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Tools  /  Butchering Yield   Free

From the hoof to the freezer.

A 150-pound deer does not put 150 pounds in the freezer — nowhere close. This works out what a game animal or a head of butchered livestock actually yields in wrapped, freezer-ready meat, how much freezer space to clear, and how many meals it becomes. Plan your harvest, your freezer and your table around the real number.

1

The animal

2

Results

Yield
Freezer & meals
Food value

Notes

Two big drops happen between the field and the freezer. First the gut/dress (removing organs, hide, head, lower legs), then boning and trimming (bone, fat, silverskin, waste). What's left — the "cut yield" — is well under half the live weight for most game. Cutting more roasts/steaks and less ground, or leaving bone in, shifts the number; grinding trim recovers meat you'd otherwise lose. A cold-weather harvest you can hang and age eats better and keeps longer than a rushed warm-weather one. Yields here are typical averages — your animal, condition, and butcher vary. Calories and protein are a lean-meat estimate (≈650 kcal and ≈100 g protein per pound of freezer-ready meat); fatty cuts like pork and well-marbled beef run higher on calories.