There’s no one right answer to the question of spoilage.
QUESTION: Archery season opens early and it’s often very warm where I live. I’m worried if I shoot a deer and have to leave it overnight that it will spoil. Will the meat still be edible if I have to do this?
ANSWER: The quicker you can recover the deer, eviscerate it and cool it, the better the end product will be. Having said that, you still have a fairly wide window of opportunity.
I cringe when I hunt down south, where it’s much warmer, and the local custom is to drag deer out of the woods whole and gut them in the skinning shed. But the meat turns out just fine.
Obviously, every situation is different, and you have to weigh the pros and cons of following a wounded deer too soon and risk losing it, or letting it lay and risk spoilage, predators and scavengers.
I’ve left deer overnight when temperatures hovered in the high 50s and low 60s and experienced no ill effects. As temperatures rise above that, so do the risks, and it’s possible you may lose some meat to spoilage, but some is better than none.
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