Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire how much will a buffalo cost me?

its looking like I failed on elk this year... i have one more day i can hunt and its not looking good, so i am considering a buffalo to fill the freezer. i live in eastern washington and would travel to montana or so to grab one. i dont need a hunt as much as a pile of meat....and i want to kill it myself. hide is of little value to me as is the head. looking for meat is the goal.

any advice?

Good question, interested in the answer as well.

look for a hunt for a yearling or 2 year old then if your not really out for hide or head....meat will be alot better though you get less than a trophy bull.....the tribes here have a "buffalo ranch" here and though im a white boy have enough connections that a some usually winds up in my freezer over the course of a year im sure the tribes here would sell yah a meat buff to shoot but im pretty sure you can find one closer to home than me even though you included Montana in your post....

high country;
I hope this finds you acceptably well and that you had a good Christmas.

The only thought I'll offer on your query is that everyone I've talked to that went on a buffalo hunt that did not keep the hide and get it tanned has said afterward that they wished they had done so.

I'm cognizant that adds cost to the process, but that's what I've been told a few times now.

All the best to you and yours in 2014 sir.

Dwayne

Buy a side of beef.

+1

Yep.
Buffalo Pasture hunts 'round here are fairly spendy.
I'd find a local rancher and buy his home grown beef also.

The rancher might even let you shoot it!

beef aint exactly cheap either right now....paid $900 for half a 4-H steer cut and wrapped a month ago cause my wife struck out on elk this year....

if you can find a ranch that grass-feeds rather than grain feeds it may be worthwhile, otherwise just buy beef.

having said that, IME,you're generally looking at the following on a shoot-and-keep-all ranch:

cow: $800-$1000

meat bull (2-3YO, 1100#) $2000-$3000

mature bull (4-7YO, 1200# plus) $5000-$6000

$900 is way cheaper than the buff hunts round here.





PG, CB or LR preferred?

LR for me. I like to overpenetrate.

That's what she said.

that was a half....be $1900 for a whole one.....least the whole one i bought and split with my inlaws.....when the girls were still home on top of the game meat we would buy 3 beef halves through out the year.....keeping two young athletes fed was an expensive proposition, Jess would come home from practice, thaw out a 2 pound package of burger, make it into three patties, fry them up and eat them and a couple hours later have supper course i also really like our local range raised beef aswell.....

$2500 for a meat bull here....
then you gotta get it cut and wrapped.....
I'll take the $900, have a third the bill and be able to eat all the meat before it's freezer burnt.
Maybe someone will sell already wrapped buffalo....I do not know.

Get on the internet and just google up something like, "buff hunts".

I'm sure you'll find something to your liking.

Seriously, the best option for cheap meat is horse. There are a bunch of old canners out there a guy could pick up for nothing. As in the cost of hauling it off. Cut it up yourself, and you're into a lot of meat for almost nothing.

No one, if it's just for meat, i don't think there is any way you can economically justify a buff over going with a side of cow.
But Buff to me does taste better than cow, the one i shot was grass fed, not kept in a feed lot. He is looking at me now, hanging on the wall.
Don't discount those hides if you do shoot one. It is not cheap to get one done, but i have two rugs or whatever made out of them, and they are quite beautiful, heavy, and you could sleep through a blizzard under them. Don't forget dustin hoffman in "little big man" under them blankets with the sisters.
About five years ago, i paid about 2k for a mature bull, another 1200 or so for the head/hide to be done, probably another 300 for processing and so on.
Since we have run out of mr buff meat was thinking of getting another one. Think i would have to kill through about 5k to do it today.

There is a Bison Farm about five miles from my Virginia Home and they have a store that sells nothing but Bison Meat and i buy from them , but never liked it as well as Beef or Elk .

i have been doing so well on deer and elk over the years that i have maintained a motto of "beef free since 93".....i am not buying a beef.