I want to hunt for meat.

[sKunkT]

Poaching is stealing. Stealing from landowners and honest hunters. If you can afford the internet, you can afford to not steal your food.

 

[1stmarine]

Poaching is illegal. I hope they get much tougher on those laws. Traditional hunters are loosing this wonderful privilege due to the wrongdoings of a few goons. Personally I will report anyone doing anything is not legal. The ethics is a different story, some have none.

 

[ridgerunner1965]

im with virg and in a simliar situation.we are landowners and can get 6 deer between me, my son and my dad.my sons mom dont want no deer meat, he does take sum and cooks it himself.my mom wont cook it either so i get the most of it and i love it.if yu bow hunt yu can get a few more.for less than 50 buks we get all the deer we can eat.

 

[Davek1977]

That's still $4 a pound, or only a little over half the current cost of ground beef.

???? Where on earth are you living where ground beef runs $8 a lb? Thats more akin to steak prices than ground beef, which is typically closer to three bucks a lb, making your "cheaper" meat hunted meat still more expensive than buying burger from the store. I'm not trying to discourage you, but its best to have realistic expectations.

 

[MCgunner]

Marlin....get a .22 and start small game hunting. Might get a shotgun, instead, but sounds like you already have the .22 by your handle. I grew up shooting squirrels and mom making squirrel dumplin's. I learned a lot about hunting, stalking, marksmanship, at an early age. I took an occasional rabbit, too, and without a dog. You will get hooked on the experience, then you'll wanna go afield, regardless, and you'll understand that bumper sticker.."worst day hunting is better than the best day working".

Besides, weather you make meat or not, theres the 'experiance', riflemanship, the exercise, th eadventure, and all the other things that go into hunting.

Hunting is a wide encompassing labor that is very rewarding, despite the costs, and NOTHING good is free.
Have at it!

Now, see, that's what I'm hitting on. Now, I toss the hides off in the trash, but if you want 'em, I could ship 'em. I'm afraid the dry ice wouldn't last that long, though. LOL Probably take 2 months for UPS to get it up there.

 

[tahunua001]

now these are just the prices at my local region but
hunting tag $10-35 for resident tags
rifle $400-600
ammo $10-20
gas/diesel $4.00+ a gallon we'll say about $60 round trip
for the cost of initial outfitting it is not worth it to start hunting to try and save money by hunting. if you already have the rifles and ammo and you have a truck/SUV that gets semi decent gas mileage and you do all the butchering yourself then it does cut costs by quite a bit. however game has a lot less fat content than domestic meat so it requires different preparation methods from what you would use for beef.

 

[newfalguy101]

The only critter I hunt for meat is deer, because its the only critter I hunt that provides enough meat to off set the costs involved.

I do my own processing, saving me a minumum of $75 ( this seems to be what a basic cut and wrap runs around here ).

Now, keep in mind, I ONLY have steaks and burger, no frills. If I want jerky, or sausage, I will have to make it.

I do enjoy hunting bunny and squirrel, but, frankly, its more for enjoyment than sustinence as there just isnt a whole bunch of meat there. I DO eat what I kill, but, the time spent is for enjoyment, NOT trying to put meat on the table.

If you bone out a deer, figure about 25-30% of live weight in cut/wrapped meat.

My approach, doing my own processing, saves us BUNCHES on our food budget.

Oh, and the sooner I fill my tag, the less cost/pound the meat is!!

Cost:

$30 - tag
$20 - gas
$00 - processing

I do NOT include costs for gun and ammo as I am a shooter and handloader, so those are already in my possession and would be whether I hunted or not