This year’s hunting season in
"Generous hunters will donate legally harvested deer to needy
Deer hunters wishing to donate an unwanted animal can take it to a participating slaughter house. There the animal is skinned, deboned, and all of the venison ground. The meat is then placed into two pound packages and distributed around the state through the Mountaineer Food Bank in Gassaway and the Huntington Food Bank.
"Perhaps a particular hunter has an excess number of animals in a given year. Perhaps they or their family are not fond of deer meat, although I can’t imagine why," jokingly said Westfall.
A lack of ability to store harvested venison is another big reason many of the deer are donated to the program. Hunters Helping the Hungry represents the largest annual donation of red meat to the Mountaineer Food Bank. Over the years, thousands of pounds have been processed and have become the table fare for homeless shelters, senior citizen centers, soup kitchens and in the freezers of food pantries where the less fortunate can pickup food items to keep them going.
While the donations of deer have been strong, there’s another side of the program that often struggles. The cost of the program can often become steep, and because DNR funds by law cannot be used for the program’s costs, it must rely on the generosity of other
"Without this funding and without these donations, the program simply can’t continue," Westfall says.
To find a list of participating processors and learn more about the program, click here.