Nathan Forest
nforest@uwyo.edu
Whether you love to eat game meats, like antelope, deer or elk, or hate it for that “gamey” taste, game meats, can be a healthier alternative to domesticated meats.
Hunting is big business here in Wyoming, and in the U.S. as a whole where, every year, thousands of antelope, deer and elk are harvested. This harvesting of wild animals provides a vital source of meat for families across America.
There has been a major push in the U.S. for people to consume leaner meats, like turkey, as an alternative to more fatty meats. Game meats can certainly help fill this role in a diet.
“If you’re looking for a lean meat, there’s probably not going to be a leaner meat than antelope, deer or elk,” Dr. Warrie Means, an animal scientist who specializes in meat science said.
“There will be some differences in myoglobin content. Myoglobin is a protein which is responsible for the red color of meat,” Dr. Means said. “Game meat generally has more myoglobin in it, so it may be a little darker, richer color.”
Though Dr. Means did concede that at the most basic level, meats of any sort are all basically the same biologically.
While game meats certainly contain less fat than domesticated meats, the differences are not as big as one would imagine, and are also heavily dependent on the cut of meat you are eating.
According to “Nutritional Content of Game Meat” published by the Animal Science department at University of Wyoming, per 100 grams of uncooked lean meat, many domesticated and game animals have similar percentages. Pronghorn antelope had 2.5 grams of fat, mule deer had 2.7 grams, elk had 2 grams while range grazed beef had 2.4 grams and grain-fed beef only had 5 grams.
Dr. Means also said that those percentages can vary greatly, and he has tested meat samples from bull elk in the rut that had less than one percent body fat. But the cut of meat is also important in fat content and many of the more choice domestic meat cuts are quite fatty.
“If you are eating brisket, there is a lot more fat, if you’re eating bacon, it’s nearly 50 percent fat,” Dr. Means said.
Though not all fat is bad, often times the fat content and quality is what gives meat a sizable portion of its flavor.
“Some of the fat that you can get from animals that are fed a lot of corn is less healthy,” Amy Bey, a registered dietician who works in Washakie, said.
However, despite the health benefits, some people are opposed to game meats because of hunting and the availability of food in grocery stores. As Dr. Means said, one of the biggest advantages of domesticated meat is that it isn’t seasonal and can be bought at any time.
But when buying meat from a store, you don’t know what has been done to it. You don’t know where the animal comes from or how it was processed and with ground beef, how many animals compose the meat.
This isn’t the case with game meats that have been killed by hunters and locally or personally processed.
“We know the exact history of that food, we harvest it, process it, we know every aspect and we know everything that was done to it,” Corey Class, the wildlife management coordinator for Laramie Wyoming Fish and Game said.
The advantages of game meats aren’t just staying in the homes and stomachs of hunters though. The Washakie Dining Center has provided the occasional offering of game meats in the cafeteria, like bison.
“We’re a western school and hunting and fishing are big here and we know that a lot of our students are coming from houses where they grew up eating that,” Bey said.
All of these experts agreed that if it is available to you, game meats can be a healthy part of a well-balanced diet. Although, most admitted that sourcing enough game meats can occasionally be quite challenging.
Bey was also quick to point out that a leaner alternative can be healthier, but Americans on average eat quite a bit more meat on a daily basis than is nutritionally recommended. It is recommended that adults only eat about 0.21 pounds of meat per day, the average American eats closer to 0.36 pounds of meat per day, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Corey Class encourages students interested in becoming hunters to check out the hunting mentor program offered by the Wyoming Game and Fish Department.
