Eatin Wild things? Racoon cooking??

[donrae]

My bro-in-law got a bear last year. They had the "hams" smoked and my sister used them in beans, just like a ham bone. Those were great beans!

She found the meat a little greasy, but it made great sausage.

 

[hennotrooster]

I looked it up! Tree squirrel hunting season in California is from September 11 to January 30.

Guess I've got time to fatten 'em up... <*evil grin *>

Thank you, Ntsees!

So where does one hunt for squirrels? If I go to Redlands where there are a lot of tree squirrels would be we able to shoot or trap them for eating? My DH set out a trap for the ground squirrels we have here in the High Desert in CA. He says the next one he catches he is going to cook told him he can do that outside. Destinduck says they are good, we do have lots of them and rabbits running the property could easily make a meal out of them and put some up in the freezer if we just knew how to catch them. He did get one in the trap he set (1st in 3 years). I will try it if he cooks it, have a good recipe? I always worry about them being diseased or having eaten poison someone might have set out trying to get rid of them. Oh we have ground squirrels can they be eaten as well? This is an interesting thread.

 

[destinduck]

I d also like to know also if ground squirrels are good to eat.We dont have those .We have mainly gray's here. Although there very few native red's left her They are smaller than the common gray's

 

[Shewholovesducks]

XD omg Bear tastes like ham? Never woulda thought of that! I'm not sure about the ground squirrel I believe I had tree squirrel. And I was wondering if it was true that rabbits for "whorls" or internal worms in them part of the year that are all over the body making them inedible. My grandmother said they did so you can only eat them certain times of year, would that be true for squire ls too?

 

[Shewholovesducks]

I pretty much eat any kind of meat you serve me. I hope my husband brings me a ground hog this year. I had turtle , frog, snake possum, horse highland cattle and who knows what done hill folks their in the stew pot. I eat and don't ask. Looking forward to trying balut or thousand year old eggs. How about some pickled bologna, boiled peanuts and a beer.

What in the world did you think of the possum? My great grandmother is said to have eaten on that was roadkill once didn't turn out too good!

You are a brave soul! Even some of my Filipino friends won't touch balut, I don't know too much about pickling I've never even had a pickled egg, whats strange about boiled peanuts?

 

[Ntsees]

So where does one hunt for squirrels? If I go to Redlands where there are a lot of tree squirrels would be we able to shoot or trap them for eating? My DH set out a trap for the ground squirrels we have here in the High Desert in CA. He says the next one he catches he is going to cook told him he can do that outside. Destinduck says they are good, we do have lots of them and rabbits running the property could easily make a meal out of them and put some up in the freezer if we just knew how to catch them. He did get one in the trap he set (1st in 3 years). I will try it if he cooks it, have a good recipe? I always worry about them being diseased or having eaten poison someone might have set out trying to get rid of them. Oh we have ground squirrels can they be eaten as well? This is an interesting thread.

If you live in southern California, you cannot hunt tree squirrels. Based on the DFW (formerly DFG) regulations, tree squirrels may not be hunted in San Bernardino, Inyo, Mono, Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, Ventura, Orange, Riverside, Imperial, and San Diego counties. But for the other counties, it's a go when the season comes. I do not know why hunting isn't allowed in those southern counties.

As for ground squirrels, I've never tried them and I don't intend to. I'm sure they're edible, but there's just something about them that I don't like.

 

[hennotrooster]

Going to have to look up ground squirrels before my DH decides to eat one. I have read the same thing about worms and rabbits and have read that this is just not so. I worry about the worm and rabid thing in squirrels. Has anyone here eaten ground squirrel?

 

[sandspoultry]

I remember going out to my grandparents farm growing up and out beside the barn my grandfather had pens about the size of rabbit hutches. He always had 'possums and raccoons in them, we would go pick apples and corn and feed it to them. I didn't know it at the time but he kept them penned for a period of time to "clean" them out before eating them. My dad was a city person and there was certain meals that he would not eat out at the farm, they used to give him a hard time about that but he never said anything to us kids about it other than to comment that moms side of the family would eat anything. lol

'possum meat is very greasy so I don't really care for it but raccoon is very good. We have it every now and then when I trap one around the chicken pens. Biscuits and squirrel gravy is an old southern breakfast favorite. Quite a few times I made my step daughter "crab" cakes and she loved them, to bad there wasn't any crab in the them it was rattlesnake. We told her after and she was ok with it but we had to promise never to repeat the story to any of her friends.

Being ex military I got to spend quite a few years in Asia and have sampled alot of different meats so i'm open to trying new things. I will say one of the best steaks I have ever eaten in my life was a water buffalo steak.

 

[wyoDreamer]

I like squirrel and used to hunt them every fall in northern Wisconsin. I only like the Fox or the Eastern Grey squirrel - and the Grey is so much better than the Fox squirrels. The Fox Squirrels are bigger, but they seem tougher and slighly "wilder" in taste. They are grey with slightly reddish/brown "highlights" to the fur. The little red squirrels are going to be really tough and not much meat on them. I guess if I were starving I would have a go at them, but there just isn't enough meat there for me to spend the time cleaning and cooking.

I don't really like bear. Every time I have had it, it was really greasy. I would think the smoked bear would be good, the smoking process would kind render out alot of that fat. I don't like things that coat my mouth in grease and then thats all I can taste. yuck.

 

[MeatKing]

very interesting thread.
I've never tried anything out've the norm..


I must say after reading this yesterday, today, I saw a squirrl dead on the side of the road.. and thought, what a waste. Someone could've ate that! lol

I would try it, if I had someone, to cook it/prepare it for me..