Deer Season is sacred around here and practically a National Holiday.   It's even considered an "excused" absence from school if you take off to go hunting!  All we'll see for the next two weeks is hunters in blaze orange all over the place!  Living up here in the "middle of nowhere" does have its advantages!  

This year, my brother (Johnny) managed to find some private land for him, Aaron and my dad to hunt on.  

Today is OPENING DAY!   At 8:20 this morning my mom called to tell me that they got one!   First time in about five years or so that they got a deer!   Aaron didn't shoot it, my brother did.  BUT, that's OK!  This was the first time Aaron had the experience of gutting a deer, etc.    They're still hunting, because they have plenty of tags to fill up!   WAHOO!!!!!!!!!!  Guess I'm going to have to find some good venison recipes to make in the Dutch Oven!  

Aaron took a picture of the deer with his camera phone and sent it to me, so of course, I have to share!  

http://i76.photobucket.com/albums/j26/gjmiklas/Mik%20Family%20Pics/AaronDeer11-17-07.jpg


Doing the Happy Dance!  

http://bestsmileys.com/dancing/7.gif   http://bestsmileys.com/dancing/7.gif   http://bestsmileys.com/dancing/7.gif

Julie

Julie
Is it a white tail deer?
In Australia we have no native deer. All wild deer here are feral. There are more wild deer now than I have ever seen.  Deer farms became fashionable and they popped up every where when the bum fell out of the market and drought a lot of farmers let them go wild. Venison is a very enjoyable meal if handled correctly. I find it hard to cook properly. I have seen some  atrocious attempts over the years. Enjoy yours.

Muzz

Cactus wrote on Nov 18^th, 2007 at 5:36am:

Julie Is it a white tail deer? In Australia we have no native deer. All wild deer here are feral. There are more wild deer now than I have ever seen.  Deer farms became fashionable and they popped up every where when the bum fell out of the market and drought a lot of farmers let them go wild. Venison is a very enjoyable meal if handled correctly. I find it hard to cook properly. I have seen some  atrocious attempts over the years. Enjoy yours. Muzz

Muzz

Take one whole rump of venison.  Make a pocket in it with a sharp knife and stuff with fresh oysters (as many as you can get in).  Skewer shut.  Wrap in streaky bacon rashers.  Bake in a preheated camp oven until medium rare.

Make a light gravy with the juices left in the pan.

Serve with a medley of vegies.  ;)


Derek

One thing you have to do with red meat is hang it to age it.  You have to have cool temperatures to do that or take it to a meat cutter for them to hang in their cooler.  This is very important for tenderness and taste.

I've asked Julie to save a steak for me and weather she thinks the 3 days it will take for me to drive out there will be enough to age the meat properly!!!!

8-)

Muzz, yes, it is a white tail deer.   There are so many of them here that they NEED the hunters to thin the herd.  In 2006, hunters harvested almost 350,000 deer during the nine day gun season!   Holy Crap!    

LK -- they're leaving the deer to hang until Thanksgiving (Thursday) because Abby wants to watch them butcher it.  It's cold enough out that it can hang in my brother's garage until then without a problem.  In other words . . . COME ON DOWN!  

Julie

Mrs._Mik wrote on Nov 18^th, 2007 at 10:01am:

Muzz, yes, it is a white tail deer.   There are so many of them here that they NEED the hunters to thin the herd.  In 2006, hunters harvested almost 350,000 deer during the nine day gun season!   Holy Crap!     LK -- they're leaving the deer to hang until Thanksgiving (Thursday) because Abby wants to watch them butcher it.  It's cold enough out that it can hang in my brother's garage until then without a problem.  In other words . . . COME ON DOWN!   Julie

Julie

The 350,000 in the season.  Where was that?  Just your area or across the whole State?

I had some venison pies once that were pretty good.


Derek

Derek, that was in the entire state of Wisconsin.   I haven't searched to see if they break it down by county.   I should probably look for that . . . but I can tell you that we have a LOT of deer here in the county we live in, which is the biggest county in the state.  Not the most populated, but the largest per square mile.

Julie

Wow so right across the US it would be huge.  Must be an awful lot of them then.


Derek

Hey Julie
That's a incredible number of deer. Your brother, first deer in five years. Does the state operate on a ballot system? You said they had plenty of tags allocated, how many deer can you take in one season. I would love to get over there and have a go, must be really some thing to see.

Muzz

Muzz, it all depends on where you're hunting.  In this area the hunters are given two tags, one for a buck and one for a doe, so you can shoot either.  In some areas, there's an incredible amount of deer so they really need to thin the herd.  In those areas, they get a tag for a doe and have an "earn a buck" program.  That means you HAVE to shoot the doe first, and basically EARN your tag for the buck.  

I've never heard of anyone being turned away from getting the initial tags.  The only reason they hadn't gotten one in five years was because they didn't have very good places to hunt.  They were hunting on public hunting grounds, where there are a lot of hunters, so it's more difficult to get a deer.   This time, they were on private lands, so there's more deer and no one else traipsing through the woods scaring the deer away.  

We've seen LOTS of cars/trucks heading home with quite a few deer.  Some years, we see more folks hauling Christmas trees home than deer, but this year looks to be a good hunt.

Julie

Up where I am the big game aren't quite that common.  There is a moose lottery each year.  Some succeed in getting a moose license almost every year.  Or if they don't they have family.

I ha-)ve a neighbor who is in his 50s. One year in his life (probably hunting since age 16), he got a moose in his first 15 minutes of the season.  Fortunately, his oldest son had a license that year too.

Imagine your hunting season ending  after just 15 minutes.

8-)