I only use gloves if I have a cut or sore on my hands or fingers, which is often.  I use a plastic elbow high glove most times.  You get them at Dicks, Sportsmans Warehouse, or other sporting goods store or a farm/ranch/feed store.  I've also bought vinyl surgical gloves at pharmacies or supermarkets. I don't use latex, gives the meat a bad taint in my opinion.  Sometimes I don't even use gloves, if i don't have any wounds on my hands. Just bring scent-free baby wipes or moist towlettes to clean up yourself afterwards.

I've never used gloves for either field dressing or when I butcher the meat at home and I have never worried about it.  However I have a friend that packs some nitrile gloves with him where ever he goes along with a bottle of rubbing alcohol to clean up with after.  I guess that we are two extremes. 

I used to always look down on people who used gloves as being unmanly or something like that.  But I've gutted literally several hundred animals, and when I'm on a hunting trip, I cannot get the blood out from under my nails and cuticles.  You just stay so much cleaner.  Yeah there will always be a slight smell, but it's easier to clean off your arms than it is to clean out all the nooks and crannies in your hands.  Anyway, it's so much better now.  I've also taken to bringing along butcher's wipes for cleaning blood off of things.  They are hydrogen peroxide based, instead of alcohol, which does a much better job of removing blood.  And I'm far from a neat freak, but I find this to be one small thing that's easy to bring along.  Gloves are also nice when you're helping your friend gut his animal, so you aren't getting crap in your fingers from someone else's game.  I usually take 5 or so pairs because my friends rarely have their own.

With some game animals like Bear, Wild Boar, and Cougars you're going to want to wear gloves when dresing them out.  Those animals harbour all types of viruses that you can get exposed to from the raw meat and the blood.  Bovine TB, strains of Hepititis, just to name a few.  The only thing on deer and elk I'dbe worried about is CWD.  Like I said I always seem to have some type of cut or scratch on my hands and fingers, so I try and stay protected.

I've never worn gloves to gut a deer, but I hate to even touch a hog without something on my hands. They are just plain nasty and are well known to carry brucellosis, a nasty disease.  

I just started using some of those blue ones a couple of years ago. I was never concerned about disease or anything but it sure makes getting cleaned up a lot easier. It's also much easier to roll up a pair and stick them in your pack after your finished than it is a whole pile of wipes.

It sounds like I should be paying attention to the health issues as well though.

I use the blue Nitrile gloves.  I really do not like to wear glovs while doing the messy work, I like to feel what I cutting...call me crazy, But I do where the gloves to help keep my hands clean and too if the animal has some issuesI do not want it transfer to me....better safe than sorry!  Sorry to hear about your friend.

I use 8mm blue nitrile gloves, which I purchase fron Gemplers.com.

I have never used gloves nor anyone I have ever hunted with. I have had one incident and I don't think gloves would have helped me then. I was skinning a bear and slipped and stuck the knife through the joint in my thumb where it meets my palm and it went clear through the joint.

Always remeber to just be careful and not get in a hurry.

Quinton