Skinning Large Game for Butchering; Deer, Antelope, Etc. - Written Narrative

Your animal should have been hanging in a cool dry place by the hocks on the back legs. The best is well above ground so small animals will leave it alone overnight. This also firms the meat up and cools the animal down, making it easier to skin.

Use a sharp skinning knife for this task. Also use rubber gloves. You may need to periodically stop to sharpen your knife. A dull knife just makes this job harder and more time consuming.

Insert your knife under the skin, between the meat and sinew, on the inside of the rear leg at the thigh area. Bring the knife upward towards the tarsal gland. This will be a vertical cut, under the skin, all the way up to the tarsal gland. Try not to cut this gland. You’ll be glad you didn’t. It can taint your knife blade, and then, your meat.

Make an incision before the tarsal gland. At this point, go around the leg cutting all the while from under the skin. This is called Ringing. You’ll make a complete circle around this area of the leg. The reason you always want to cut skin from underneath is that you will not get as much cut hair on the meat. This leads to less meat contamination and less hair on your processed meat also.

Start just below the tarsal gland. Grab an edge of the skin, take your knife and cut away the muscle and sinew. Keep pulling the skin… keep cutting away. You’ll have to move around quite a lot for skinning. Take the leg skin all the way down to the thigh.Now do exactly the same thing to the other rear leg. Make a vertical cut up to tarsal gland. Cut a ring below the tarsal gland. Pull downward while cutting away. Repeat down to thigh.

Now, you’ll have both rear legs done!

This can be a bit time-consuming, but, it isn’t a hard task. Again, take your time, don’t rush. Pay attention so as not to cut yourself.

Since your field dressed animal is split and splayed, skinning will be easier around the tail, butt, etc. Just continue to pull and cut as you go. Many people save the tail. Use it as a souvenir. Put in your shop, garage, home, or use it for fly-tying.

You’re continuing down the body now. By moving around the body you get better access to the areas you are working on. Another reason why it’s necessary to hang the deer… you need to move around a lot!

We’re going to assume that you’re going to save this hide and send it away to get it tanned. We’ll teach you how to tan it yourself in a subsequent article.

Don’t forget, in this case, this animal is NOT going to be taxidermied. We’re just skinning for butchering, and going to send the hide in to get tanned.

Okay, where were we. Go to the front legs now. Puncture the skin above the knee and “ring” all the way around it. Again, on the inside of the leg, cut under the skin, vertically proceed cutting towards the chest. Continue the cutting about halfway across the breastbone. Now, do the other front leg. Once you finish the other leg, you should have a long incision from the inside of one front leg, up and across the breast bone, down the other leg all the way to that knee. This makes life easier for you when skinning.

Now, cut from the middle of your breast bone where your incisions have met and extend further up the neck. Go about halfway up the neck, and ring around the entire neck.

On the front legs, pull the skin away as you cut the muscle and sinew. Keep pulling and cutting all the way to the front shoulder.

Go back to the body skinning you were doing. Continue to pull downward and cut. Continue all the way down until it would be easier to start removing the skin from the neck area.

Then, remove that skin.

Then, finish the body.

You should be done now. Next time will be easier. You’ll know what you want to do differently, if anything.

Remember to be careful above all else.