be tender, young deer can be tough.
It has a lot to do with the butcher.

 

[oneshotonekill]

Okay few questions for you fellas. If I shoot deer. Get it gutted and cooled quickly. What should my next step be? Typically I would quarter it and then proceed to process. Would it be benificial to quarter it and let it set in an ice chest for a few days draining bloody water and adding fresh ice?

 

[ignerntbend]

Okay few questions for you fellas. If I shoot deer. Get it gutted and cooled quickly. What should my next step be? Typically I would quarter it and then proceed to process. Would it be benificial to quarter it and let it set in an ice chest for a few days draining bloody water and adding fresh ice?

You have the idea. If the weather is hot use an ice chest (or the refrigerator if your wife'll let you).
If the weather is cool, opinions differ on how soon to skin. I skin right away.
Don't freeze for seventy two hours.
I put up a long ton of deer before I figured this out.
Edit: You can butcher the meat right away, just don't freeze it for at least seventy two hours.
TRUST ME I read it in a book.
Books really are good for something.