megalomaniac
Well-Known Member
How does this work? Just shoot a deer and drop it off either whole or field dressed at a participating processor with a permanent kill tag affixed? Does the processor give you a discounted rate for the processing when it is just being ground and donated?
Normally before season opens I contact friends and coworkers who like venison but who either don't hunt or who have gotten too old to hunt and get a list to fill. I skin, quarter, and age the meat, then give them the cleaned quarters (bone in or bone out, depending on their preference) and they do the final processing themselves, or take to a processor themselves if they want smoked or summer sausage.
In a normal year, that's 6 or 7 deer donated in addition to 2 bucks I keep for myself (between 4 hunters... me and 3 kids doing the killing).
This year my population has exploded due to a mass die off from coyotes before fawn drop 2022, then we've killed any coyotes that have since shown back up since the die off (18 killed since last summer). As such, we have had 2 great fawn crops in a row (50% recruitment past 2 years). I'm expecting to kill an additional 10 does this season compared to years past for management purposes. I'm turning my son and his college friends loose to accomplish this harvest requirement. I have 8 deer spoken for, but will likely need to donate 5 or 6 if my son does not find other college friends who want a deer.
Normally before season opens I contact friends and coworkers who like venison but who either don't hunt or who have gotten too old to hunt and get a list to fill. I skin, quarter, and age the meat, then give them the cleaned quarters (bone in or bone out, depending on their preference) and they do the final processing themselves, or take to a processor themselves if they want smoked or summer sausage.
In a normal year, that's 6 or 7 deer donated in addition to 2 bucks I keep for myself (between 4 hunters... me and 3 kids doing the killing).
This year my population has exploded due to a mass die off from coyotes before fawn drop 2022, then we've killed any coyotes that have since shown back up since the die off (18 killed since last summer). As such, we have had 2 great fawn crops in a row (50% recruitment past 2 years). I'm expecting to kill an additional 10 does this season compared to years past for management purposes. I'm turning my son and his college friends loose to accomplish this harvest requirement. I have 8 deer spoken for, but will likely need to donate 5 or 6 if my son does not find other college friends who want a deer.