looking for advice on deboning moose

[gone hunting]

We have plans for a moose hunt this fall. The plan was to take the boat down a lake, set up a base camp, get a moose or two, then pack into a valley, set up a spike camp and look for caribou, goats and sheep.

My 18 year old son and his buddy want to do do the spike camp for moose. Is it just me, or is a moose too big to put in a pack? OK, I can see we have to debone the thing, and I don't see a big problem there, but I have never done this before and can't imagine walking into my favourite butcher shop with a bag of meat , and saying I want steaks and roasts....

Is there anyone out there who has done this sort of thing, who can make the whole process seem clear to me? This area has some tank size moose, and I admire their youth and enthusiasm, I just want to know it's going to work.

[Brambles]

Deboning Moose is the same as deboning any animal of the deer family, just a lot bigger.

If you have't deboned a deer then its hard to describe where to make your exact cuts, you don't want to just start cutting roast size chunks off.

But here it goes....

With the animal on its side, guts still in, no point in gutting the animal when doing this method.

Cut the hide up the back from the tail to the base of the horns, the hide is thick there but a good longer knife will make quick work of it.

Then
-Take your first backstrap off and put it directly in a game bag, lay it in the coolest spot you have at your disposal.

Skin the hide down the sides of the animal and down the front shoulder, cut the leg off at the knee, find the joint and it'll come right off.
Separate the front shoulder and put it right into a game bag and then in the cool spot.

Skin the hide down off the hind quarter and separate it from the spine, find the joint in the hip socket and it will come right off, be careful not to hit the bladder when cutting to find the socket, and don't puncture the gutbag.

Then to get the tenderloin make a small incision and reach in between the gutbag and the spine and remove the tenderloin, get your buddie to hold the gutbag back a bit so you can see what your doing.

Take what ever meat is salvageable and edible.

Then its time to flip it over, each guy grab a leg and roll the moose over onto the side you just finished up on. Repeat the process you just did for the new side.

Cut the horns off, this is the only time you'll need a saw, you can take the whole head if you like but its just a lot of unecessary weight. If you don't have a saw, cut all the meat and hide off the skull and remove the lower jaw, tounge etc. Make sure you get the last vertibre at the base of the skull, it will make it easier to remove with a knife.

So now you've got all the meat off and a bunch of bone. The only thing left on the moose is the spine and the gutbag, the hide is still probably attached to the belly.

The front shoulders the trickiest. The shoulder blade is shaped like a T if you were to take a cross section of it, find the boney ridge that runs on the outside of the shoulder to the first joint, run your knife down both sides of it keeping tight to the bone, Then fillet the meat off the shoulder blade on the top side and the underside. If you be careful when you cut you will have one chunk of meat still all intact at the bottom by the knee joint, the top of this pile of meat will actually be in 3 pieces but its still joined at the bottom. If your real good you can make it so its still one piece but that sometimes is more trouble than its worth, kinda like peeling an orange and keeping the whole rind intact, not much point but looks cool.

The rear quarter is easy, only make one cut on the inside of the quarter, make the cut from the hip bone to the knee joint following the inside of the thighbone. When the cut is complete you start cutting and working the meat off the bone, you'll end up with a very large chunk of meat with one cut on it.

Trim up the rest of the meat and leave the junk for the birds, no point in carrying it if its not edible.

Spiking out for moose might be a little adventurous, mostly depending on how far from the main camp, especially for 2 guys and especially if they have never delt with a moose on the ground before, its an eye opener the first time.

My moose last year that my brother and I backpacked took us 3 trips each to get it back to camp, so if your spike camping you'll have to go back for another trip to pack camp back too.

One quarter will usually fill a packframe and be a good load if you going any sort of distance, if your only going a short distance you can maybe do a quarter and some backstraps or horns or tenderloins but that will be a real good load, even the tenderloins on a Moose are big.

[hunter1947]

There you have it ,good advice from Brambles someone that who knows what there talking about ,couldn't have said anything different myself.

[Gateholio]

Deboning is a good idea.

Shooting a moose close to base camp is a GREAT idea.

:razz:

[Mr. Dean]

Brambles nailed it.
If you want some visual aid, P/U a copy of Deer Proccessing 101, or another title; Quarter And De-boning Elk/Moose. Both are put out by Advantage Outdoors and I have seen them at various outdoors stores.

I have the deer dvd. Well worth the 20 bucks...

[gone hunting]

Hey BRAMBLES, thanks for all the time and detail. That's what I was looking for. I've dealt with my share of moose, but always within dragging distance of a truck, quad or boat. I use a good quality snatch block and rope. I've packed deer and goat but this moose packin' thing will be a first. Thanks again.

[guest]

Brambles has pretty much hit it on the head, it's a tough thing to master only doing it once or twice a year but doable by any body. Try to keep track of your separated cuts you take off the main bones. Use a good quality boning knife it helps a ton! Always slide along the bone edge or side and only insert the knife into the flesh as deep as .
Put into good quality game bags then set into plastic bags in your pack but be sure to take it out of the plastic asap.
Now about packing out a moose ....a de-boned moose for that matter!
The de-boned flesh is shifty in a pack and needs to be packed well, and tied tight to avoid movement. I have pack out big bulls off mountain basins far away from any road and it is no cakewalk. The first time I tried to carry too much weight in my back pack and after shuffling down a creek bed for a mile or two, I thought my head would blow up. Oh my GOD! My legs were ready to fall off or tremble a quake level of 5.4 !! After many close calls and out of control stumbles down the mountains a guy quickly learns it's more about making several trips with lighter loads to avoid punishment beyond belief. MOOSE ARE BIG ! Therefore the hardest to pack out, make-sure you understand the work involved. It is cool to bag a dominant bull in the back country surrounded by his harem. It will serve a memory long not forgotten and a lesson on Hard Work!
If your son bags a big one tell him to expect to pack out around 400 to 500
pounds of meat......then theres the rack.....
have fun!!
C/T

[Vansmasher]

A long fish fillet knife works awesome. After deboning 2 huge northern bc moose last september, I'll never go on a hunting trip without one again.
Probably already been mentioned, but keep your bags of meat organized if possible.... ie, hide's in one, fronts in another, burger in another and so on.
Good luck

[Vansmasher]

Great info, answers the questions I've had about the technique. What is the minimum requirement to prove species / sex from the time the animal is boned out and during transport? Just curious since I can see two deer easily becoming one.
its in the regs dude.

[Brambles]

evidence of sex, IE: leave a nut, and a patch of hair on one of the major 4 quarters.

[Vansmasher]

A long fish fillet knife works awesome. After deboning 2 huge northern bc moose last september, I'll never go on a hunting trip without one again.
Probably already been mentioned, but keep your bags of meat organized if possible.... ie, hide's in one, fronts in another, burger in another and so on.
Good luck
SORRY, MY TYPO.... I meant hind quarters in one.... not hide's in one, if you're deboning you're probably not packing out the hide.

[gone hunting]

A friend of mine, who is a meat cutter, once told me to avoid letting the meat from one quarter, touch the meat from another quarter, during transport. He said it's a good place for bacteria to set up camp. I can't see how this can work with bags of deboned meat. Has anyone had any problems with that.

I've also read that meat should be aloud to "set up" over night, on the bone. The idea being that if it goes through the rigor and relaxing process without being attached to bone, it will be tougher. Any thoughts?

Do you just hang the bags of meat to cool, when you get back to camp?

[Gateholio]

My favorite boning knives :


http://www.victorinox.ch/index.cfm?site=victorinox.ch&page=60&lang=E

[rocksteady]

http://home.att.net/~sajackson/guttless1.html


Study this one, works on all animals, even moose..

[Vansmasher]

A friend of mine, who is a meat cutter, once told me to avoid letting the meat from one quarter, touch the meat from another quarter, during transport. He said it's a good place for bacteria to set up camp. I can't see how this can work with bags of deboned meat. Has anyone had any problems with that.

I've also read that meat should be aloud to "set up" over night, on the bone. The idea being that if it goes through the rigor and relaxing process without being attached to bone, it will be tougher. Any thoughts?

Do you just hang the bags of meat to cool, when you get back to camp?
I've actually hung up individual deboned chunks back at camp, definitely the biggest pieces off the quarters and backstraps and most of the large chunks of burger meat. Most of the really small burger chunks we just spread out on a tarp and turned them occationally so the air could glaze each side up a bit. We were in a fly-in camp and our pick up was delayed so we had a lot of time to tend to our meat.

[MidnightRun]

We were in a fly-in camp and our pick up was delayed so we had a lot of time to tend to our meat.

Ahhh life in camp !!

:lol: :p :lol:

[kennyj]

We always build a meat rack out of logs and branches at the kill site and at camp, a few feet off the ground, and lay the meat out on it to cool.The bones hold the heat and should be taken out right away IMO.De-boning a moose is a big job but very satisfying.You get to know each piece of meat personally.
Kenny

[Brambles]

I've also read that meat should be aloud to "set up" over night, on the bone. The idea being that if it goes through the rigor and relaxing process without being attached to bone, it will be tougher. Any thoughts?




That could possibly be true if you have the convienance of a meat cooler, but when your in the boonies and the coldest thing is the shade of a tree and a breeze you want to get that bone out and the meat opened up so that it can cool as fast as possible. Those are big muscle groups and will hold the heat in longer than you think, it will start rotting close to the bone and then you won't have any meat to take home.

Hanging meat without a bone can also be a PITA, if its cold enough then you can leave the bone in to make hanging easier, its a judgement call on the weather and temperatures.

[Gateholio]

That could possibly be true if you have the convienance of a meat cooler, but when your in the boonies and the coldest thing is the shade of a tree and a breeze you want to get that bone out and the meat opened up so that it can cool as fast as possible. Those are big muscle groups and will hold the heat in longer than you think, it will start rotting close to the bone and then you won't have any meat to take home.

Hanging meat without a bone can also be a PITA, if its cold enough then you can leave the bone in to make hanging easier, its a judgement call on the weather and temperatures.

x2

:razz::smile:

[gone hunting]

Good point. The trip we're planning will be late sept early oct. Warm weather, won't be a problem up in the hills. Snow's more likely. I still think the smart thing to do would be to get our moose near the lake, then pack up in the hills for caribou, sheep and goats but if we still have a moose tag and something too big to turn down shows up, I feel a little better informed and prepared.

Thanks for all of your input.

[Brambles]

Here's a tip

Go and spike out for caribou, sheep and goats first. After you've had your fill of that then go back to the lake and hunt moose around the lake.

You don't want to shoot a moose in the first few days and have to stay in camp the rest of the time babysitting your meat.

[ruttinbuck]

Here's a tip

Go and spike out for caribou, sheep and goats first. After you've had your fill of that then go back to the lake and hunt moose around the lake.

You don't want to shoot a moose in the first few days and have to stay in camp the rest of the time babysitting your meat.
Thats the plan to a tee this fall.Just waiting for the LEH gods to decide whether the second half of the hunt will be for Elk or Moose.RB