THIS POST IS ABOUT RAW MEAT. BE WARNED. IT CONTAINS IMAGES.
Recently, a few hunters went hunting. Part of harvesting larger animals includes allowing the meat to hang so that the body heat can fully leave it. If you freeze the meat while it is still warm, it'll spoil and be ruined. Large walk-in coolers can work for this purpose, but, in cold weather, many hunters will just hang the meat outside while it cools. This is where a problem can come in.
HOW HIGH IS HIGH ENOUGH?
Again, be warned, as soon will see. The neighbor had a nice buck, with a good amount of meat on it. Since there was already a place to hang a deer near his house, he hung it there. But...
Unfortunately, it was not really high enough to keep it safe. As you can tell, almost half of the deer is now gone. Since the deer was hung so low, dogs were able to eat away at it. I'm not sure if any wild dogs or coyotes also partook of the feast, but some of the dogs from the nearby neighborhood certainly did.
The neck of the deer is basically gone, one of the front legs is completely missing and the other one might as well be. While the tenderloins, backstraps, and the hind quarters will still all be able to be used to feed his family, obviously there was still a good amount lost.
If you compare it to this deer, which I shot, you will notice a difference. Now trust me, I'm not trying to say, "Look how smart I am compared to the neighbor." That's not it at all. But, I do want to make sure that you understand the difference and why there is a difference. If any of us can learn from someone else's mistake, we might as well, right?
Hanging an animal to cool outside is just fine. Many have been doing it for thousands of years and we are still doing it today. With the proper weather, the harvested animal will cool just fine and the bugs won't be around to try to eat it while it cools. However, if animals are able to get to it, they will!
Even though I had hung my deer higher, I still decided to move it before I left it for the night. If you can see the bright green strap that it is hanging from, you'll also notice the pale yellow one that it is not hanging on. I wanted to move it further out from the tree truck, to help possums, raccoons, and other potential threats.
Although the deer that got raided by the canines still served a purpose, since it fed the dogs, and the rest can still be eaten by the family, I think that we can agree it is best to try to avoid situations like this. In the end, it is just a simple lesson in life, but, unless we are exposed to a situation like this, we may not consider it in time to avoid making the same mistakes ourselves. The 
As always, I'm 
and here's the proof:
proof-it-is-hanging-high-enough
Until next time…
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