Talking of eating Crow...I have shot a couple of Woodchucks up here in NH, (with my trusty Greener HammerGun)...Id see the tops of my Bush Beans quivering, n Id put the sneak on him...though a 22 through the kitchen window is more efficient, but less fun.
Im a huge fan of Rabbit as table fare...never had the guts to dress one up for the oven...perhaps this year....anyone ever eaten a Groundhog??, its in the same family, rodent,right
cheers Franc

He's a big squirrel that eats only clean, green, vegetation. You could do worse. Squirrel is, "the other dark meat". I rate it with beef.
I've done it, but not recently (I make more money now, than I did then). I prefer it prepared as Brunswick stew, and use actual beef gravy. Google Brunswick stew, and skin him, then, have at it.

Best,
Ted

I remember trying it years ago at a game dinner and I think it was prepared primarily like a stew. As I remember it was ok.
Jim

I used to shoot them growing up (their holes and our horses were not a good mix), and my father would take them to work for some of the plant workers. It never occurred to me to keep them.

Shot a bunch of them years ago in NY. Use to just stuff them back in their holes. We may have been missing out. Like Ted said they're greenies.

I've tried grilling and stewing. Stewing worked much better. It's boney, but perfectly good tasting. Grilling produced pretty tough meat. A pair of woodchucks can eat 1/2 ton of Alfalfa in a summer, so in that light, eating them tastes pretty good.

Thanks folks,
I can make a pretty good stew, will try it with Woodchunks ...with Dumplings too...will report back
I believe the Beverly HillBilly's thought highly of it
cheers
franc

My father can tell you....in the early 60's he would drive his Chrysler into the 'farm country' outside of Buffalo and shoot woodchucks with his .222 Remington. The farmers would welcome anyone who would shoot them.

He'd load the trunk of the Chrysler with them when he was done and drive into the...more racially segregated ..... area of Buffalo. He remembers it well even now at the ripe age of 88... the folks there came to recognize his red car coming down the street. By the time he came to a stop they'd be lined up. He'd pop the trunk and the woodchucks would be parceled out in no time.

I ate then a couple of times when I shot them as a kid. My mother, who grew up in Idaho, would cook woodchuck for the family but she refused to even let me bring a rabbit into the house. Harking back to her childhood in Idaho, she considered rabbit to be vermin.

Steve

They also spoke highly of opossum innards, particularly as left-overs served the next day.

Steve

I would think most recipes for rabbit would work. It reminds me of when my Grandma was alive, I'd always bring home a rabbit for her, and she'd make traditional Hasenpfeffer. Mmmm, onions, wine, and vinegar...Waldmurmeltierpfeffer?

one time when up at deer camp one of the guys brought a big pot of ChopSuey ....we were all suspicious about it??...but he said he wouldn't tell us what it was made out of until after dinner..we said he had to eat it with us..He did....we all ate in fact I think I went back for seconds....turned out to be porcupine...Im telling you, you couldn't tell it from raccoon or possum .....

Crock pot, onions, carrots, etc
YUM!!

I have eaten groundhogs. They are great. Every bit as good as beef. They are grazing the same grass as a steer.

The biggest issue I had was the fact that we hunt them in summer. So if you kill one at mid-day, it's too hot to drag him around the rest of the day. The ones I brought home were killed late afternoon and cleaned out promptly, then put in a cooler.

I agree with skeettx above. The crock pot is perfect for making a nice tender entrée of groundhog.

Curl

I used to run traplines in MN and WI, we lived on venison, beaver, muskrats and raccoon. I wouldn't pass up a nice young woodchuck or marmot if given the chance. Folks used to joke that "we didn't know you could eat meat that didn't have a bullet hole in it".

I much prefer the young ones just out of the den for the first couple days. Cut up, battered and chicken fried. And you really need to clean them quickly, skin them and cool the meat very soon or they will stink you out of the house while cooking. Head shots with .22 only; not blown up with a high velocity varmit bullet to the body.

I have eaten young groundhogs many times, slow roasted with potatoes and onions, or made into stew and it was very good. As Ted says, they eat the same thing as cattle... grass, alfalfa, and clover. I typically have to replant my broccoli every year until I shoot the garden raiding groundhogs. They tasted like beef to me with a finer texture to the meat. I've always taken the advice to not bother with larger older ones, and have been told they quickly get very tough and don't taste as good when they mature. But I couldn't say that's factual or not. In my area, the young are just now getting old enough to survive alone if the mother is killed, so we never hunted them until after the first week of June. So the window of time to shoot small ones for the pot was short. When I used to go chuck hunting with my Dad and Uncle as a kid, we always gutted them and put them in a cooler and after hunting, they'd drop them off at the home of a black guy my uncle worked with, and you'd have thought we were delivering gold bars. It didn't matter if they were smaller or big old gray haired boars.

Fifty years ago my Arkansas grandmothers fried the young squirrels like chicken. They made squirrel and dumplings with the old ones.

Both methods produced a good meal.

I made a good Gumbo with one,it was greasy but was very tasty.Don't forget to make a big pan of biscuits to go with it.My late retired machinist buddy reported his mother mostly raised them on groundhogs and they made shoe strings from the skins.
Mike

I always cut them into five pieces, cooked them in a crock pot with chile verde, then deboned them, and threw away the bones and used the chile/'chuck for a substitute for machaca in burritos and enchiladas.

I lived in Vermont then and you should have seen my "Woodchuck" neighbors scarf them down (the exotic "Negra Modelo" may have had something to do with it....). Not a lot of Mexican food available in those parts in the '80s. "Woodchucks" HATE woodchucks.

Had to read that line twice. I placed one word in the wrong sequence the first time!

guns I laughed out loud. I was raised on a farm too.

Thanks.

My Lithuanian grandma cooked woodchuck---for the dog. How did she cook it? Just throw it into a big pot, boil it, hair, guts and all! What a stink--she said you just needed to kill the worms, dogs eat road kill and survive. Yuck! Nothing went to waste on her farm.....But I read there are some scent glands you should cut out if people are being fed. Never tried it after seeing grannie cook it!

NO!!!!

Watched an episode of "Hillbilly Blood" this weekend where the boys from Cold Mountain, N.C. cooked up some possum road kill. Sorry to say the only part left worth cooking was the legs. It kind of looked funny with those possum feet in the frying pan.
But I will say it must is going to be a long summer when a tread like this sprouts legs like it has.
Just saying

One Sunday when I was a kid, the Old Man skipped church and went fishing. Bored, I grabbed an old single 12 and went for a walk in the back pastures. I jumped a fat groundhog and gave him a dose of #3. I toted him back to the house and asked Mom if she would cook it. For some reason, she agreed, and I cleaned him and she threw him in the roaster pan with some onion soup mix. Lo and behold the Preacher shows up to check on why we weren't at church. Now, for anyone who hasn't grown up in the Bible Belt, it's common for preachers to make their rounds and its a written, enforceable law (somewhere) that he must be fed best Sunday dinner when he comes by. Mom went into a panic, because she was flat busted with the Old Man out fishing (another law). She went into a bustle fixing cornbread, potatoes and green beans while nervously conversing with the Preacher as he patiently sat at the dinner table. I set the table and poured the ice tea. Once all the platters were filled, out came the main entree. The Guest of Honor lifted the roaster lid and there sat brother groundhog, all gray and slick with fat. At which point Preacher, a man well experienced in surprise meals, deadpanned, "Well, what are we having, rat?" Mom's heart stopped and and her mouth started moving with no words coming out. Preacher asked me to help cut it up and we dug in. Kinda stringy and a bit greasy. We finished and Preacher went on his way. Mom took her first full breath only after the door shut. Next Sunday we were all in church. I recall the Old Man not looking too happy.

I have shot a lot of groundhogs on our farm in Virginia. Never eaten one though.

I have been told by those that have eaten groundhog that the younger ones were good eating.

Good story A10CN....laughed out loud on that one!

Never eaten groundhog, there's none here in N ID, but perhaps a rock chuck would be a good substitute. My brother and I did cook up a raccoon he trapped years ago. It tasted decent, but was a bit greasy. My folks were mortified that we cooked and ate it.

Never tried wood chuck, but always intended too...Any of my 3 favorite muskrat recipes ought to work for 'chucks:
1) boil lightly the skinned/gutted body and pick the meat off. Then layer the meat in a casserole dish with alternating layers of rice and cheese. cover and bake at 350 for 20 minutes or so.
2)I once substituited muskrat for chicken in my mother's chicken caccatorre recipe. Those that tried it, loved it.
3) Muskrat meatloaf. Ground rat mixed with all the traditional meat loaf ingrediants. Very tasty.
Mergus

I have not eaten any Woodchucks but I had an older friend who was raised out in New York state, he told me they used to hunt them to eat. They would string out a can of baked beans for them when they got gunshy. He claimed that a Woodchuck could not resist baked beans from a can. I know they eat them.
I also had an older lady who taught me a good method of cooking Raccoons and I am sure it would work for Woodchucks.
First she said to never try and eat an old one, only the younger ones. Next you have to skin them as soon as you can and gut them, then you take out the scent glands under the front legs, she called them kernels. You then take a knife and cut and scrape off all the fat you can get off the carcass. Then you need to parboil them in vinegar water, this removes more fat residue and gets rid of some of the stronger taste.
Last, you cut up a large onion and an apple, quarter both and stuff them into the body cavity, then do a slow roast in the oven after adding a little liquid to the bottom of the pan. This method turns young raccoons into a delicious meal. I have eaten Beaver fixed this way as well. Cook them long and low to make them good and tender. Bob

Thanks for the replies lads,
Now that I've made up my mind to eat one, I prolly won't see one this year, as I only have a small container type garden on the deck, but might just plant a small row of bush bean to Bait them in.
In the past, after shooting them,what put me off skinning was that they just seemed to be crawling with fleas n ticks...any good way to de louse em?...i was thinking a decent singe with a hand held propane torch?...or do the vermin leave the body when it cools?
I suppose I could put a flea n tick dog collar on them for a couple hours after death?,lol.I wonder if you could soak them in vinegar or booze, even a mild bleach mix or something to rid rid ofthe wee vermin?
cheers
franc

Lots of game animals have fleas, ticks, etc. Nobody delouses their deer, do they? I have shot a few deer that had a lot of ticks that dropped off the carcass after it cooled. But that kind of cooling is a problem in the summer. Just gut 'em and skin 'em and the pests will be gone with the entrails and hide. Stick with the young chuck's or you may not go back for seconds.

No. Man, those suckers are tough to skin.

This isn't about eating them, but a friend is a rifleman. Any rifle he acquires is not truly his until it has killed a groundhog. He bought a Remington .416. I asked him if he used solids or soft points. "Soft points," he deadpanned. He said he caught one out in the open at about 20 yards and put a round through the center. The chuck up and took off on a run and collapsed at the entry to its hole some 30 yards away. He said inasmuch as the bullet had not opened up, my comments about their tough skin did not stand up to the facts.

Pound for pound - inch for inch, groundhogs are the toughest animals I know of. They will tear up a much bigger dog in short order.

Whistle Pigs are very good eatting! To prepare gut and remove glands on legs. cool and skin as soon as possible. cut in quarters. place in lidded pot and cover with water.parboil and change water as it clouds up 3 times this is important as to cleaning the meat. you are now able to cook as you perfer,fry as chicken.bake as a roast or grill. done this way it is as goof as fresh chicken. ENJOY. Pilgrim

I have really enjoyed this thread!
Read every entry and giggled a lot.
Good on you all for eating what you shoot, or at least talking about it!
My dad used to cook squirrel (yes, your native grey which was introduced here back in the C19th), tasted fine but has too many bones for my taste.
My mother would never touch it!

Toby,
The front end of the squirrel is bony. The hind quarters of grey and fox squirrels are a meal fit for a king. I usually hunted them with a Remington 552, using .22 shorts, which would save a half hour of rock throwing if you had put a .22 long rifle round through one resting on a branch in the tree, and he died in place. I usually had a least a few that I put the shot into the front, and ended up with some trimmings for the gravy, off the front, and little else. I would pass a shot rather than put the bullet into the hindquarters. Head shots happened here and there, but, the shot into the front end just behind the front legs was most common for me.
I was never big on frying anything except fish, but, prepared as I posted, in a Brunswick stew, wild squirrel is better than good.
I might end up divorced if my Colombian born wife saw me heading up the walk with a fistful of squirrels, so it has been a long time for me.
I will work on fixing that-maybe she can visit her homeland around the time small game season opens, here.

Best,
Ted

Squirrel was always my favorite Fur game to eat. Best piece to me was the back, hindlegs next & front leg last, didn't care for the rib cage. I could tell when I skinned them which way they would cook. Young tender ones went to the Fry Pan, older tougher ones had to made into a stew or Squirrel & Dumplings. A young frying squirrel is Royal Eating as far as I'm concerned.
Hunted them for many years with a Mossberg bolt action I took in on a trade. Couldn't get anything for it so got my money's worth shooting squirrels. It would feed either LR or Shorts. It was a tack driver with LR but "Patterned" rather than grouped with shorts. I shot the standard velocity LR's in it for squirrel hunting to avoid the Super-Sonic crack of the High speed stuff. Easiest way to clear a tree of squirrels I ever found was to fire one of those high speed rounds with the sharp crack.
I have eaten quite a few ground hogs & a couple of coons. My personal preference was for the Coon. I don't think we have "WoodChucks" in the South, least I never heard no animal called that. I would take some good Gator Tail over any of the above though, but don't get any of it except by traveling a Fur Piece to a good Cajun Restaurant. CrawDads are also mighty fine eating, I Like them made into that Etoufee. I like just about any meat I ever tried except Liver of any kind, I'll take a good bait of Chitlins over liver anyday.

I have a particular aversion to shooting any kind of 'chuck'.

regards
Chuck

Good one Chuck! Perhaps we could assuage your aversion to shooting a "chuck" by using the word marmot? To which both the hmmm.... woodchuck and rock chuck are of the genus marmota.

You could probably substitute the chuck in this recipe......lol


Or, find a can of this..........

You're right, Miller. Down heah' they are called groundhogs. Plenty of 'em in N. Georgia, tho' not here in my area, thankfully.

SRH

Some years back I lived in a citified area but still managed to have a small garden. A chuck decided to show up and chow down. No shooting allowed, so Animal Control rented me a Hav-a-Heart trap. Sucker was halfway through chewing his way out through the wire mesh after only an hour in the box.
That, and their whistle is damned loud.

How much ground could a ground hog hog just doesn't have the same ring to it.

'How much whistle could a whistle pig pig'....nope.