I've never understood letting meat hang for so long. I always gut asap, hang to bleedout, and get into my cooler asap. It might hang in there for 2 days MAX before I skin and quarter, and right after that it's packaged and goes into the freezer. I always wonder why people complain that they don't like venison "because it is gamey". Anytime I hear that, it is usually the result of mishandling meat. IMO, hanging for 7+ days is mishandling of meat. Bring on the haters.

To each his own but I wouldnt go as far to say its mishandling the meat. I age mine to my satifaction and if its going to be table fare for my family I am definitely not going to mishandle the meat. I have taken lots of animals and pretty much treated them all the same as I mentioned early in this post and have yet to regret the way I took care of any. Mishandling in my opinion would be someone leaving the guts in while they parade a deer around in the bed of there truck to show everyone on a 90 degree day, then skin down enough to get the straps out and throw the rest away..........thats mishandling!

This makes no sense.

Your face makes no sense

Look, I'll concede the fact that it comes down to personal taste and preference. I've known hunters who have left meat to hang too long, or in a cooler too long, or in the fridge too long, and it ended up rancid and had to be thrown out. If you have a method of hanging it for 2 weeks and it turns out awesome then good for you. In my experience, it has never come out good from sitting or hanging a long time.

Not sure why cbump said it makes no sense, however, isn't beef aged by hanging in a cooler for something like 30 days? Doesn't hanging allow some process to take place that breaks down certain fibers and makes the meat better to eat?

Hmmm,

Beef Aging

Yes, that is why you hang meat. That is why I said it makes no sense, referring to him saying that is why people say it tastes gamey.

LMAO

It would appear that everyone feels strongly about how they let their meat bleed out, age or whatever you want to call it before they process and package their venison for freezing.If you have been in enough deer camps I am sure you will have witnessed many different ways peolple take care of their meat(or not) from the time it is shot till the time it goes through the gate leaving the lease on its way to a processor or taken home to be processed by the hunter.I am sure we would all be surprised at just how long the meat could age without going bad as long as the meat had been handled correctly after the deer had been shot.Since I cut meat and managed meat markets for major grocery chains for over 25 years I believe that letting meat sit in a ice chest or refridgerator or hang in a cooler for 7-8 days would be fine as long as the temperature was close to 32 degrees.I cut up some hindquarters today that had been in the fridge for 4 days and they looked like they did when I put them in there.The way I look at it is, if you like the taste of your deer meat with your method of bleeding or aging the meat then keep doing it.If it works ---don`t fix it. Most of the MISHANDELING of meat I have witnessed happens long before the meat arrives at the processors or at someones home.

I think the taste of a deer is a direct correlation to the area they are taken from. Its the diet. I hunt in an area that is heavy in agriculture. The deer eat a ton of wheat, grain, and cotton. They are fat and don't feed alot on natural forage. Everyone who takes a deer off of my place always comment how great the venison off our place tastes.

I made a mistake a shot a deer in Ozona. I processed that deer the same way I do back home. It smelled strong and tasted pretty wild.

Yeah, that's true. Taste and smell. I hunted my family's land near Art (Mason County) for years and those deer always smelled aweful. Just gutting them would gag a maggot. However, the deer on our place in Junction never had any kind of odor. The deer at Art were always more tender. Odd considering both properties aren't all that far apart.

I assume all of you process your own deer when doing this? I always have taken to processor after gutting. Is this something y'all do before taking to processor?

If you quarter it yourself it is usually cheaper then taking a whole deer to the processor. I know TCH from the forum had his deer quartered and in an ice chest (soak and drain method) for 5 days and then took it to Kubys to have it processed.

We process our own. I'll shoot a deer and immediately cut the throat to bleed. Then I'll hang by the hind legs and skin. After I skin, I gut and quarter. After quarterin we let it hang outside for 6-12 hours to cool and dry. Then we put in the vault to hang for 3-5 days.

I think if possible you should avoid field dressing a deer or gutting it with the skin on. I dont like blood or hair going inside the cavity. It ruins the ribs. This may not be an option for alot of people, but we have a processing center on location where we hunt.

Another mistake people make in my opinion is hanging deer by the head or antlers. Most of your meat is in the hams. If you hand by the head blood will collect in the hams.

Yes. Some processors charge less if the deer has been skinned, and still less if it has been quartered. So, it saves processing fees, too.

3-4 days in cooler no problem. plenty of ice and drained often. When I was a kid we had a big cooler to hang them in. The old guys would hang every deer for a week before skinning, quartering and proccessing. They swore it got rid of the gamey taste.

i killed mine sunday morning about 8am temp approx 70-73degrees he hung gutted and covered till monday morning skinned 1/4 by noon monday and minus the lumbars and inside tenderloins the shoulders and rumps are still on ice goin to get processed tomorrow been doing that for as long as ive hunted. As long as its gutted reasonably soon and covered from flys my grandfather-n- law a old veternarian whom are also are state meat inspectors, lets it hang a day or two which is a big long for me but hes 80 and has hunted all over the world and knows way more than me so to each there own. Xarean are you gut shooting those deer that stink? haha im just kidding uh saying deer meat taste gamey is like saying fish taste fishy. gamey isnt rotten TWO totally different taste i promise plus the meat will smell horrible while cooking. ever wonder what a uncastrated beef feed corn and foraging on acorns and such would taste like i bet it woud be gamey do you!

Lets see, shot just before 6pm this past Sunday, guted 6pm, skinned, cut out backstrap and tenderloin then quartered and put on ice around 7:30, backstrap eaten around 8pm the next day. Mmmmmm

You could alway cut a small hole in the garbage bag. That way the blood drains out with the ice water.