Update on roadkill score!

SRSLY SCORE!

10 squirrels, 3 bunnies. I think atleast 1 bunny may not be usable (too squished, not sure what it's got mixed in with the meat), but everything else looked good!

Tomorrow is butcher day in the backyard, so I will try and get pics (if the SO will take them for us).

I let the guy know to give me a call in a mth, he said it won't take that long before he has more. Anyone want some squirrel? LOL

Also, as an aside, I helped a rabbit breeder clean her rabbit tent and got 2 bunnies and some mice for my labour. Good deal!

So the bunnies and squirrels were roadkill someone saved or are these scores your total personal pickups?

There is a guy who has the contract for this area for roadkill, and I let him know that any FRESH (3-4hrs cold weather, 2 hrs warm) squirrel/bunnies I would like to take off his hands. This is our first try, so we will see what we get out of the deal.. I have no problems throwing out any that look "off" or too squished to identify. Heh. Even a couple of squirrel and a bunny out of each trip is worth it for me, as it's a totally natural source of meat! No medications there. He asked if I wanted raccoon, and I was like NO THANKS! Dirty lil garbage pickers.

Alright, no pictures. I ended up having to do this inside our bathroom as it was cold and rainy today, the SO couldn't handle the smell of all the raw meat, so I had to go it solo.

Two bunnies were useless. The other was good, got a leg, two arms, ribcage, back, and head off him. He was fairly easy to skin, because I knew how to do it (rabbit breeder showed me).

The squirrels, well... I only used 4. The others were either too ripe or too "squished" (mixed with road dirt and whatnot). I got their arms, a couple legs, lots of rib cages, and a tiny amount of whole organ (most was smooshed). Saved the 4 heads for my moms GSD (and that's what the bunny head is for too). MAN! These things are hard to skin! I wasted a LOT of meat the first few before I realized an easier way, and even then, I literally feel like my hand has a pulled muscle from the strain of trying to skin those little buggers. The grey squirrels were easier than the black to skin, too. Weird. Everything is in the big freezer (separate from our "daily" meat freezer) for two months, we're not going to take any chances with any wee buggies. Hopefully the cats like the squirrel, the ribs and back are soft soft soft and will be easy to feed/eat!

If you plan on doing this regular, you can get a little skinning knife, they make the job a lot easier I hear. No one wants the fur? Really?

Ok now I understand. I was thinking you picked these up yourself and then was like "wait.. why is she talking about a guy?" LOL! I skinned my first grey a few days ago and it was beautiful. The fox squirrels I've attempted to skin were AWFUL and I ended up just ripping off as much as possible and leaving the legs and head furred. I think I like them skinned though and will try and do so from now on. I found it easier to cut the head off and then use a kitchen shear to cut down the neck to the belly, between the muscle and hide. Then I pull the skin around the neck away first, work out towards each arm and go down the back and to the legs. I also remove the tail. After it's skinned I then take out the intestines and stomach. I fed all the organs and heart to Wav so I didn't have to freeze and deal with the bloody thawing later on. Before freezing I washed the carcass out in cold water and let it drain off. I got 3 good portioned meals out of that little grey. I can easily get 5-6 out of a fox. Then suckers get 2-3 lbs easily!

Our kids aren't fans yet! Also, I am a bad mommy and would prefer not to clean up furry blobs of skin and blood off my floor. :S So until everyone eats it all, no one gets any (we are working our way up the mousie size chart).

Shall I have skin/fur for you next time? The fur pulls out real easy, so I can't guarentee how pretty it'll be.

Heather; yeah, I don't have time to roadkill search sadly. This makes it so much easier.

I did this: cut off head, tail, feets... attempt to skin starting at neck, freeing atleast legs for cats to eat... pull so hard I cried to get the ribs/spine... give up and work on freeing just the legs for the dog. I really need a good set of shears, one day I will have them! Out of ALL my squirrels, I got 3-5 meals. I am definately doing something wrong! LOL I think I am being overly cautious about what meat I will use, and what I won't. :S