How do you drag game out?

[CGO]

I haven't used sleds with runners, like the kind we rode on when we were little kids. ( After you get too old to ride those things, they're best used for ice-fishing.) I have used the semi-stiff yellow plastic things that kids play with in the snow. It's kinda hard to keep a deer carcass on the yellow sliders. Ditto for toboggans, especially in steep terrain. Neither work quite as well as just wrapping the animal in a sheet of visqueen and duct-taping it together. ( Make a tube out of it around the carcass, two layers thick. A couple of wraps with a bungee helps to keep the plastic in close to the animal. This doesn't hurt a thing, either.)

This works great on snow, of course, but they do tend to get a little out of control going downhill, since the stuff is just so slippery. If it's a big, bony-headed warrior-buck, you could get run over and gored. ( Don't ask me how I know this.) On wet leaves it's pretty good, too, and on dry ground it's somewhat better than the hair on their hide. When you get to rocky soil, though, it wears out the plastic pretty quick.

Nothing like a wheelie-cart for dry ground, but they're also a pain in the neck to pack in, with all the other stuff one has to carry around. On the other hand, if you're packing in a camp, a game cart may be worth it's weight in gold. We have used them for that, and every time I've had to make an extra trip to camp to get a cart to haul out a carcass, I've been glad I did. Mostly that has been when the ground was dry, and it was easy walking but hard dragging. In situations where the visqueen dragging works well, carts with wheels on them typically do not. The wheels get clogged with mud & slush, and just sliding the animal out in a plastic sheath works so slick that it will make you feel smart. It also packs pretty small on the way in.

 

[CGO]

I have followed comment on LRH for a few years and have been a sponge trying to learn more about reloading and shooting but have commented on anything. This is a first for me.
I have a brother-in-law that has built elk and deer sleds for about 25 years. He uses UHMW or something similar that is about 1/8" thick. They have holes around the perimeter with grommets installed allowing the animal to be tied on the sled with para cord. In the front there are 3 holes with grommets installed where the pull rope is attached.
They work well on almost any trail or road, dry, wet or snowy but they can be difficult on steep side hill areas. They work extremely well on snow but gravity can be the devil going up hill and then get out of the way down hill. I have found it is easier for me to quarter or half the animal and cary it out on a pack frame in rough country.
I knew a couple of older gentlemen who shot 2 deer several years ago up in northern Idaho and drug both out on closed roads, they were about a 2 mile drag on dry forest service road and they reported it worked very well but it did wear a hole in the sled where the hip was positioned. They got a second for additional hunts.
He also built a few for search and rescue for Montana with the grommets installed with the spacing for body bags.

 

[merasmus]

This forum is "Long Range Hunting", implying we're a bunch that are willing to take longer shots on game. I'm my experience, it's rare I shoot game closer to the truck than I am and longer shots means longer distances to drag game out. How do you all drag game out? Any clever devices or tricks to make dragging a deer or similar game out of the field? I just use a rope and lots of leg power but I'm getting older and lazier and might buy/build an easier way to get a deer out. What do you all do?

It's either this way or we use a Honda Rope Winch. Those little units are amazing! We have taken the last 8 bulls out whole by using the rope winch to get it to the road and then hang it/skin it in camp.

 

[merasmus]

We use horses a lot. I'd rather ride than walk. We have quartered and packed moose out but usually just lash them on our home made game sled made from a plastic barrel and drag them out from the saddle horn. We quarter them if we need to. We also have a game cart that I made. It has one wheel in the middle of the frame and 2 people can walk it out like a stretcher. We can unpin the wheel and move it to one end and then one person wheels it like a wheelbarrow. It just depends on where we are as to what we do.

 

[merasmus]

These pictures should have been attached to the below reply

 

[merasmus]

We use horses a lot. I'd rather ride than walk. We have quartered and packed moose out but usually just lash them on our home made game sled made from a plastic barrel and drag them out from the saddle horn. We quarter them if we need to. We also have a game cart that I made. It has one wheel in the middle of the frame and 2 people can walk it out like a stretcher. We can unpin the wheel and move it to one end and then one person wheels it like a wheelbarrow. It just depends on where we are as to what we do.

 

[SavageHunter11]

maybe I don't understand this concept of the rope winch. Do you just hold onto it while it winches? i was under the impression that you'd have to secure it to something like a tree to use it.

 

[Gwine]

My father in law showed me this winch that his brother built many many years ago. Pre chainsaw winch days. They grew up hunting elk in Montana and he needed something to help get them out. I'm told the motor came from an old tamper, not sure what the gearbox is from.

I'm going to see if I can get it running again for nostalgia sake.

 

[jimbires]

Gwine , if that thing could talk . I'll bet it has some stories to tell .

 

[jasent]

I never drag game. I use the gutless method