How to skin a deer Video Lecture | Hunter Education: Becoming an Expert Hunter - Hobbies

[Roy]
Let's get him over here and see if can't find
a good limb to hang him on to skin him.
Right here looks pretty good . How you skin
one is actually personal preference.
I like to skin them from the back end, down.
A lot of people hang them up by the head and
skin them from the head first.
Normally I'll skin the back legs down before
I ever hang one up.
You just cut around the leg.
Just cut the hide, right down across
the ham.
You hold this thing between your knees, if
you're careful.
And just cut the hide.
A lot of people cut the glands off the back
legs if it's a buck.
It's not really necessary as long as you don't
let it touch the meat.
It doesn't cause any problems.
Get it started and it will usually pull down.
Do the
same on the other leg.
Again just skin it around this hind leg, being
careful not to cut that tendon because that's
what we're going to hang him with, this tendon
that runs up through his back leg.
And once you get it started, it'll pull on
down.
Then we can put the gambrel in there and get
ready to hang him up over the limb.
Since you're tall, I'll let you put it up
there.
Okay, let's get him a little higher.
There we are.
That's good.
If you can tie him off over there to the tree.
So he doesn't slip.
And you just...
You help hold him there, we'll work the hide
down from here.
Normally once you get it started this hide
will just pull on off without too much cutting
with a knife.
Get started down on both legs.
There you go.
Put this stuff down.
And you get the tail free.
Then the hide will pull on down.
Next thing you want to do is split the hide
on the front legs.
Now, if you were going to mount this thing,
you would want to pull the hide just straight
down over the legs rather than splitting the
hide back up to the chest.
Since this is a small buck we're not going
to mount him.
We'll go ahead and split the hide.
Do the other one the same way.
And sometimes it's a little difficult to get
started.
Okay, you need to peel it back a little bit
so it'll come off easier when you pull down
on it.
And just like the hind leg you can just loosen
the hide a little.
And once you get it loose, it'll just pull
back.
It helps when you have two people, one to
hold the deer, otherwise it starts swinging
around in a circle.
I'm going to go ahead and split this hide
down the sternum.
Okay, then you can start pulling down on the
hide.
Sometimes you have to stop and use a knife
to help it along.
Okay Mike, just a second, I'm going to cut
this little that's holding us here.
[Mike]
This little piece of meat here, well we can,
I got it, we got it.
[Roy]
And just pull all the way down around his
neck.
Okay, boy, come on.
Use a knife a minute over here.
Get it started again.
And it's hanging up inside here just a little
bit.
Keep your hands back, there you go.
Now it should pull down the rest of the way.
This one's going to be a little stubborn.
Work it down a little bit with a knife, Mike.
Sometimes bucks hang up a little, more on
the necks, especially if they're in rut
Now let's see if it'll come on down there.
[Mike]
Need to slit the hide here.
[Roy]
Probably.
You want to skin it down as far as you can
so you don't waste any meat and the neck makes
a pretty good roast or you can boil the meat
off of it.
This deer was neck shot so we don't need to
really take it further down than where the
bullet wound is, that's plenty good on this
one.
[Mike]
Uh, huh.
[Roy]
Okay, now we got it skinned down that far,
the next thing to do is go ahead and take
the head off.
We'll lay the hide out so we can put the meat
on it.
And you can take a head off, easiest way is
to use a saw.
And go ahead and cut the meat with your knife.
Get it cut down to neck bone and at a vertebrae
joint if you can.
And take a saw and cut it off.
There, now let's lay that hide out, over here
will be fine, Mike.