# Cutting their throats



## Bears Butt (Sep 12, 2007)

I'm curious about this one. I've been hunting for some 40 years of so, and it used to be we would always cut the throat of the deer we shot. About 20 years ago I read something in Fur/Fish and Game magazine about stopping that tradition. If my recollector recollects right, they said the deer bleeds out internally and to cut the throat is just a waste of time and ruins the look of the animal as well as the cape. I have not cut a throat since and all of my animals were bled out adequately.

I process most of my own animals and have not seen much (if any) residual blood in any of my animals, so not cutting the throat doesn't seem to hurt it at all.

Who among this forum still cut the throats of their deer?


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## lunkerhunter2 (Nov 3, 2007)

I do. I like it when they are still alive and can watch you do it! HA
Seriously, It is a habit and one i will probably never change.


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## GaryFish (Sep 7, 2007)

I quit doing it several years ago as well. My dad taught me to do it, and it never made much sense to me for the reasons you said. With the internals removed, the heart is no longer beating, so blood won't be moving through the circulatory system. Even when we did it, not much came out anyway - just what was in that immediate area.


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## hunter_orange13 (Oct 11, 2008)

Unless I shoot a monster that I plan on hanging on the walls, i'll keep on cutting their throats. I've never NOT cut their throat. One guy from our camp said it makes it easier to reach up and grab the windpipe when gutting it. As I said, i've never tried not doing it though.


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## Al Hansen (Sep 7, 2007)

I used to then stopped. Made them hard(er) to drag. Don't do it if your going to have it mounted. They need that cape.


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## hockey (Nov 7, 2007)

Cutting it's throat is like cutting out the scent glands WHY?


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## wyogoob (Sep 7, 2007)

That's an interesting question. 

I was taught to cut a big game animal's throat if it was still alive. It wouldn't make any sense to cut the throat if the animal was dead, it's heart not beating. So I will cut the throat of a big game animal only if it's heart is still beating and I don't want to save the cape. 

I really think antelope taste better if "bled" out. I also think animals dispatched with an arrow taste better than those that died from bullet trauma, like a deer shot in the heart, front shoulder or spine.

When we butchered hogs and cattle on the farm we shot them with a .22. A shot behind the ear "stunned" them. The wound was terminal, but their heart would beat for some time afterwards; long enough to allow me to cut their throat so they would bleed out. I was taught it was very important that a hog bleed out, especially if preserving hams and making sausage. 

Slaughterhouses use a pistol "bolt" in the brain or electric shock to first stun the animal and then they cut the throat while the heart is still working. Geeze, a grand mal seizure on a 1200-pound cow is, well, a significant event.


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## quakeycrazy (Sep 18, 2007)

Whatever floats your boat I guess. To me cutting the throat when it is dead already doesn't do very much without the heart beating. It's funny someone mentioned cutting off the scent glands as well, my buddy and his family still wil cut their throat and cut out the scent glands but I learned years ago that neither of these traditions really do much.


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## campfire (Sep 9, 2007)

Some thoughts:
First, I was also taught to do this from my youth "to drain the blood". then I grew up and learned a little more about anatomy and stopped believing this is necessary. (Why do you need to sever vessels in the neck when you are going to sever the largest vessels in the body (like the aorta and vena cava) when you clean the animal?)
Second. I have found that by cutting the throat from the outside it is easier to remove the esophagus and trachea (wind pipe) when cleaning. These will spoil faster than anything I know.
Third, cutting through the heavy hair in the throat (particularly on bucks and bulls) dulls your knife quicker than anything.

Practice: So when I am not going to cape the animal I still cut the throat to make it easier to remove the trachea and esophagus but I make it the last cut so as not to dull my knife for the rest of the job.


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## Truelife (Feb 6, 2009)

Lots of opinions here. As a taxidermist I would suggest never cutting the throat. But as a hunter I would say why is anyone still dragging a deer anywhere. Or even cleaning them for that matter. I guess I shouldn't say that because I drug my wife's deer this year, but that's because I could almost spit in the truckbed from where it died. If it's any distance at all I would much rather cape it, bone it out and put it on my back in the backpack. Your back is going to be tired and sore when you get done anyway, might as well not be fighting all the brush too.


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## ntrl_brn_rebel (Sep 7, 2007)

Truelife said:


> But as a hunter I would say why is anyone still dragging a deer anywhere. Or even cleaning them for that matter.


+1

Cutting the throat is IMO one of the most interesting "traditions" I have ever seen. Whatever floats your boat I guess, but again like has been stated before why when the heart is not even beating???????????

I personally do not like cutting a hundred dollar bill up (average price of a deer cape) but I hope the tradition continues because without it everyone would have a cape and mine would be worthless :mrgreen:


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## katorade (Sep 23, 2007)

ntrl_brn_rebel said:


> Truelife said:
> 
> 
> > But as a hunter I would say why is anyone still dragging a deer anywhere. Or even cleaning them for that matter.
> ...


+1 I didn't cut the throat on mine and well it didn't run away.


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## Mojo1 (Sep 8, 2007)

My family has never done it, no one I ever hunted with back south that I can recall did it. I tried it once, all I accomplished was get the neck meat dirty on the drag, never did it again, never will.

I've cut some hock scent glands off, maybe 50/50 on them, never could tell a difference on that either, same for cutting the nuts off.

The most important thing you can do to make your meat taste better is get the guts out and cool the meat as quick as possible.


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## TEX-O-BOB (Sep 12, 2007)

Cutting the throat is stupid. It makes NO sense at all. Looks terrible, serves no purpose, and ruins the cape.


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## Winchester (Nov 1, 2010)

I had an interesting experience this year watching a young man take care of the gutting of his deer. Keep in mind this was a deer he did NOT intend to have caped and mounted. He pulled out his knife and opened up the belly cavity, pulled out a bone saw and cut up through the chest cavity in about 10 seconds, reached up and cut the throat, grabbed the windpipe for a handle and pulled the whole mess out with one tug. Way clean and something I hadn't seen before.


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## campfire (Sep 9, 2007)

Winchester said:


> I had an interesting experience this year watching a young man take care of the gutting of his deer. Keep in mind this was a deer he did NOT intend to have caped and mounted. He pulled out his knife and opened up the belly cavity, pulled out a bone saw and cut up through the chest cavity in about 10 seconds, reached up and cut the throat, grabbed the windpipe for a handle and pulled the whole mess out with one tug. Way clean and something I hadn't seen before.


If you take that same bone saw and split the pelvis also it makes it even easier. You do not have to even ream the butt hole.You just cut the end of the gut off when it gets turned inside out.


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## wyogoob (Sep 7, 2007)

I'm making some salami and having ham for breakfast so I'm thinking about bleeding animals and how important it is to help prevent unwanted bacteria in salami and bone-souring in hams. On the farm we always stunned the animal and then cut it's throat to bleed it out.

Slaughter houses cut the throats of cattle and hogs. But what do they know.

The FDA requires bleeding out of hogs and cattle at slaughterhouses. But as we all know the government is "stupid".

From: http://www.libraryindex.com/pages/2173/ ... -PIGS.html

"Hog Slaughter
Hogs are generally killed via electrocution or by stunning followed by bleeding out. Electrocution is accomplished by stunning the hog with a wand with sufficient shock to stop its heart. This is called cardiac arrest stunning and is the technique most large hog slaughter plants use. Hogs can also be given an electrical shock to the head to render them unconscious. Next, the animals are hoisted up by their back feet and bled via a small incision in the chest. Fully electrocuted hogs are also bled out in this manner. The dead hogs are then lowered into vats of scalding water to remove hair. The meat can then be processed. (See Figure 4.14.)"

From: http://www.libraryindex.com/pages/2171/ ... ATTLE.html

"Cattle Slaughter
Cattle killed at federally inspected slaughterhouses are required by law to be killed humanely. In most plants the preferred method is use of a stun gun. Cattle are directed single-file through chutes that lead to the stunner. As each animal passes by, the stunner shoots a stun bolt into the animal's forehead to render it unconscious.

The animal is then hoisted up by one rear leg to hang from a bleed-rail. At that time, its throat is cut so that the blood can drain out. Federal law requires that no animal fall into the blood of other slaughtered animals. This is why bloodletting is performed while the animal is suspended in the air. Following bloodletting, the animal moves down the line to a number of processing stations where the tail and hocks are cut off, the belly is cut open, and the hide is removed."


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## proutdoors (Sep 24, 2007)

I never cut the throat, and I never gut the animal.


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## wyogoob (Sep 7, 2007)

I won't do it if I want to save the cape or if they are dead, heart not beating.

I still gut animals...dig through the innards with much delight. :lol:


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## woollybugger (Oct 13, 2007)

Always cut the throat. I was taught this early on. My grandfather was a butcher. He and my father would process animals in a small shop behind his house during the hunting seasons for extra money back in the day. Me and my 3 older brothers would work wrapping, grinding, and cleaning up mostly. But we learned a few things about the process from him too, including proper care of game meat in the field. I saw first hand the full spectrum of game well cared for and that which was not fit for feeding a coyote, and everything in between. 

If you do not cut the throat, then how do you remove the trachea? Getting the entrails out , blood cleaned off, and cold mountain air circulating through the carcass as quickly as you can makes a world of difference in meat quality. 

Another thing I see very often is leaving the hooves and lower legs on. Those come off first. Easy peasy, just a sharp knife in between the carpals/tarsals and whamo! just took 10 pounds off your deer. No use for them anyway. And, you can make a nifty handle behind each achilles tendon for carrying or hanging your deer.  

But, what would a career butcher know about proper care of meat, anyway?


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## proutdoors (Sep 24, 2007)

woollybugger said:


> If you do not cut the throat, then how do you remove the trachea? Getting the entrails out , blood cleaned off, and cold mountain air circulating through the carcass as quickly as you can makes a world of difference in meat quality.


The gutless method makes it so you don't have a need to remove the trachea, nor even touch the entrails. It also allows the meat to cool quickly, I contend far quicker than wasting time cutting the throat, removing the entrails, and worrying about the trachea. But what do I know, I have only helped haul out over 300+ deer/elk in the last 20 years.


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## Mojo1 (Sep 8, 2007)

wyogoob said:


> I still gut animals...dig through the innards with much delight. :lol:


Hear, hear, how else you gonna find out what they have been eating? 8)

Wait we are talking about Mulies here, don't really need to know that to shoot them.

The three whitetails from this year's hunting trip all had bellies full of over cup acorns and alfalfa, since there is only 4 of those trees on the property and one alfalfa field, that's some valuable knowledge right there when you are thinking about setting up bow stands. :mrgreen:

I still gut mine immediately after the kill, I wait till they are hanging to skin them, but back home I usually have them hung in less than an hour, usually less but then I'm usually not miles in the backcountry there.


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## dark_cloud (Oct 18, 2010)

I never cut the throat. Its a waste of time and a good cape. If you were to take a steak from an animal with its throat cut and one with out, you could not tell the difference. If the animal is still alive, it might help bleed it out, but after its dead, there is no circulation.

Try pro's way, its the best way, except you still need to gut it, the best part is inside..........."liver, its whats for diner"


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