Yes , we didn't when I was a kid my dad had to be back to work Monday after opening weekend and he didn't get a deer that often nor was it that much to have it done.


once I started shooting deer I learned how.

we have it well set up now bought a nice grinder about 15 years ago after messing with small grinders

grinder is by far the most expensive piece but a good one lasts a long time and does a lot of deer

Process two deer a year and grind all the burger by hand. I’m no expert but enjoy the process.

Process about all the meat we eat here. Done 3 beef steers, helped teach a kid to butcher his own hog. Every thing from coturnix quail, meat rabbits and chickens, turkies, deer etc it is a part of living with out depending.....

Yup butcher and fillet all my game

I do. I was raised mostly by my grandparents and he did his own deer. I did also hunt with my dad and he always did and still does take his to a processer. I could just never justify the cost. Over the years I've collected things to make the job easier, like an electric meat grinder, sausage stuffer, food sealer, etc.

But other than keeping the prime cuts for steaks, I mostly can my deer. I just cut it all up in cubes and throw it in a quart jar, add a beef bouillon cube and fill it with water, then process. It's so versatile done up that way. The water and bouillon make a broth that just needs thickened into gravy. Can use it for stew, "beef" tips, stroganoff, potpies, just deer and gravy... or drain the broth and use the meat to add to to chili, make fajitas or steak sandwiches, bbq deer, whatever.

All I ever knew was........you shoot it, you finish it. No matter the critter.

I started canning meat a year ago. Great way to process it. Makes a lot of cuts better and great for storage. And like you mentioned can be used a lot of ways. Very convenient to prepare a meal with also.

My All Purpose Boy and I always do our own. We are too picky not to. It is so dang expensive here (right around $100!) that it's like Yes Sir said above.....you'll have near "store-bought" price into it if you pay to have it cut and packaged. I have, because of time restraints, had 4 big game animals cut up by a "professional" butcher....one elk that I had already skinned and mostly deboned already, two skinned and quartered, and trimmed pronghorns, and one doe whitetail. The elk butchers screwed up my burger and also some meat for canning. The pronghorns were barely edible and the Wyoming butcher had only saved about 1/2 of the edible meat I would have. He was shut down by the state that very fall because of sanitation issues. He also lost (??!!) the head/cape of my bro-in-laws pronghorn. The doe whitetail was done by a neighbor that butchered deer. He was a very meticulous guy, so I trusted him.....plus he did them all one at a time so you goy only your own meat back.

When I was a kid there just weren't any deer processers around here, everybody did their own. Now 90% of even the rural folks pay the job done.

Deer butchering is usually a 3 day process for me. It could be done in one or two but I'm lazy lol. The first day I skin and quarter the deer and put it in a cooler of ice. The next day I bone it, chop it up, and at that point package and freeze any steaks I'm planning to keep. The rest goes into the fridge or back into the cooler. The third day I can up all the cut up meat OR grind it into burger or sausage. I usually don't do BOTH from one deer. A deer is either a burger/sausage deer, or a canning deer.

Have for years, my dad taught me and I have taught my son. Only thing I don't do is smoking whole hind quarters, our local butcher shop does that for me.

What do you do with the smoked hind quarters? Are they just smoked, or cured and smoked like ham?

Since high school. But take the trimmings in to get cheese garlic summer sausage.

I do. I make sausages, jerky, meat sticks, as well as regular cuts on everything we hunt.

Do you a mix for your deer sticks, or your own recipe?

I've always processed my own. I'm picky with what goes in my freezer. Also, my wife (who fishes, hunts and traps) and I had a prenuptual agrrement. She had to change all the diapers and I have to clean and process all the critters. She was done in a couple years - thirty six years later I'm still going. LOL

I am kinda picky about how my meat is processed so I do everything myself and don’t trust to many others to take the care into it as I do.

I've always butchered our own , showed the son and nephews how to also..It ain't rocket science

Have for 50 yrs,,deer hogs,beef ,etc.

My son and I do our deer , hogs and small game
To expensive, abt 100.00 bucks for deer around here and never know whose meat your getting.
We take good care of our game right from the shot, some meat in the past , when I did use a processor, the meat was terrible.
No problems now.