T. GAMBLE: Thanksgiving bounty priced deerly

As you read this, you are probably about to eat the Thanksgiving meal or you have already done so.

Almost everyone will include turkey with the meal, but some people — actually, quite a few in Southwest Georgia — will also include the most expensive meat in America.

Is it veal, or bison, or lobster?

No, I mean deer meat.

Yes, many will share their harvest of freshly killed deer with deer sausage or deer steak, maybe even deer stew or roast. It comes off the land and makes one proud to be an American to eat it.

I almost have to stand at attention when I eat a deer burger. Troops should be given deer sausage right before they are dropped into a hot zone. Eating deer meat is just by God all-American, like John Wayne, apple pie, and fondling women you barely know if you are a congressman. But things are not like they used to be.

The average deer steak now costs approximately between $400 and $600 per pound. One must buy a $1,000 rifle, $2,500 deer lease,and hunting tags and licenses and ammo for another $1,000. You cannot go deer hunting now without a four-wheeler of some sort, preferably one that qualifies to be called a mule.

When I was growing up, a mule cost about $250 and you had to feed it every day. Now, you don’t feed it, but it will cost you about 15 grand for a decent one, more if you want a radio, lights and room for all the beer you have to drink after you kill the deer.

It is considered impolite in most deer hunting circles to refuse to drink beer after the kill. Some, drink a little before the kill, which explains why, every now and then, Nellie the cow falls victim to a deer hunter.

You also need a hunting camp, with either a built cabin or a camper outfit of some type. That adds about $7,500 more. It might actually be cheaper to buy a race horse and try to win the Kentucky Derby, but race horses really don’t taste all that good at the Thanksgiving meal.

When I was growing up, deer hunting was much simpler. You went out in the edge of the woods. You then nailed about four boards to the side of the tree at the three-foot, five-foot, seven-foot and nine-foot heights. Then, you nailed about four boards together on a sturdy limb and sat there all day while nothing came by.

Nothing came by because it is pretty noisy hammering all those boards and because there really weren’t any deer around back then. Back then if I saw a deer, I’d stop whatever I was doing and go tell whoever I could. It was big deal. Now if I stopped everything I was doing every time I saw a deer I’d never even get to work.

By the way, we also did not fool with any type safety mamby-pamby when I was growing up. You held the shotgun in your right hand (rifle if you were really lucky), ammo in the other and tried to climb up those boards that weren’t really centered too well so that when your foot hit one side they leaned heavily that way and almost dumped you onto the ground.

There were no harnesses, or fancy ladders, or pre-built boxes with heaters and Wi-Fi. If you killed a deer — and I do mean if — the steaks cost 25 cents a pound.

Either way $600 a pound or 25 cents a pound, I hope you enjoyed the Thanksgiving meal and may God bless you with a bigger, better mule next year.

Email columnist T. Gamble at [email protected].