Deer are regularly hunted across the United States, but some people pay exorbitant prices for imported deer meat:
Wintertime is a special time of year at Cafe Berlin, located just a few blocks from the Capitol building in Washington, D.C. This is when they roll out their menu of wild game, such as deer, wild boar, and quail. Regular customers have come to expect it. "They ask, weeks in advance, 'When does the wild game menu start? When does it start?'" says James Watson, one of the restaurant's chefs. And the star of that menu is venison. The restaurant serves venison ribs, venison loin, even venison tartar. It's food that takes your mind back to old European castles, where you can imagine eating like aristocracy.
You won't see venison in ordinary supermarkets. At Wagshall's, a specialty food shop in Washington, I found venison loin selling for $40 a pound. This venison comes from farms, usually from a species of very large deer called red deer. Much of it is imported from New Zealand.
Yet there's a very different side to this luxury meat. Less than two hours drive from Washington, Daniel Crigler has a whole freezer full of venison that he got for free. Crigler's home in central Virginia is surrounded by woodlands full of white-tail deer. For Crigler, they are venison on the hoof. And he loves hunting. "I love the outdoors. I love being out. But I also like to eat the meat," he says, chuckling. It's pretty much the only red meat he eats. And as he shows off the frozen cuts of venison in his freezer, this crusty man reveals his inner epicurean. "That's a whole loin, right there," he says. "What I like to do with that is split it open, fill it full of blue cheese, wrap it up in tin foil and put it on the grill for about an hour and a half."
And here's the odd thing about this meat, so scarce and expensive in big cities; so abundant if you're a hunter in Madison County, Virginia. Hunters like Crigler kill millions of deer every year in America, but the meat from those animals can't be sold: It hasn't been officially approved by meat inspectors. Also, the government doesn't want hunters to make money from poaching. Yet hunters are allowed to give it away, and many do. As a result, venison occupies a paradoxical place in the world of food. It's a luxury food that turns up in notably non-luxurious places.
Related: Arby's is Selling Venison Sandwiches in Six Deer-Hunting States
Deer in Multiple U.S. States Test Positive for Chronic Wasting Disease, Leading to Restrictions
(Score: 2) by Kromagv0 on Thursday January 04 2018, @07:40PM
Bought the car for under $10K. I have already put over 130,000mi on it in the 4.5 years I have owned it (I have a long commute), and got it with 80,000 miles on it. I plan to hopefully keep the car until it has 500,000 miles or more on it, and I don't sell off vehicles that are derivable, only sell them off to the scrap yard because they are so worn out and broken that they aren't worth fixing and no longer run.
Given that I have a long commute and regularly put on close to 30,000 miles a year on that car the little additional driving doesn't increase the insurance cost.
BMWs don't have timing belts they have chains that are lifetime, unless you really do something dumb, so that big expense is removed.
They do have weak factory water pumps that tend to fail at about 140,000 miles but for about 1/3 of the price of the OEM one you can stick a much better stewart pump in them that are a lifetime pump which I did and that was before I acquired my lake property.
Brakes on that car seem to last closer to 150,000 miles as it is a manual and unlike so many I actually know how to drive stick correctly (I can even drive a non-synchro manual without issue as well). Also as it is all highway except for the first mile and last 2 so the brakes don't get any real use heading up there and back over that 250mi round trip.
Being a manual also means that the huge area for failure has been eliminated which is the automatic transmission, especially when towing which murders automatics.
Even if I didn't own the lake property and go hunting I would still be doing things like changing the coolant every 2 years, changing the brake fluid every 2 years, changing the oil in the diff every year, changing the oil in the manual gear box every year so costs don't change. Granted the additional trips up there over a year do require another oil change but a filter is $8 for that car and I buy oil in bulk when it goes on sale so even with 7 quarts of a good synthetic that is only another $40 for the oil. AC service isn't difficult either and a can of R-134a can be had for about $7 here and even then my experience is that lack of use is what causes issues more than usage.
Suspension and tires are the only things that really do experience additional wear but the suspension gets more damage from the crappy pot-holed streets in the winter than by trailering. For tires I seem to go through them at a rate of a set a year as I like to go into winter with a good amount of tread instead of just serviceable tread to squeeze that last 5,000 mi out of them.
I even put a K&N filter in it not for the very slight increase in performance but because over the long term that lowers the costs as it is washable and reusable.
I try to be really smart with my money and vehicles as I grew up poor so I got to learn how to fix things, take care of things, and spot good deals.
There is the correct gear and then there is what people think they need which is a shit ton of other stuff for hunting. A good gun, some ammo, the correct amount of blaze orange, warm cloths, a good pair of warm boots, a flash light, compass, map of the area, a box of waterproof matches, a lighter, small first-aid kit, a smaller pocket knife, a large knife or hatchet, some rope, and a backpack are all that is needed when you are out. I do have a hanging stand I bought years ago at a pawn shop for $30 and that included 4 climbing sticks but that isn't necessary but is nice as it gets you up out of the line of sight of the deer and gets your stink up away from them as well. I don't have special camo cloths and don't buy into the fancy gear like game cams, call, rattles, scents, scent killer, etc. I find if you know an area, learn about deer, and learn how to spot their signs you don't need all that other stuff. Look for scrapes, rubs, food sources, water sources, understand the topology, changes in cover, scat, prints etc. as it makes up for lack of gear when out hunting.
Then there is the challenge and fun of the hunt. After a day of hunting back at camp you can sit and shoot the breeze with your buddies.
T-Shirts and bumper stickers [zazzle.com] to offend someone