Oct 16 - Field Dressing and Skinning

Oct  16 - Field Dressing and Skinning 

Tools of the Trade!

After my last posting about my deer hunt I was asked to post a blog detailing the skinning process from start to finish.

Now the smart way to do this would be to post pictures to allow my “visual learner” readers to follow along with the process.  Unfortunately, I never bothered to document the process with pictures so I’m going to have to ask you all to indulge me and follow along as best you can.  If I confuse you I apologize….send me an email at slieberman03@gmail.com and I’ll do my best to clear up any misunderstandings!

First….let’s talk about tools:

You need a knife, a sharpener, a hack saw and some way of hoisting the beast to make your work easier to perform.  (Actually the hoist is more of a luxury…you can easily do all this work on the ground….and I’ve done it that way before….but if you can hang your game you will find that this whole process works a lot easier.)

Ok…so let’s start out immediately after the shot has rung out, and your game has just been converted from a free creature of the wild to your own personal property.

The first thing you need to do,  as quickly as possible, is remove all of the internal organs of the animal.  This is essential to protect against meat spoilage, and helps to do two things:

1) Reduce the amount of acids that can effect the quality of the meat.

2) reduces to weight of the creature and makes it easier to drag out of the field.  (There is an additional benefit as well…the forest creatures will love the free meal of iron rich tripe you leave behind for them!)

So….how do we cut this thing open?  First turn the game on it’s back, or side, and spread the hind legs as far apart as possible.  Now using your ultra sharp hunting knife insert the blade around the anus and cut a circular incision around the entire sphincter.

Now isn’t this fun?

Next find the sternum.  With a light sweeping motion of the freshly sharpened blade, create an incision from the sternum down to the anus.  Be careful not to cut too deeply…you want to gently split the skin keeping the internals intact.  I have seen hunters use a gut hook to literally “unzipper” the skin….I’m not a big fan of this as too often the gut hook nicks an intestine and the resulting bile creates a mess.

Once the organs are exposed it’s time to get dirty.  Grab hold of them and pull them out! If the incision you made around the anus was deep enough and through the colon should come out as well.

If you did this right you should now have a steaming pile of gray on the ground next to you.  You should also have exposed the diaphragm still inside the beast holding back the heart, and lungs.  If you shot the animal correctly there is a good chance that they have been liquefied, and your next step is potentially very messy.

Using your knife cut out the diaphragm, now CAREFULLY reach inside with your left hand (assuming you are right handed) and feel around for a hard tube near the inside of the throat.  This is the windpipe and the esophagus.   Now with your right hand take your knife and reach up and cut that pipe.  This is kinda hard since you will not be able to see what you are doing…just be careful not to hurt yourself.

Now that the pipe has been cut put your knife to the side and scoop out the internals.  The animal is now field dressed….the next step is either to drag it out of the field or  to skin it right there.  We will assume that your going to get it out of the field and will be doing the skinning job at home.

Ok…so now your home and you’ve dragged your deer into the back yard or your garage.  You could do the skinning process in your front yard but for obvious reasons I don’t recommend it.

If you have the ability to hoist the animal that will help tremendously. 

Cut an incision in each hind leg right below the knee joint between the bone and the Achilles tendon. The cut should pass completely through the leg and allow a hoist or hook to go through it.  Now, using a rope and some buddies, lift the game up and tie it off so that the game is hanging upside down with the butt about shoulder level with you.

Now….using a newly sharpened knife make a slight cut just below the hooks all the way around the knee.  (Do this on both knees).  You should not see any blood….what you should see is the bright white of the dermal layer.  Next cut an incision up the leg towards where the anus used to be.  (Again….do this on both legs.) 

With that complete, pull the fur on the leg towards you and sweep the knife lightly under the incision points.  The skin should immediately “pull” from the body.  Start at the highest point and work down.  So…you start at the original incisions near the hooks and slowly work towards the butt.  Once you’ve arrived at the butt you can now start pulling the skin down over the back of the animal. 

Do this work slowly!  The inside of the skin should be white.  If you see red chunks of meat hanging onto the skin you are going to fast and need to slow down.  (If you want to keep the hide you will need to go back once it is off and remove all of that meat).

When you have the skin down past the stomach grab a hacksaw.  This is now the time to saw the pelvic bone in half.  Again start at the anus and work down.  Once the bone is split, the entire animal should open up even more.

Ok..back to skinning.  Continue pulling the skin down the body.  By now the skin should be hanging down over the head.  You will need to work around the shoulders and find a point on the front legs to make a similar “ring” cut as you did on the hind legs.  This allows you to slip the skin off around the shoulders and begin peeling it away from the neck.

Once you have the skin down around the top of the neck it’s time to grab the hack saw again. 

Time to saw the head off! 

This is usually surprisingly more difficult than you would think.  Just stay with it, the saw will eventually cut through and the neck.   Once this is complete the head and the skin (now called the “cape”) will fall to the ground.

Now is when I usually take a hose to the carcass and remove any dirt or hair that was accidentally left on it. 

This is also the time I remove the non-edible parts of the legs…(the parts where we did not bother to skin). 

Ok….so now we have a huge carcass hanging on a couple of hooks looking like something you would see in a butcher shop.

Grab a couple of large bins to hold the meat, and let’s do some initial butchery!

Take your knife (sharpen it again) and start cutting away along the shoulder.  The joint for the shoulder should come out easily.  Place both shoulders in the bin. 

Next, reach inside the carcass and remove the tenderloins that run along the inside of the spine.  Once those are out remove the meat that runs along the back on the outside.  These backstraps are the best!!!

Finally take off whatever neck meat you want, and lastly remove the hind legs.  (When you do this the stripped carcass will fall to the ground.)

And there you have it!  A fully stripped and processed game animal!