THIS is why I don't support hunting, FUCKWAD.

The BBQ Pit
41

Christ, you’d think this thing was a person or something. Its a dead animal, most likely road kill. Get the fuck over it. I understand that there are some slob hunters out there, and I won’t try to defend them, but to get this worked up over a dead deer, when the only evidence of any wrong doing is the location of the body, seems to be a massive overreaction.

Also, its funny that Coyotes are mentioned as a victim of urban growth, when in fact they have benefited from it more than almost any other animal. The natural range of the coyote is the s.w. united states, and yet now they can be found in, I believe, all of the lower states. They are remarkably adaptable animals, and hardly are suffering in numbers.

LogicinMotion you couldn’t be more wrong about the vast majority of hunters. It is, in fact, illegal to hunt with full auto weapons, and to say most hunters are just waiting to shoot anything that moves makes you sound like you are reading from a PETA pamphlet, not living in reality.

42

Unfortunately, we have some trigger-happy types who don’t even pretend to be hunters. Last year, some asshole took a .22 and killed several reindeer that had been raised by a local family and that were used for sleigh rides, etc. He was caught eventually, I believe.

More recently this travesty occurred. The fuckwad who shot the animal hasn’t been caught, but there is a substantial reward out.

Luckily, this sort of incident is not common. There will always be idiots and psychopaths, but the vast majority of hunters here are responsible and law-abiding.

43

I cannot find an online cite*, but based on prior reading and my limited forensic pathology training, lime does not reliably dissolve corpses (Scylla and serial killer Dopers take note). In fact, there have been cases where bodies have actually been preserved for long periods thanks to a misguided coating of lime by the killer(s).

*plugging “lime dissolve corpse” into Google dredged up an incredibly weird set of links, including references to Halloween recipes, Catholic firefighters, paleo-Judaic research, the Black Dahlia case etc.

Sheesh.

44

I braved it, and took a look around. Hopefully the FBI won’t come knocking anytime soon. I found this…not the best, I admit.

cite

45

I’m not talking about burying a body in lime. I’m talking about composting it. A little lime in the compost heap helps things out. I dunno why it works, but it does. Probably, all the bacteria and whatnot need some mineral matter on top of all the organic matter, but I really don’t know.

My compost heap consists in large part of horse manure with a variety of household organic waste thrown in, some leaves, grass clippings and such, and it will easily liquify even large bones in a matter of months.

When I turn the heap (which usually consists on throwing the base back on top to form as high a vertical pyramid as possible when it starts to flatten out too much, I occasionaly encounter old bones and such. After a turning or two (I do it about every other month) it’s like they’ve been in a pressure cooker. They become soft and gelatinous and then they’re gone.

Y’all are looking for the wrong kinds of links. You need composting links.

http://www.compost-bin.com/food.shtml

This one’s interesting in that I seem to have stumbled upon the ultimate composting mix which is horse manure (and why I have a compost heap) I don’t grind up bones, but I have no problem with dissolving.

http://www.feedlotmagazine.com/issues/200303/p32.html

I know you need nitrates and carbon for good composting, maybe the lime helps with the nitrates?

I note that composting links tell you not to compost meat or bones. I’m getting the idea that this is because it stinks and attracts flies and vermin.

Well horse manure don’t exactly smell like petunias, and a buried animal in the compost heap never made anything worse.

I should also note that my compost heap is pretty large. A deer carcass’ volume is going to be fairly negligible, compared to total size.

The biggest problem with my compost heap is leaching. Around the heap (which is in a corner of the property) there is a zone of death where the nasty water from the heap has basically killed everything around it. Then there is a zone of explosive growth.

Nothing lives in the compost heap except microbes and at the very bottom where it is nearly become earth you may find some big fat, pale, sluggish worms.
Ahhh, here is that ultimate carcass composting site. Really more info than you want:

http://216.239.37.104/search?q=cache:72ePrq2C5JsJ:www.gov.mb.ca/conservation/regoperations/livestock/pdf/large-carcass-composting-fs.pdf+how+to+compost+bones&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

46

and anudder:

http://216.239.37.104/search?q=cache:NbJaAB-pRzwJ:www.ag.iastate.edu/farms/02reports/nw/Livestockcomposting.pdf+how+to+compost+bones&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

47

Pig composting with pictures!

http://www.dpi.qld.gov.au/environment/13767.html

Looks like about 3 months to do the bones in. I’m going to change my earlier statement about the lime. My compost pile is mostly horse manure and very moist. It seems the best carcass composting pile has straw or shavings in it. These suck away some moisture, so I think the lime helps my pile as a dessicant.

48

From the link

Hmmm…rich humus…almost like humus made with cream.

49

My “bad hunter” story:

Several years ago, I was horseback riding with my sister and cousin at a friend’s house, going through trails on a very large, private, wooded property which has plenty of “no hunting” signs about. It was also about 2 weeks after the end of hunting season in the area. We heard a shot off in the distance, and knew it had to be on this particular property. Since two of the three horses were chestnut, and therefore looked VERY much like deer through the trees, we rushed back to the house and barn as quickly as we could (although scary, that was one great gallop across a field!)

Our friend had heard the shot as well from inside the house, and seeing us come back so quickly was all it took for her to know that the shot had, in fact, come from her property. She called the local police, and they came and found the hunter’s car parked just off the road about a kilometer away. They waited until the hunters came back, and arrested them. I believe they plead guilty to the charges and paid some pretty hefty fines, but I don’t know for sure. The shot that we heard wasn’t actually aimed at us, thankfully, and we weren’t involved in the whole thing afterwards since I was only 14 and my sis and cousin are 2 years younger.

It was still a pretty scary situation to be in, though!

50

Assuming one was newly poor and had to buy all new items, a new single shot shotgun can be had for about $70, orange vest for $7. These aren’t revolving costs. A box of 5 slugs and a box of 25 shotshells costs about $10 and roughly $25 for licensing.

First year layout is a bit over $100. A 100 pound deer will yield roughly 50 pounds of meat. Average out the top cuts and the lesser cuts and call it all hamburger, which my store is selling for 2.98/lb. One deer already paid for itself and then some, not to mention small game such as rabbits, squirrels, birds and waterfowl, which in themselves can easily pay for themselves in one year.

Most of the hunting poor though, already own what they need and the annual cost is ammunition and a license. Yes, $35 dollars puts a lot of rice and beans on the table. It can also put a lot of meat on the table to supplement the rice and beans that most always have around. All the hunting poor I ever knew had dogs but they weren’t hunting dogs. Just your average family pet, so I’m not sure that the cost is a consideration. When I was a kid, it was a very rare day when we saw beef or chicken. Deer, bear, moose, duck, grouse, rabbit and caught fish was always on the table, along with our garden stuff. The money we saved on meat was better spent on other things. The poor who didn’t get a deer would call my dad or the local game warden who would put them on the needy list for roadkills and such.

Antlers and hides were always put to use as well. Buttons, keyrings, slipper moccasions, purses, wallets, toys, “chopper” mitten shells, blanket throws, etc. Some we’d keep, some my mom would sell at craft fairs during tourist season.

It may be a “hobby” for a lot of people, but not for a lot of others.

51

Don’t forget to add in the cost of butchering. Small game and birds practically go to the table by themselves, but I think it’s a very small minority of hunters who slice their own chops and grind their own chuck. And what about stuff like that nasty doe-in-heat scent, duck call thingies, the time and money that goes into putting up tree stands, etc? Not necessary to the hunt, but do most hunters still have them?

Not to sound Dickensian, but if the rice and beans are on the table, the meat is not necessary: it’s just tasty.

And if a family can afford to feed and care for a dog, they damn well should be able to feed themselves.

Oooh, the antler trinkets sound neat. Something I’d support a lot more then the dead-critter-bits-on-a-plaque that appeal to my stepfather’s decorating sensibilities. From the sound of it, your family falls in my minority (opposing my overwhelming majority) for whom hunting is more than a hobby. But I stand by what I said: for most North Americans, hunting is not a viable means of support. Today, when it is distribution of food, not availability of food, that determines whether people go hungry, feeding the poor is not the strongest pro-hunting argument there is.

52

And for an example of what hunting licenses cost a year, here’s the fees for Pennsylvania.

53

$75 to get a deer butched. My husband hunts and got a nice-sized deer last weekend. We now have about 60 pounds of venison in the freezer. He doesn’t use deer calls or “doe-in-heat” stuff or a tree stand. He does use a scope, but he does it the old-fashioned way, tramping through the woods, looking for tracks.

**

A matter of taste, maybe. I prefer meat to a steady diet of rice and beans. We have meat with the rice and beans.

**

The place we took the deer to be butched had a sign up that said something like “Hunters for the Hungry” and is a drop-off site for those who wish to donate their deer. It will be butchered and the meat distributed to needy families at no charge.

54

Change “butched” to “butchered” in the above post. :smack:

55

You rather butchered that post, didn’t you? Yes, yes you did.

Victory is mine!

56

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by BiblioCat *
**A matter of taste, maybe. I prefer meat to a steady diet of rice and beans. We have meat with the rice and beans.

Taste. Not necessity. We ain’t in frontier days anymore. Anyway, occasionally ground meat goes on sale for a $1.49 a pound. Catch that sale, and have a freezer full of meat for $89 and change.

Which is great, and I support that kind of initiative for several reasons. But a poor person may have trouble coming up with fees, equipment, and the cost of butching…butchering if necessary, and a better-off person could simply donate an equivalent amount of food. Hunting is not necessary as a means of support, and feeding the poor is not the strongest argument for hunting.

57

My turn to butcher a post, specifically the coding. The second paragraph there was written by me, not BiblioCat. The first and third are hers.

58

Which tag should you put on a butch deer?

59

Whichever the deer identifies with.

60

The vast majority of hunters that I know, myself included, butcher their own deer. It ain’t rocket science.

As far as the “fees” go, in my state a landowner and his resident children may hunt on their own land WITHOUT PURCHASING A LICENSE.

As for equipment, you would be hard-pressed to find a household of rural poor around here that didn’t at least have a shotgun and/or grandpa’s old thirty-thirty.