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John, I've read in a number of your books your advise to leave game meat "on the bone" for a period of time before processing to avoid cold-shortening.
With antelope season fast approaching and temperatures still fairly warm, I was wondering how you accomplish this without spoiling meat?

Do you have a walk in cooler? I'd appreciate any advise you could give. Thanks

Antelope are small enough that even on a fairly warm day just skinning them is enough to allow them to cool down. But if necessary, we just cut the shoulders and hindquarters off, then put them and the entire ribcage in a big cooler or two. In theory we could also fit them in the spare refrigerator we keep in the garage. If we lived somewhere the antelope season normally opens in hot weather (and there are plenty, why I don't know) we'd either use coolers or, if close enough to home, the refrigertator. I've hunted antelope during the very early season in New Mexico a few times, and if a walk-in cooler wasn't available, "quick quartered" them and stuck them in a big cooler.

There are a couple of other factors. Antelope meat is very tender, because it doesn't contain much of the "organized collagen" that makes meat tough--and is also what aging the meat breaks down. In fact, a "shear test" at the University of Wyoming, where a knife blade is attached to a pressure gauge, found that even mature buck antelope are just as tender as 6-month-old commercial lambs. So they don't need aging. Just allowing the body heat and rigor mortis to dissipate (both of which usually take place within 24 hours) is all that's required before butchering.

But if at all possible we like to leave the hide on, which protects the meat from flies and dirt very well. On moderately warm days, far from anywhere, we usually just spread-eagle field-dressed carcasses to allow the body heat to dissipate, especially if we take them toward evening. But have also just placed a big bag of ice inside the chest cavity, which helps cool them even quicker.

These days we mostly hunt near home in Montana, where the rifle season doesn't open until the second week in October. While it can be pretty warm then, the season lasts 5 weeks, and we usually wait until at least the second week, to allow the opening-day chaos to subside. We often shoot antelope on frosty mornings, and occasionally when there's snow on the ground.

Thanks for the info John

Mule Deer, why is there such differing opinions about the teste of antelope meat? I have my opinion but was wondering what you think.

I have two opinons:

The first, of course, is that many hunters don't cool pronghorn meat soon enough. I don't think leaving the hide on "taints" the meat, as I have heard many times, and have plenty of evidence to prove it. But a whitetail doe about the size of a pronghorn can take being warm longer without affecting the taste of the meat. The very first pronghorn buck I killed was with one of my hunting mentors, who promptly wrapped the gutted buck in a tarp to keep the blood from messing up his vehicle. Even though the buck was killed cleanly, dressed promptly, and the day was pretty cool, that was one of the two antelope I've killed that tasted somewhat bitter.

The other was treated exactly the same way by a "guide" who promised to take it directly back to camp while I continued to hunt with my partner. Instead the guide drove around for at least 4 hours, with the buck wrapped in the tarp in the back of a Jeep Wagoneer, while he apparently completed a drug deal.

My other opinion is that apparently there's some chemical in pronghorn meat that a few people taste, but most do not. It must be similar to why cilantro tastes like soap to some people, but not to most. One guy I know cannot stand the taste of pronghorn meat, even when everybody else at the table thought it delicious.

Thanks, M.D. I had no idea about your second opinion. Interesting. I happen to like the taste of antelope and have said so to my family, friends and hunting acquaintances. Most of them think I know little about want is good, consequently, they often ask me to take an antelope that's been in the back of a truck for hours and looking a lot like road kill. Which says to me that many hunters have a lack of respect for antelope. How can you cook and enjoy eating something you didn't like in the first place. Anyway, that an opinion I hold.

I agree. Have heard too many people over the decades say something like, "Too bad you have to eat the stinkin' things." Why hunt antelope if you don't like to eat them? Or learn to take care of the meat correctly?

In my experience (16 antelope), the only one that tasted bad (gamely) was gutted promptly, but was not skinned for several hours. I have immediately gutted and skinned every other antelope I have shot, and they all tasted great. My sister is not fond of any game meat, but she will eat antelope and like it.

Just one more data point: SIL shot a doe, and from the time she dropped to the time she was skinned, in pieces, and on ice was about an hour and a half. She was delicious, cooked with teriyaki.

I always skin and quarter my lopers quickly and put in my huge cooler that has a lot of ice in cooler. and keep ice on those quarters tell I get home. many times ice is almost all melted so the cold water is move`n around and actually cleaning the loper meat so when home all`s I have to do is just cut the meat up,