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Armadillo

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BillinOregon

BillinOregon

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I was yakking with a friend who trapped 37 armadillos over the past year on her farm in Missouri and the topic of 'dillo as table fare came up. Apparently it was on more than one American table as "Hoover Hog" during the Depression and is alleged to taste like high-quality pork. I have since heard from three fellas who have personally eaten it and all agreed it was excellent. I kinda like the critters so am in no hurry to dispatch one, but it is interesting to know.
https://armadillo-online.org/food.h...los,traditional ingredient in Oaxaca, Mexico.
 
Jaeger, yes, they are vectors for Hansen's disease, but carefully cleaned and fully cooked the meat presents no risk of transmission. Also, keep in mind that 95 percent of humans are immune to the leprosy bacterium. It's probably biologically safer eating 'dillo than feral hog!
Oldwood, in parts of the South, it was apparently possum. Listen to Burl Ives' lyrics:
 
Armadillo are considered a huge nuisance around here. They are seen as roadkill as much as possum once was. They keep one portion of my yard and many of my wife's flower beds ripped up most of the year.
As far as the possum as food here in the south, when I was in my teens we has a feist that was a squirrel hunting fool in daylight hours. Bring a long gun out at night and he wanted to hunt possum. He was on more tree dog. My dad worked at a large local aluminum plant with quite a number of men of an ethnic minority who were noted for their love of the meat of the possum. A few of us boys would take Fido several times a year and capture a few possums and send to my dad's friends at work. Occasionally they would bring their dogs and we boys would act as guides as we knew our way around at night.
 
Ok....One more back woods W.Va. story , vintage , 1940 .My neighbor's grandpap told about how they used to go out on the Cheat River , and get a bunch of coons , cook 'em up and feed their kids two girls , and four boys , fried coon for supper. They had a looser undesirable cousin that seemed to show up every time he sensed a coon feast. In back woods W. Va. then , possom was shuned as good eats by most folks. When coon huntin ' ya always git a possom or so , 'cause dogs tree most anything , and flash lights went dim , and coal pit carbide lamps had only enough light to see to navigate the woods. So , with little way to differentiate coon eyes or Possom eyes to shoot , possoms got wasted. ...........Back to the undesirable intrusive cousin coming uninvited to supper. The boy's mom gave the ok to cook Possom for the cousin so he would quit coming uninvited , and coon for the rest of the folks. Cousin was served fried possom , all he could eat , and the rest coon. The joke fell on the boys , as cousin said , that was the best coon he ever ate.
 
Meats meat and I’ve tried lots of wild food but I was going to try both armadillo and opossum several time. Could never get it in to the pot.
Both have been too nasty for me to try
Spiders snakes and and most bugs I can handle. But I’ll kill any armadillo I see
 
Armadillo is a great survival food, tasty, nutritious, easy to clean, easy to kill. The meat looks and tastes like rich pork.

Wash your hands well after de-shelling the carcass, and be sure to cook thoroughly; no rare meat.

Possum, for me, is much too greasy to enjoy.

Funny possum story: My ex-wife loved cats; when we went our ways, she had 24 inside cats and 24 outside cats. And with all the catfood out back on the patio, neighboring possums knew where to come for a free meal.

Well, one of the baby possums got left behind one night, so she put it into the bathtub with some old towels, and fed it right there. She called me when she had taken care of the baby for about 6 weeks, and said that the baby was growling and hissing at her, what should she do?

Told her to carefully pick it up in one of the towels, take it outside, and turn it loose!


Never thought much of eating the pesky marsupials after finding a dead cow in the back pasture. Walked up and kicked the carcass; about a dozen possums came scrambling out! Adult possums have 52 shiny, sharp teeth that are covered in the goop from eating anything they can find.
 
I would agree that armadillo is excellent table fare!! At least the ones we eat growing up. This was in South America. Dressed out they had more meat than an average chicken. Young Whistlepig isn’t bad either if prepared correctly.
 
Had them when I lived in Louisiana. They cautioned that you shouldn't handle them because they were carries of a cancer that could be passed on to humans.
 
Codger Craig Wilcox said:
Armadillo is a great survival food, tasty, nutritious, easy to clean, easy to kill. The meat looks and tastes like rich pork.

Wash your hands well after de-shelling the carcass, and be sure to cook thoroughly; no rare meat.

Possum, for me, is much too greasy to enjoy.

Funny possum story: My ex-wife loved cats; when we went our ways, she had 24 inside cats and 24 outside cats. And with all the catfood out back on the patio, neighboring possums knew where to come for a free meal.

Well, one of the baby possums got left behind one night, so she put it into the bathtub with some old towels, and fed it right there. She called me when she had taken care of the baby for about 6 weeks, and said that the baby was growling and hissing at her, what should she do?

Told her to carefully pick it up in one of the towels, take it outside, and turn it loose!


Never thought much of eating the pesky marsupials after finding a dead cow in the back pasture. Walked up and kicked the carcass; about a dozen possums came scrambling out! Adult possums have 52 shiny, sharp teeth that are covered in the goop from eating anything they can find.
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When I moved to the Ozarks I tried my hand at trapping the local wildlife.
I had trapped beaver and snared a rabbit or two growing up in New Mexico
But had never tried coon, Bob cat and such as run around here.
Killed a opossum and cut it up to bate my traps
Nothing came near, except a crow
I never trapped a bird before.
Caught bobcat and coon on chicken guts, Fox, Bobcat and mink on cat food. Never trapped a coyote, but nothing seemed to be interested in opossum meat
 
Gotta share this one.........Times were tough after the coal mines shut down post WW2. My dad was working three jobs , so we wouldn't loose our house to the bank. I spent most of my time as a little kid growing up in the 80 acre abandoned farm field and woods behind our house. Mom's cousin was land mgr. for the Pa.Game Comm. , and he gave me a book on how to trap critters. Read the book , did some field research , and found the muskrats living in the creek banks in the edge of the field , might have saleable hides. Got a jump trap the size to clamp on a muskrat , set it in a big hole in the creek bank on Sat. afternoon. The book said to check my trap at first light to insure my catch didn't escape. Sunday morning before breakfast , I ran the couple hundred yds. to the trap site to find a good sized grey fur ball critter in my trap. The book said , I had to kill the critter , skin it and turn the hide inside out , and put a board in the skin , fur side in to dry it. I gave it a good wack with a dry limb , and it looked dead to me. My six yr. old sensible brain thought I should see if this thing was a muskrat , or some other valuable fir bearer. Our neighbor's house was closest , and John was from W.Va. , and knew most everything about wild things , so knocked on his kitchen door. Sure enough John came to the door dressed in his church goin' clothes , a blue suit. I showed him the critter I had caught , and asked him if he deemed it to be valuable. John said it was a big possom , and not too valuable , which made me sorry I had "killed" it by mistake. John said , not to worry. He said to take it out on the side lawn , leave it there for a bit , and observe the "dead" possom from behind the corner of the garage out of sight. John left for church , and in a minute , the possom sprang up and trotted down the road as if a miricle happened. When John got back from church , I ran over to him and told what happened. He laughed and said , possoms sometimes go into a sleep , if they are threatened , and come alive when danger is passed. That was a six yr. old trapper's first lesson. As i grew older and more experienced , I ran a trapline of 30 or more trap sets starting at 4Am in the morning , and back home for breakfast , and school bus by 8 AM. In the trapping season , my best year was around 20 + musk rats worth $2 each. I was rich after the traps were pulled before winter Ice shut the season down , and I sold my furs. When you have little , then gain something , though the work was hard , lessons are learned.
 
Camping/fishing at Bennett Springs state park, I took ny Bassett, Roscoe, for an evening stroll. He's never seen an armadillo and I did not realize what the animal was that was digging beneath a tree. Also didn't realize Roscoe could shed his dog collar.

Armadillo jumped up in the air and took off with Roscoe in pursuit, baying like a bloodhound after a convict. He was an old dog, but waddled along as best he could. They headed for the Niangua river where I lost sight. Calling his name did no good. Walking past some people drinking beer around a campfire, I asked if they'd seen a Bassett chasing an armadillo.

"Can't say as I ever have." "Well, if you do, the dog is mine. Please let me know if they come past you all." Roscoe came out of the brush a while later, without an armadillo. I did not know they can run. They look like those roly-poly bugs.
 
NotDanielBoone said:
When I was in Georgia recently shooting pigs the locals we were with told us to not touch the armadillos because of leprosy. I guess they were right.
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I read that about 20% of them are infected with the virus and one can get infected by touching or eating it. I won’t kill them but won’t touch them either. They are common here in Central Florida.
 

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