The Nastiest animal you have gutted?

[midnight flyer]

Odd, I apologized to it before I put it down...even with all my years hunting...just shooting a downed cow seemed...dunno.

Man... I know what you mean. I used to bird hunt on my buddy's place and there were runnning about 100 head of cattle. The little calves weren't really cows to me... they were like puppies. They would follow us around, eat out of our hands, and run and play with their gangly legs flying. Worse, their large-brown-eyes-to-face ratio is way off. Does any other animal have bigger brown eyes than a small calf?

When they are fully domesticated, they rely on you to take care of them. Walking up to an animal that trusts you and doesn't struggle while you put a bullet in him is hard. Having him look at you with their big brown eyes full of complete trust while you pull the trigger and (hopefully, quickly) kill them is harder.

I was out for a day of shooting birds and barbecue/beer and the ranch hand that took care of the place came up to us and asked us if "putting down one of the sick animals" was going to bother our hunting. It was midday, so not a problem for us. He walked over to a smaller part of the herd, pulled out a calf and walked him well away from his mother, over by us.

The calf walked peacefully beside him, and they stopped by his truck. All of this was now right by us where we could see everything. The cowboy dropped the small harness rope he put on the calf and the animal just stood there and looked at him, unconcerned, waiting to see what was next. He took a pistol out of his belt and shot him in the head. The calf fell over stone dead on a large triple folded tarp. We used the tarp to help pick up the animal and put him in the back of the truck. We slammed the tailgate home, and he drove off. We were a little shaken at how business like it was for him.

About a half hour later, the mother cow started mooing, looking for her calf. It got really loud, and she stayed right where she was, waiting for the calf to respond for hours. At the end of our time there, she was almost braying.

We left early and skipped the evening hunt.

In all my years I can't think of much that bothered me more.

Robert

 

[rwiggins]

Can we add a NSFE (Not Safe For Eating) qualifier to these types of threads? :barf:

I can't say I've ever had one experience to match another's here. Oh My GOD!!! Guess I've been lucky or blessed. Something. Seriously. Great thread, by the way. Thanks for making me flinch, now. Really. Appreciate that.

 

[mrappraisit]

No exactly skinning an animal but my mate was hiking across some very wet bog land in Scotland when he came to a large patch of mud.Spotting a conveniantly sized boulder he decided to leap onto that. Imagine his suprise when the said boulder burst spraying him with smelly bodily fluids as soon as his feet landed on it.Turned out it was a dead de-composing sheep !!!! He then had to hike for the remaining 5 miles or so covered in the foul smelling goop before getting back to where he was staying !!!!!

Best story ever!!

 

[udtjim]

Did anyone ever skin a Badger? That is about as foul as it gets.:barf:

 

[bmilla35]

I would have to say a deer...

For all the hunting that I do (not necessarily shoot), at least once a year I encounter a gut shot deer. It's pretty bad. I start gagging pretty much every time I catch a wiff of it. To quote my friend when he first smelled it (we were quite young), "Worst fart ever!!"

 

[DRMUDD]

 

[Midnight Scout]

Last year I decided to do my own work on a European mount for a buck I took. When I started boiling the head, bot fly larvae started coming out of its nostrils. I had never seen them before. Yech!

 

[6749]

first place went to a rabbit i shot with my bow, i had the bird hunting tip on it,the one with wire loops on it. it tore the head off when i got it, worms and bugs crawled out, that was the last rabbit i shot, 15 years ago.
second place went to a moose my dad shot, died in the middle of the swamp, fell a tree into the swamp. took use six hours to get it out, and the water was pretty warm

 

[jdm61]

Male feral hog. My brother and I have a strict "sows only" rule now when going after meat hogs.

 

[TheGame]

Gutshot deer is the worst for me. At least it wasn't my deer. I didn't have to eat any of it. (It didn't look to good) He insisted it was good meat though..

 

[cz375hh]

In the first year of our marriage I proudly brought two Canadian geese home from a hunt. It was single degree cold so I cleaned them in the auxiliary shower down stairs. I had the swamp gone bad smell going when the wife called down from upstairs-"what the heck are you doing & what is that smell?"--"Just cleaning the geese dear I answered"--"Well if they smell that bad I am not cookin them" --she held to her word they died in the freezer of freezer burn...Steve

 

[haggismonger]

UDTJIM- as soon as I saw this thread title, that's what came to my mind. Badgers are unlike anything in this universe. It's a smell that isn't specifically comparable to anything else, alive or dead, it's just disturbing and offensive. Number two slot has to go to a male coyote. I couldn't finish.

 

[stevomiller]

When I was a kid my buddy poked a bloated up deer with a stick and it ruptured. Eee gads!!!
I've seen worms in fish I have caught, but haven't had any worm infestation in any of the birds, small game, hogs or deer. However, one deer I had to carry out was during an August hunt and it was 90 degrees out. There were so many fleas and ticks on this thing that it looked like the skin was crawling, I thought that bugs were on me for days. When I hung it up to butcher, a giant larva crawled out of its nostril (about as big as two segments of your index finger) and fell on my arm. Freaked the hell out of me!

 

[JCavSD]

Oh hell, you people are going to turn me into a damn vegetarian if this keeps up! This thread is like a bad accident...I can't help looking at it.

 

[bhoff]

Wild Turkeys....

 

[GhostWolf]

Now this thread is hilarious. Bringing back alot of memories.

 

[Gossman Knives]

I have to add gutshot deer to the list. Also groundhogs and red fox. When I praticed taxidermy, my buddy had me tan 30 fox hides. They were prime and full of their musk smell. Add that smell to a salt/vinegar brine for tanning. Pickled fox. That smell hung around the house for awhile. I did my taxidermy in the basement. The wife had a fit.
Scott

 

[Codger_64]

Wild turkeys are bad. Real bad. The worst I ever had was a buck whitetail deer. He and I arrived at the same place at the same time, and saw each other at the same time, eight feet seperating us. I was quick with a shotgun slug (Remington Copper Solid) and dead centered his chest with him facing me. It was one of those times when time stands still. He gave a "wet dog" shiver and expelled the liquified contents of his chest, stomachs and intestines like water thru a fire hose nozzel... on me. I was drenched in "liquid deer" from head to toe and from my gun's buttplate to muzzle. When my hunting buds came to see what I had shot, the were aghast. I can imagine what they thought at the sight of me standing there covered with gore. They thought I had shot myself! It took me a few minutes to explain to them what had happened, and then they still weren't convinced that I wasn't hurt.

Codger

 

[batosai117]

I was able to go dove hunting with my soon-to-be uncle today

It was a pleasant surprise as I had planned on being outside to enjoy the slight scattered showers and greenery after a brown, dry, and hot summer. I downed 2 doves and one sparrow by accident

The sparrow went to the cats and I held on to the doves. I had set up a tarp since the rain was coming down harder than when we started. It kept the essentials dry and I was happy that my stuff was able to be used. After two and a half hours of enjoying the landscape, I headed back in (he had already gone in by this time). So by this time, it's dark and I have to get my meat off these birds ASAP. So I went about breasting the first one and I damn near gagged when I saw the birds lunch roll all over the table:

I only used my knife once during both gutting sessions and that was to sever the meat from the wing that refused to tear off. More pics:

I hope you guys enjoyed the fresh catch

 

[smustian]

Makes me hungry reading all of this, guess I will have to pull some venison from the freezer. Need to eat it all soon anyway. Bow season starts in a couple of weeks and I will need the room. The RC-3 and RC-4 are quivering with excitement by my hunting pack. They are ready to go!