Customer Reviews

Making the Most of Your Deer

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I'm a reasonably successful deer hunter and we eat a lot of venison at our house, but I have always paid to have the deer butchered. From now on, I'll be doing it myself the easy way Walrod describes...and that will save me about $50. I've also learned things about aging meat for tenderness, making sausage, and there is some really interesting information about how to improve the flavor of venison. Also how to tan the hide myself, taxidermy, mounting antlers, and antler-craft. Even how to make soap (yes, soap, not soup) from the fat on a deer. This is a good book for any deer hunter.

This book looked thorough, and there are lots of 5-star reviews so I bought it, hoping to learn at least how to field dress a deer, and about how the animal can be used.

It is informative and interesting. Walrod writes well. But, after reading it (and the field dressing chapter several times), I still don't feel that I know how to gut a deer. It lacks the necessary descriptiveness or detail that I was looking for. For example, "...insert the knife at least four inches..." WHERE? In the anus? Four inches from the anus? Two inches? How doesn't that butcher the colon? I was left with as many questions as I had to begin with. The pictures didn't help. They're black & white and not very clear. Not enough either.

It's not without redemption though. I learned about the different cuts of meat, uses for them, etc. That was informative. (There are lots of recipies - but you can just search the internet for recipies.)

Can't help feeling a little let down by this book.

My family hunts. We rarely purchase red meat at the store. We hunt and that is how we feed our family throughout the year. I always felt bad when the hide was thrown away after cleaning and skinning because it was so beautiful. But it cost so much to have it tanned. This book has great ideas and instructions to get it done. Unfortunately I didn't get the book until after hunting season. But I am looking forward to using what I learned from the book next hunting season. Especially the soap and tanning the hide. There is information in the book that if you have any hunting experience, will be old information but there is a lot of good useful information in the book and worth the cost.

Clear, cold--more than a little frosty, a good morning to hunt, and it just got better. A nice eight point cautiously makes his way along the edge of the woods. All the fatigue from the long hours of waiting washes away in a rush of adrenalin. I raise my rifle for the killing shot. I squeeze the trigger and the buck crumples. Silence fills the air. The hunt is over, but the hunting experience has just begun.

You got up a 4AM, had your wife call in sick for you, braved the cold, spent hours lying in wait, saw a twelve point while taking a leak, missed an easy shot, but finally you bagged that whitetail. Now what? Now is when you wish you had picked up Making the Most of Your Deer written by Dennis Walrod and published by Stackpole books.

Dennis is an experienced deer hunter who has written for a number of outdoor magazines, including Field and Stream, Outdoor Life, and Gray's Sporting Journal. In these tough economic times, you want to get the most bang for your buck, and this book will show you how.

Dennis starts with the basics of field dressing and getting your deer out of the woods. First, make sure the deer is dead. There's more than one hunting story about a "dead" deer springing to life on an unsuspecting hunter. If you approach a deer, and the eyes are closed, that is almost a sure sign that the deer is still alive. Shoot again aiming for the heart or the base of the neck, then unload your gun and get that deer tagged.

Field dressing can appear very complicated to a beginner, but there is more margin of error than many veteran hunters will lead you to believe, and it's really no more difficult than changing a tire, and even a botched field dressing job will leave the venison in better condition than if the deer was left unattended. You want the carcass to cool as quickly as possible. Dennis covers four basic methods from the involved "ream-and-tie" to the "quick and dirty", usually performed when the sun is going down, and you are still a long way from the road.

Yep, you have to get the deer back to camp, and there are several methods. The most conventional is to grab it by the antlers and start walking. Sounds easy, but it isn't, especially if it's doe season, and the way back is almost always uphill. You can bet on it, and don't pull the deer backwards; you'll just end up deeper in the woods. You did remember to bring rope?

You have the deer home, and you've decided to save some money and butcher the deer yourself, but it's a little intimidating. A commercial butcher has an array of cleavers, chopping blocks, and band saws. But venison butchering can be done with far fewer tools than butchering domestic animals. Often using the same five inch blade you used for field dressing and skinning. Native Americans were able to butcher a deer with no more than a sharpened rock. Do you really need an electric knife? Dennis goes on to cover why home butchering can be the better choice for you, what tools you will find the most useful, as well as aging meat for tenderness and preserving the meat.

The meat is my personal favorite part of the deer, and Dennis includes some great venison recipes as well as information on making sausage, and some useful information on how to improve the flavor of venison. He also goes on to cover a wide range of topics including salting and tanning hides, basic leathercraft, soapmaking, trophy mounting, and whitetail deer handicraft--such as fishing lures, and that deer leg lamp that uncle Earl has in his workshop.

The hunting experience doesn't have to end with the moment of the kill. Native Americans utilized the entire deer, from the meat for eating, to the tendons and intestines for bowstrings, and even the ribs were used to add rigidity to baskets. Such complete use may no longer be practical, but if modern hunters acknowledge the responsibility to use a deer to the fullest value, we increase not only the value of the deer, but of ourselves...

This book is written in an outdoorsy, folksy style and is enjoyable to read. The author thanks all the people he knows who posed for the pictures, the photographer, kind of like they all got together and made this book. That's great as far as I'm concerned; it is what this type of book is all about.

It has lots of good information and even though I've taken more deer than I can remember, there is a lot of information I took away from it. Some of the ways I do things will be changed and some are new.

Overall very enjoyable. Honestly, if you don't know anything about deer hunting or gutting a deer you may want to hang out with someone who does because you probably won't learn it from any book. But if you want to learn more about deer and using what they can provide, this is an excellent book.

the book is very detailed, reader friendly, and fun with plenty of useful info. very recomended

This is an excellent book! I bought it as a nice reference to the meat preperations and recipes (because I already do all that stuff myself). The second half of the book was new things for myself to learn about things to do with the deer remains. I will be making soap from the fat from now on, instead of leaving that stuff for the chickadees.
I've been wanting to take up taxidermy and thought this book might help. It goes into some detail (not as detailed as a taxidermy only book), but enough to make me more interested in taxidermy. You can't get into too much detail in only one chapter, but this book does tell enough of the process in one chapter. I'm going to buy some more detailed books on taxidermy, but this book really helped my interest in the subject.
Overall, I would highly recommend this to any, and all deer hunters. You may know how to field dress, butcher, etc, but you may not know everything else you can do. This is a must have, so buy it, you won't regret it.