It all varies from person to person. I have spent hundreds of dollars fishing and caught maybe $5 worth of fish over the years. A guy I used to work with goes fishing at Yellow Rock most mornings. It is the most dangerous fishing spot in Sydney. He catches decent amounts of fish but he and his wife eat very little of it (they are Chinese, if that explains anything). What is really cool is that the block of flats he lives in is mostly elderly couples and he keeps them supplied with a constant supply of fresh fish.
Maybe not cost effective but certainly karma effective.
I suspect the OP is talking about an entirely different group from “hunters”, so the economics are a lot different.
Where I grew up, about a fourth of the locals had pickup trucks, and of that probably a majority had rifles in the back window. We were surrounded by woods, and deer would walk around in your backyard (as would rabbits and other animals.)
Most likely a lot of guns were inherited, or at least used for decades. Any “drive” to hunting area was probably just enough to get to somewhere a bit away from town. And very likely a lot of people didn’t necessarily buy proper permits and whatnot.
I don’t think they were just hunting deer, and in fact, they probably had a gun rack in their pickup because they needed a deer rifle and a game rifle. Or at least, as related to me by my 8th grade algebra teacher, shooting a rabbit with a deer rifle doesn’t leave any rabbit worth picking up (I never hunted, so this is potentially apocryphal, like the story our 5th grade teacher told us about the giant zit that he was able to pick so deep his whole finger went in there…) Certainly, it was generally easier to find rabbit pellets in the woods by my house than deer.
I would have to imagine that it was more economical for them to hunt than to buy meat at the grocery market. I didn’t get the impression ever that they were just out there hunting for sport (though of course we were all macho mountain men, so who knows.)
In the same way I THINK about playing par golf. Unfortunately, the skill set I bring to the problem in both cases is inadequate to the task of actually making it happen. I’m happy to get one and call it a day. It’s rare that I’d get a second deer. If I did, sure, more donation for the cause. And I’d love to do it.
I don’t hunt, but my mother’s family are all hunters, and my brother and father hunted. When my maternal grandfather died, the only rift in the family was who got his best hunting rifle, the eldest or youngest son. Bitter fight, that. Not that they both didn’t have guns that were very expensive, but that was their dad’s gun, and they both wanted it. My brother never bought meat - living in the PNW he bow-hunter to keep his freezer full. When my dad died, my brother took his guns, and he had guns and bows of his own. My point being, that guns that are well-kept last a long time and the pro-rated expense is negligable. Now my mother’s eldest brother bought property up North (in Michigan, where they live) and built a family hunting compound on it with a very large cabin. Enough to sleep probably 30 people. That makes hunting expensive. Around here, and in Michigan, you didn’t have to travel far (just outside of town) to get your deer.
I figure it can be as expensive or inexpensive as you want it to be. And from the results I’ve seen, the take doesn’t care how much you’ve spent.
I’ve never been hunting; always wanted to go. It wasn’t anything my father wanted to teach me (I Swear he channeled Atticus Finch at times).
I know NJ has almost no hunting at all (nothing you could cook anyway). I’ve seen hunters stalking deer just over the Water-Gap in PA though. I’m not sure what’s allowed (rifle? shotgun?), what licenses cost, or if ‘CWD’ has infected those herds though. Still, its got to be more humane than being slammed into, dragged, and smashed into ground meat by an 18-wheeler along 100 feet of black-top.
We have beef cattle that are butchered and processed at a local place. We certainly do get our own cattle back, and we’d be able to tell the difference, since our cattle are raised differently than most around here (wholly grassfed, for one example) in ways that make a difference in taste. My husband got a bit of meat once from a steer that had been hit on the road and died slowly, with a lot of adrenalin in his blood, and the meat tasted AWFUL. If you know what you’re looking (tasting?) for, you can definitely tell if you’ve gotten your own meat.
I imagine it would be much the same with venison. As discussed here, the speed and skill with which a deer is dressed makes a marked difference in the taste of the meat. An experienced hunter would know if s/he got back venison that was from a deer not dressed expertly.
I’m sure it happens, but at a good processor, it wouldn’t happen often.
I worked my way through high school and college first as a camp cook and then as a guide. I continued to return during hunting season for almost a decade after I graduated (usually as a guide).
The pay was very good, tips were excellent and I always left weighted down with venison or whatever we happened to be hunting.
It paid for a couple of semesters of college and helped pay for a couple of cars I bought.
So has hunting been good to me? Yeah, for a poor rural kid from the high country of Colorado, most definitely.
Yes, most hunters I knew of in Michigan had to take time off from regular jobs for hunting and weren’t people who hunted solely for sport or hunted ‘big game’. I’ve never personally met anyone who hunted elk or bear, etc. My brother, for example, hunts so that they can have a decent Christmas; less money for groceries, more for the kids’ gifts. He enjoys the hunting, no doubt, but it’s important to him and his pals for economic reasons as well.
Kinda reminds me of a roommate I had a few years back. He was a contractor and one of his clients ran short of money and paid him with some elk or moose sausage or something. He in turn, gave some to me to make up his being short on rent that month. What’s the relative value of that meat? I dunno, but it worked out well enough in the end. I’d never have come into elk or moose sausage any other way.
The amount of hassle and paperwork involved in getting an air-rifle in Australia is exactly the same as that required to get a .22 or a shotgun… as a result, about the only people with air-rifles in Australia are Olympic/Commonwealth Games target shooters.
In Wisconsin the hunters can donate the deer shot, and the processing is paid for by the liciense fees. The pantries get free meat for those that can’t afford enough food. The cost of an activity you do has nothing to do with if you want to participate. The I can buy meat cheaper in the store is used by someone like me, that hates deer meat. You can’t buy deer meat in the store, so you need to shoot it or get it from someone that does. My one brother will normaly hunt all the seaons like bow hunting, gun hunting, anterless deer, and earn a buck seasons. He’s donated maybe 10 deer a year. Those last hunting seasons are attempts by the DNR to reduce the herds. We live near the fringe of the ever change CWD zones, where the DNR is trying to control it’s spread. They actually thought they could eliminate it, and this fall admitted they failed and it won’t likely happen.
I want to add that not all hunters spend shit loads of money to go to a camp, travel, and party. Some walk out the door, walk into their woods, and shoot a deer. They process it at home too. The cost is a residents liciense, a couple bullets, and some paper to wrap the meat in, so even the poor can afford it, if they have the gear, which is a weapon and orange clothing, which can be a cheep orange disposable plastic rain coat. Many have there dads rifles that have been passed down, father to son.
The processors that mix the meat, get known in the surrounding counties and avoided. They are the ones that seem to come up way short on the amount of processed meat when done also. A few pounds from a dear in somebody else’s freezer you know.
I’ve certainly not saved any money by hunting for meat. 7 or so years of hunting, and I’ve gotten 2 deer. The first, a 4 point buck, 120# dressed. The most recent, a 48# dressed doe. (she is MIGHTY Tastey! :D)
Not cheap by the pound, but the enjoyment I get from the walk to my stand site, and watching the woods come awake in the morning, or shut down at night is priceless. It’s also time away from the cares of work, crying daughter, and talking wife, that keeps me sane! I can’t imagine how much the therapy would cost from a “licensed professional” vs the relatively low cost of my hunting each year.
Though I’ve purchased a few firearms, and an inexpensive bow (about $200 for the bow, and another $200 in accessories over the 5 years I’ve owned it), both of the deer I’ve taken have been with “hand me down” firearms (one shotgun, one .30-30 bolt action) from the Father-in-law.
