Is Marten meat edible for humans.

Edible yes, palatable no.

I "lived" on it for a couple of weeks in the winter of 1978-9. As Mike says..it's not palatable..... and that's being charitable !!

It was all I could do to cook it !! I boiled it, of course, and just the smell was enough to ALMOST trigger vomiting. I eventually smeared a little toothpaste on my upper lip just so I could tolerate the smell.

Give it a try if you enjoy new culinary treats. This is one that falls into the emergency only category !! True life or death situations only !

As Colonel Townsend Whelen stated, it is all food. But it is the difference between English sparrow and Morning Dove. Pine Marten are part of the weasel family and from mink to wolverine, those are rank scented animals who stay alive, because larger predators are put off by the smell of their glands and their meat. Sometimes meat as sage grouse or coot is repulsive due to what they eat in sage or snails. Weasels just are a dark meat which there is not a cure for, like not putting turnips into soup as it all tastes like turnips.
My brother presented me with the prime rib of the sky, which is the bs the fish and game boys to sell sandhlll crane licenses started for propaganda. It is not that it is bad, but it is not prime rib. It reminds me of wild turkey in one meal at Thanksgiving is enough and like Muscovy duck in I never wanted to make a habit of eating that either, and I love how gamey wild duck is.
It is just some meat does not have an appeal as pork gets old for me too.
Weasel though is like crow, coot or things that you see in abundance yet as no one shoots them, in no matter what you do to it, when you are done boiling it, seasoning it, marinating it, you take a bite and realize there is not any covering that meat up.
Your question should have been an answer in, "Why does my dog or anything else eat my marten carcasses?"

Stick with beef, Hereford beef, as Angus is what is ruining the market in it has no flavor, the opposite of too much weasel flavor.

Must have been a tough winter Ken ! Would love to hear the story someday.

Must have been a tough winter Ken ! Would love to hear the story someday. [/quote]


I've heard the short version but would like to hear the whole story too.

I third that motion about the story of that winter.

Isn't BBQ sauce the go to flavor enhancer.
pour it on thick and simmer till its a soft mush

It was a dark & stormy night in the winter of 1978-79. The only time I ever trapped with a partner.

We had been flown into a lake in late September and set up our camp..... a couple of 10x12 Wall tents. One for storage and one for sleeping & cooking.

A third guy was to join us the first of November or thereabouts. He was supposed to arrive with a C-185 load of groceries as well as his own gear.

He never showed up.

About New Years we were getting pretty low on grub. There had been caribou around in December and we killed a couple. Also there were a few hares.

Short part of the story is that we were down to about a cup of Krusteaz pancake mix and some garlic powder.

I managed to find a set of older shed caribou antlers and sawed them into short chunks. Boiling those for several days produced a greasy scum on the water. We added the Krusteaz and some garlic powder. It wasn't GOOD but it wasn't awful. I think it was more of a psychological meal than any real nutrition.

By the next day my partner had the squirts and by the second day he didn't feel like leaving camp. I ran his line and pulled his sets. I continued checking my line and picking up a few marten. All while hoping to score on a caribou. We decided to try the marten. I gutted a few and cut them up. Boiled them until the meat fell off the bones. Added the garlic powder and gave it a try. Wretched stuff.....but we figured it would either "make one or push one". In my partner's case that wasn't an issue.

He continued to feel pretty lousy and would lie around the stove all day hoping to feel better. Then he lost a couple of teeth and I decided things were more serious than I thought at first. All this time I was doing OK. We continued to eat the filet mar-ten.

We discussed the idea of my walking out for help. It was about 65 miles to the nearest radio that I knew of but of course there was no trail and I knew I could not leave partner alone as he was unable to get wood.

I snowshoed a runway on the lake and kept checking traps We kept eating marten. Partner lost another tooth and was obviously losing weight. I am still not sure whether it was protein poisoning or scurvy or what, that was ailing him.

Eventually, one evening I heard a Cub and It circled over.... and I signaled them to land. It was a guy & wife who were wolf hunting. I explained the situation and they gave me all their freeze-dried emergency food. I gave them a note to call a friend of mine and explain what we needed.

About 10 days of bad weather later my friend showed up. We loaded up the camp and gear and got back to my homestead where I had plenty of staples but no meat. That was ok as I did have a lot of jarred salmon and some dried salmon. So all was well in the end.

But one interesting observation. We ate a couple packets of that freeze-dried stuff that first night and it had a miraculous affect on my partner. Plugged him right up, lifted his spirits, and gave him a bit of energy again.

I don't really think the antler soup or the marten caused the sickness. I think we had been eating so much protein and so little fat that it took too much out of our systems to digest all that meat.

Not an experience I'd care to repeat.

That would be a nail biter I'm sure.

I remember that account, thank you for describing it so well again, Sir Ken ! Cannot imagine the feeling of loosing teeth.

Then there was the time his back went out........
Go on, tell...........

Hope that guy that was supposed to show up got a taste of his own medicine at some point. I miss the single sideband days.....now every trapper has 911 at the push of a button.....no more good character building adventures and the stories are getting pretty mundane....

It took me four years but payback was sweet !

Thanks for sharing. I can imagine revenge was oh so sweet.

I was once dared to try marten for $100, I didn't think I'd be able to stomach it without being in a starving condition. Needless to say, I did NOT try it!

I'm glad that someone else has tried it so I know how bad it really is! Glad that you made it through Ken so that we could all have the pleasure of gaining knowledge from you.

What an ordeal! Sounds like one step up from that movie Alive, where the plane crashed and to survive, "Martin", was dinner.



Are you willing to tell us that 'sweet' story? I

Not on a public forum. Suffice to say he had a very long boat trip one ......week.

You can listen to that story and more on the ATA website for a couple bucks - Ken's oral history interview is a really good listen. Thanks for sharing!

https://www.alaskatrappers.org/interviews.html

Just downloaded and listened to Ken's story. First time I've heard his voice. Enjoyed that hour so very much. Thanks Jwood ... and Thanks Ken.