SECOND HARVEST FOODBANK
Ohio hunters provide deer for 219,200 meals
Thursday, April 2, 2009 3:23 AM
By Mary Beth Lane

THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
The Second Harvest Foodbank of Southeastern Ohio used to receive the venison from 20 or 25 animals as donations from hunters during deer season.

This past hunting season, the food bank got 198 deer, processed into 6,503 pounds of venison. That provided a source of lean protein for more than 5,000 meals, said food bank coordinator Marilyn Sloan. The food bank stocks 203 food pantries and soup kitchens throughout southeastern Ohio.

Statewide, deer hunters in the 2008-09 season more than doubled the amount of venison they donated to help feed the hungry compared to what they gave the year before, officials with the Ohio Department of Natural Resources' Division of Wildlife said this week.

Hunters donated 1,096 deer -- more than 54,800 pounds of meat -- to food banks statewide, enough for about 219,200 meals for Ohioans in need. That compares with 418 deer, or 20,902 pounds of venison, that hunters donated the year before, wildlife officials said.

Donations of deer meat increased because for the first time the state paid a $100,000 subsidy to Farmers and Hunters Feeding the Hungry, a national organization with chapters and butchers across Ohio. The Ohio Association of Second Harvest Foodbanks donated $26,628 as a required local match, said executive director Lisa Hamler-Fugitt.

Hunters always could donate venison to food banks. But state wildlife officials figured that hunters would be likelier to donate surplus deer if they didn't have to pay the $75 that butchers charge to process a carcass.

Wildlife officials also wanted to encourage hunters to kill more does as part of an effort to thin the deer herd.

The Division of Wildlife plans to repeat the partnership next deer season, division Assistant Chief Jim Marshall said.

mlane@dispatch.com

quote:

Ohio hunters provide deer for 219,000 meals

...yea we did.

Kudos to Ohio, and all of the great guys living there who donated to this worthy cause..

Don

quote:

Originally posted by Kathi:
Donations of deer meat increased because for the first time the state paid a $100,000 subsidy to Farmers and Hunters Feeding the Hungry, a national organization with chapters and butchers across Ohio. The Ohio Association of Second Harvest Foodbanks donated $26,628 as a required local match, said executive director Lisa Hamler-Fugitt.

Blackmail?

quote:

Originally posted by onefunzr2:

quote:

Originally posted by Kathi:
Donations of deer meat increased because for the first time the state paid a $100,000 subsidy to Farmers and Hunters Feeding the Hungry, a national organization with chapters and butchers across Ohio. The Ohio Association of Second Harvest Foodbanks donated $26,628 as a required local match, said executive director Lisa Hamler-Fugitt.

Blackmail?

I think you missed the next sentence:
"Hunters always could donate venison to food banks. But state wildlife officials figured that hunters would be likelier to donate surplus deer if they didn't have to pay the $75 that butchers charge to process a carcass."

I did my part.