Newbie meat care question

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LibertyJim

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Joined
May 28, 2014
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Colorado
How big of a freezer will I need to store an elk? If I am successful I will take my elk to a processor near me and won't be doing the butchering myself (yet). Any ideas of how many cubic feet of freezer space that will be? Ballpark? Thank you!

Jim
 
A decent sized bull is going to net you around 180 - 2220 lbs of meat.

Depending on how it is packaged and what it is mixed with, an off the cuff guesstimate would be about 10 cubic feet of space in a freezer.

I think my upright freezer is around 18 cubic feet and 2 full bulls won't fit without giving some of it away.
 
Thanks for the replies. Costco had a 7 footer on sale the other day, but that now sounds small. "Honey, my internet hunting friends told me I needed to go bigger!"

Jim
 
I think my freezer is 5 feet wide so it is roughly 20-25 cu ft. 1.5 Elk Fit in it fine.

I like Chest freezers better than upright freezers.
Manual defrost NOT Frost Free. (less freezer burn)
 
You could probably get close to fitting an elk in a 7 footer if there was nothing else in it and it was a smaller bull and for sure if it was a cow. It would be a pain to organize it so that you weren't digging around every time you wanted a different cut of meat though. I like the upright freezers because you can put roast on one shelf, steaks on another, etc. and not have to dig through it all to get what you want out.
 
2rocky said:
I think my freezer is 5 feet wide so it is roughly 20-25 cu ft. 1.5 Elk Fit in it fine.

I like Chest freezers better than upright freezers.
Manual defrost NOT Frost Free. (less freezer burn)
Click to expand...

I like the frost free. My goal each year is to eat everything before the next hunting season so I rarely have anything get freezer burn. Sometimes I find something in there that is a couple years old though and never have noticed much of an issue with freezer burn. I also use the food saver bags and I think that helps too.
 
I keep meaning to make a 2x3 divider out of plywood to partition steaks roasts and ground meat for the reason you mention above.
 
You can get more in a chest freezer than an upright.

I used to have a small 6cf and a 9cf chest freezer could fit a small elk in the small one and a big elk in the bigger one...

I prefer the upright more so for convenience than anything now. I organize stuff in beer boxes (bottle case size) or paper boxes (copy paper). Two boxes fit side by side on a shelf perfectly. I can get roughly 35-40lbs of meat in a beer box and close to 50-60 in a paper box depending how its packed.

I've had chest freezers as well and can get about another 20-30% more lbs in one of comparable size. When full they're a PITA to find anything and the freezer ends up being an unsorted disaster after a couple months. I usually have 3-4 different kinds of animals of multiple cuts... along with 3-4 types of fish, etc at any give time. I really like to be able to open the freezer and dig out what ever I'm looking for easily.

Most uprights have 4 shelves, so the smaller ones will hold about 300-350+/- and the bigger ones around 400-500 lbs. I've got a 21 and a 14cf... I put two entire AK moose in them along with a deer... had to bungy the door shut for a while. :)

Nice to open the freezer and be able to ball park how many pounds of meat you have left, or get an idea how much you have when stocking up for the winter.

Good luck on your elk hunt.
 
I have a kenmore 12 upright, 28" x 26" and assume it's a 12 footer. I have and elk and antelope in it along with a few other items from 2013. It's about the right size but with this years 4 antelope and 1 elk due to arrive in Oct, it won't hold those 5 animals.
 
I have a 14 cubic foot chest freeser. I have not killed an elk yet, but that freezer can hold a half of beef (@330 lbs); half a hog (@110 lbs) and 2 whitetails, at the same time. Not much room left when all that is in there, but it will fit.
 
When the wife and I got married one of our first purchases was a freezer. We ended up with a 16 cubic foot kenmore upright. 25 years and 3 boys later that freezer is still chugging away. While there were times it was packed with elk and deer and ducks, etc...we always seemed to find room especially if I kept it defrosted. Lots of meat has gone in and out of that thing over the years.
 
Dang Zach, the last part of your reply where you started discussing "stuffing..Wife...in there....." gave me pause.
 
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