Folding knife
Drag rope
Pen {for filling out tags}
Zip ties {for affixing tags to deer}
Small flashlight
cartridge wallet
Compass
Lighter
Water bottle
Sandwich if I'll be out all day
Everything fits in my coat pockets. I don't carry a pack when hunting. If I had to carry so much shyt I needed a pack, I'd quit hunting and take up golf or something.
Enough shyt there I wouldn't be stuffing my pockets. Just as easy to carry a small pack with all of that.
Then you've got the wrong hunting coat. Not surprising. Most don't have enough pockets and what they do have are too small, insecure and/or poorly placed. Nobody in the group I hunt with wears a pack of any kind.
LOL. If you got more than a half mile from the road and a "drag rope" would only be useful to hang some quarters in a tree while you packed out the others on your back, you might think differently.
You should read some Benoit books. They'll show you how far deer can be dragged by actual men.
20 years old or so, drug a small deer a mile or so across a cut bean field with a sling or belt as a drag tool.
Told myself never again.....I have been fortunate so far.
I've dragged full grown bucks over a mile. I've also hoisted them over my shoulder and carried them through thigh deep water when crossing a creek. Much depends on what the terrain is like. They aren't terribly hard to drag down a valley over mostly level ground, particularly with snow on the ground. Of course they go down hill easily. If it's a bad drag I've boned the front quarters, cut the loins out, put the,meat in my game bag, tied the hind quarters together and carried them out over my shoulder.
