Gun of choice, bovine slaughter?

[slumlord44]

I never heard of so many different ways to do something so simple. I am 68 and still living on the family farm I was raised on. All we ever used to butcher hogs and cows was a Remington 512 and .22 shorts. Close as you could get. Aimed between the eyes and 1" up. Seemed to get the job done fine unless the animal moved or you were a realy bad shot.

 

[hrvatska1]

.22 short in the top of the brainplate.

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[mr.trooper]

This is not complicated. Virtually any firearm will work.

Just walk up to the darn thing with a feed pale and dump some feed on the ground. One the animal is distracted, step back a few feet and put virtually any bullet from virtually any kind of firearm behind its ear.

If the animal is particularly tame or acclimated to you, you wont even need the feed.

 

[leadchucker]

My granddaddy dispatched hogs with a big hammer. He would lure the hog to the slaughter area with some feed, walk calmly up to it and let him have it. He said it didn't immediately kill the animal, it just stunned it. Once the deed was done, he would quickly hang the animal up by its hind legs, cut its throat and let it bleed out. He said the animal would bleed out more thoroughly that way. Made for better meat.

Probably not a good idea to try this on a cow tho unless you have a really big hammer.

 

[Zeke/PA]

ok, when I worked in the slaughterhouse, when we had a big steer the killer (there's a job title, eh?) wouldn't use the bolt hammer. He kept an old Win. 62 on his station, and would drop them with a round to the forehead, right between the eyes. Don't know if it killed them or just stunned them, as we had them up and bled out in a couple minutes after that.

His method worked great, except for this one time....BIG 'ol steer, took 6 rounds to the forehead and then went down. That's when he stopped using .22 shorts and upgraded to .22 LR

VERY similar to what a friends of Dad's did.
Every once in awhile, the rifle was reloaded but NEVER wiped off or cleaned in ANY way.
Sadly, the "butcher" was struck one day by a "cow" that still had some reflex action.
Dad's Buddy was left blind in one eye with several other ailments due to the "hoof kick" that was not anticipated.

 

[scaatylobo]

T2F = spot on

You have the correct way already.

Just remember that you will not move it afterwards unless you have a tow truck or comealong and overhead beam strong enough.

Position it correctly and measure the shot as directed.

I have done a few [ horses,cows,pigs ] and a Veterinarian friend gave me the location,works very well.

I chose a 6 1/2" S&W .44 magnum,once I did use a snub .357 on a donkey.

All the same results,expect blood and I do contact shots - so wear a face shield as the bone fragments are painful.

 

[leprechaun50]

By now it has died of old age.

 

[Al Thompson]

I think every meat eater should kill and butcher an animal at least once.

Buddy of mine, several years back, asked me to show his kids what butchering a deer looked like. Next deer I killed, drove over to his place with the non-dressed deer and me and the kids disassembled it.

Obviously, I agree with the quoted post.

 

[biohazurd]

Where i was raised farmer/ranchers used a good variety of weapons some use Shotties some rifles and some handguns. The farms i worked on, was raised on it was common to use a .357 or .44 cal Close range to the head. Though lower caliber hanguns would probably suffice i have a serious obligation to humanely put down these animals so i have never used anything less then a 4" barrel .38 special to dispatch a large cow. Now some bulls were extremely aggresive and in that case high powered rifle to the from a safe distance.

 

[Bassleg]

I use a Marlin 94 357mag make an x from the ear to the eye, then bleed it out.

 

[skimbell]

A former student of mine came back to school a couple of years after he'd graduated. I of course asked him what he'd been doing and he started to tell me a story that actually made me laugh at him.
He'd gone to work at his uncle's butcher shop in a small rural town in a state to the south of Illinois. I asked him how he liked the work and he said it was OK but he "kinda got sick of the killing". I asked what the problem was since you could sort of figure on working with dead animals in a butcher shop, and sometimes you might have to make 'em that way. He recounted how he'd been trained, using a .22 to kill both pigs and cattle. "one for pigs, two for cows" had essentially been his training. Apparently he was a bit slow on the second shot for a cow that he was trying to dispatch and as a result the cow, after the first shot came after him, chased him through the stock doors and down the street. He escaped by ducking into a gas station and the cow kept going. His uncle and several of the locals spent the better part of that afternoon looking for the run away cow. They found it and the story ended well for the butcher as well as the customer.
My former student however was contemplating a career change.

 

[Kiln]

Buddy of mine, several years back, asked me to show his kids what butchering a deer looked like. Next deer I killed, drove over to his place with the non-dressed deer and me and the kids disassembled it.

Obviously, I agree with the quoted post.

I don't enjoy the process but it doesn't bother me a whole lot either. Every meat product you eat has to be killed and cut by somebody.

 

[Certaindeaf]

A former student of mine came back to school a couple of years after he'd graduated. I of course asked him what he'd been doing and he started to tell me a story that actually made me laugh at him.
He'd gone to work at his uncle's butcher shop in a small rural town in a state to the south of Illinois. I asked him how he liked the work and he said it was OK but he "kinda got sick of the killing". I asked what the problem was since you could sort of figure on working with dead animals in a butcher shop, and sometimes you might have to make 'em that way. He recounted how he'd been trained, using a .22 to kill both pigs and cattle. "one for pigs, two for cows" had essentially been his training. Apparently he was a bit slow on the second shot for a cow that he was trying to dispatch and as a result the cow, after the first shot came after him, chased him through the stock doors and down the street. He escaped by ducking into a gas station and the cow kept going. His uncle and several of the locals spent the better part of that afternoon looking for the run away cow. They found it and the story ended well for the butcher as well as the customer.
My former student however was contemplating a career change.

I wonder if they had the poor fellow using shorts just for a joke. never know. He should know, at least in the future.

 

[Hunter125]

My dad still has an 12" x 1" piece of solid steel he used to use to put down sick cattle on the farm he worked on growing up. I think it was a piece of some kind of drive shaft. He put a leather strap on it and kept it in his truck for a while for defensive use before he got his CCW permit.

 

[VTmtn.man]

Thanks all, I'm glad I got advice and planed this well. The process was done in about an hour and went very well. .410 slug above/between the eyes, throat cut all within 5-10 sec. Sharp knife, x2 pieces of twine and a sawsall made for a vey uneventful processing. I guess the next time it won't seem like that big of a deal. I am saving the hide & have it spread out in an out building on rough plank floor boards and liberally covered with Morton's table salt 15 lbs worth. I plan on scraping then salting again. Any FYI advice on details would be great! We could open this up in a non guns related post...

Interestingly, my GSD isn't at all interested in the fresh beef, liver etc. she's only had stuff that has cured is this unusual? and do you think that once it has hanged for a wk or so she will be more interested in it?

 

[Flopsweat]

Gun related cow video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwBFkT_KZr8

 

[Garmangabis]

You are overthinking it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNOQQpzGgv0