Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting Regarding Boning Out a Critter...

This guy was on just enough of a slope that those ropes are there partly because he was sliding down the hill a bit... Camera doesn't really catch it though.

I shot him in the morning, and had him on the meatpole by dark. I left the bones in the quarters; as 1minute says, to completly bone him out would have been too messy for this noob.

It was hot enough that I got the hinds pulled off and hanging in the shade before I hiked out to get my quarter bags and pack frame. Seemed to work, there's a LOT of heat stored in those rear quarters and getting them cooling is job #1!

I did the whole thing with a Gerber hunting folder that has a bone saw blade. It worked, but the bone saw was more appropriate for a deer than an elk IMHO. a little bit of cussin' getting through the leg bones etc. The other elk I killed last year, I mostly used a Buck Vanguard, the rubber-handled one. That's a good knife too.

I do like a tiny little Gerber ultralight folder for parts of the gutting. Big knife = more potential for mayhem- for me anyways.

Top pic is roped-off elk, bottom shows the Gerber, folded up unfortunatly.