So as the years have went by, I continue to see lots of uses of deer meat and body parts that I have incorporated to my processing skills.

Here is what I keep on the primal end.

2 hams
2 shoulders
2 top loins
2 tenderloins
Liver
Heart
All rib meat
All neck meat

Here is what I do on the processing end.

All meat is either cut into meal size portions or ground or cut into stew meat or canned.
I mainly use the neck meat as stew meat.
The last deer that are taken are turned into highly prized jerky that takes way too much time for how fast it is consumed.
All scraps cut off the meat are dog food. (silver skin, bloody meat, fat). I freezer them in gallon zip loc bags half full. Saves me on dog food and adds "gravy" to store bought dry food in their bowls.
Bones are either given to the dogs uncooked or my daughter uses them for collagen bone broth. She is now using the front shanks for her broth.
The dogs get the cleaned ribs and the spinal column. Yes my dogs are very "healthy" this time of year.
The liver is either frozen to eat later or used for dog food in smaller portions or cut up and salted as catfish bait. Lemme tell you, salted deer liver is one awesome catfish bait and it's tough enough to be used for multiple catches. Just give it a good salting and set out in the sun and make liver jerky for the catfish. You won't be sorry!!!

I don't use the brain or the hide as that is seen to me as WAY TOO MUCH work.
Even got to where I don't care about the antlers unless I am gonna mount it. Get thrown out with the hide and guts.

What else do y'all do besides what I have mentioned? I like to use as much of the deer as possible.

If we dont eat the liver I slice it on the slicer and put it in the dehydrator run it like jerky for dog training treats.

Typically use every but head hide, and bones. All scraps and trillion are saved for the dogs.

There is some $$$ in the antlers. Wouldn't be throwing them away.

I save all of the thick fat/tallow for my sister. She melts it down and makes lotion or something. Last year, one big doe had 11 lbs of clean fat.

Four quarters, neck, and back get cut into as many big pieces as I can get. Can always make it smaller, if wanted for grinding or canning.
I save the tallow, if the deer have it, for trapping bait and bird feed for the wither. The chickadees love it.

Heart , tenderloin, backstraps , hinds , and shoulders if there’s any thing left of them

you can also pickle the tongue

I get as much as I can. What I don't touch is other than the tenderloins is anything that is inside the cavity of the deer. Especially on gut shot deer. So I don't deal with the rib meat or the abdominal wall muscle. Scavengers can have that.

One of the most valuable parts of the deer we shoot for me is the suit. Easily go thru 100# a winter at my bird feeder station. Up to 5 Pileateds and dozens of of other woodpecker eat a lot!! Not a single part of our deer doesn’t get used for something. There’s always the bait pile that feeds something. We just converted a vintage Calvinator frig into smoker to smoke our own sausage. But it does require a lot of additional time and effort some may not have.

Rib cage goes into chicken coop. They pick it clean.

Good post, thanks.

What do you do w/ the rib meat? I try to grind some rib meat, but it's tough to get much off the ribs.

I agree wholeheartedly with your stew meat.

I turn in the hides. A number of places around here love accepting deer hides, and most offer something in exchange.

The tail can be used for fly tying.

The carcass can make bobcat bait.

Some save urine for deer lure.

I've seen people use the tail to add to the rear end of their decoy to make it more life-like.

I donate the head b/c our state wants them for testing.

The Marshfield Clinic wants people in Wi to turn in wood ticks from their deer as part of an extensive study they are doing on ticks.

Tenderloins, backstraps, footballs, neck roast, heart. The rest is burger... The liver stays in the woods with the rest of the guts

Liver saved for weasel bait

We eat two a year, prefer it greatly over store bought beef.. I posted the other day on here about that.and how . we don’t buy meat.. and some guy had to let me know he could afford the butcher shop.. like I was a peasant.. lol

How much does the liver shrink up when you salt pieces for bait? do you freeze it then wait for warmer weather to let it turn to jerky?

Save the heart but leave liver on gut pile. Layers on the ribs get removed and trimmed down. Between the ribs is left on the carcass which I’ll toss in a tree for the birds to pick clean.

The last doe I shot weighed 119# field dressed and yielded 52# of meat. I break it down into the roasts/steaks, clean trim for jerky and more cordy or fatty trim for grinding/ sausage.


Dave

We grind everything except for the backstraps, loins and flank steaks. Neck gets trimmed for grinding as good as I can. We don't cut any bones any more.

Heart gets eaten by us, liver gets dehydrated for dog treats.

Hide gets turned into rawhide, eventually tanned.

Feet/legs below knees get skinned and tanned.

Some leg bones get turned into knife handles.

Leg sinew gets dried and saved.

The leg shanks (lower section, from the knee down , all four legs) will be tough with lots of chewy connective tissue if you treat like a regular muscle. But in the crock pot, low and slow, all that dissolves and it falls off the bone. Great stew meat, barbacoa, etc. It was my wife’s least favorite cut until we figured that out. Now it’s her favorite cut.

Basic cut no burger everything gets made into chislic just our preference probably never learned to prepare it right the cats get the scraps.

As far as burger goes, I do as little as that as possible. So much simpler to do roasts and steaks. I got a smoker and a crockpot and not afraid to use them. I only grind trim .