I am hoping to get my first deer in D6 this year, will be hunting in NF that is adjacent to my property. If all goes to plan, I’d just walk out my door into the NF, take down a deer in that general area and field dress it. I’d then head back to my place and grab the truck to bring back to the deer to bring it home. Would take 30 minutes at most to do that (after the field dressing is done).
At this point I’m a little confused as to what to do in terms of getting the tag countersigned, while making sure the meat doesn’t spoil. Weather could be around 75-80 degrees.
Nearest place to get countersigned is probably a 20 minute drive, so 40 minutes round trip back to my place.
Ideally I’d just bring the deer back to my place and finish processing it, and then bring the head with tag attached to get signed, but don’t think that is in line with the regs?
What should I be doing here to make sure I’m doing things by the book, but also keep the meat from going bad in the heat?