theHunter Classic Forums

This is simply awsome! 10 million lbs per year of sustainable wild venison.

https://elknetwork.com/montanans-love-their-wild-game/

Yep, I have one in the freezer. ....Although I think his math is a bit "generous". I just checked the Montana Fish&Wildlife website and the total number of elk harvested in 2016 was 24,532. So using rough math, 10 million divided by 25,000 is 400 lbs of usable meat per elk. That's WAY high, especially considering that the 24,532 elk consisted of 11089 bulls, 12,526 cows, and 917 calves. It takes a BIG bull to get more than 300 lbs of boned meat, with 250 being a good rough average for bulls. For cows the average is probably closer to 150, and 100 for a calf. So on average, and still being a bit generous, I'd guess that 200 lbs per elk would have been closer to reality. So 5 million pounds is probably a better estimate, IMO.

Still, 5,000,000 lbs is a lot of elk meat considering there are only about 1 million people in Montana (a state about the same size as Germany). Although nearly 5000 of the 25,000 elk were harvested by non-residents like me...

At no point do they speak about 10 million pounds of elk meat. The numbers mentioned are:
5 Million pounds big game meat
10 million pounds wild meat per season

He calculated with 245 lbs per elk, 60 per deer and 39 per antilope, the numbers are explained in the video

The really mean thing is this tasty looking venison steak they're grilling while talking about it
Now I'm hungry

Knut wrote:At no point do they speak about 10 million pounds of elk meat. The numbers mentioned are:
5 Million pounds big game meat
10 million pounds wild meat per season

He calculated with 245 lbs per elk, 60 per deer and 39 per antilope, the numbers are explained in the video

The really mean thing is this tasty looking venison steak they're grilling while talking about it
Now I'm hungry

Oops...I didn't watch the video, just read the article. I think I was thrown off by the fact that the website is called, "The Elk Network", so I assumed they were talking about elk. Sure, adding in deer and antelope probably puts the number nearer to 10 million. Although I still think 245 lbs per elk is high, considering that a bit over half of the elk harvested are cows and calves.

But his calculation would be 18800 elk taken (if calculated backwards), while your numbers are 24000. So I guess the 5 million lbs elk meat are not too far off

Knut wrote:The really mean thing is this tasty looking venison steak they're grilling while talking about it
Now I'm hungry

That got me too!