When did you start?

horsey300 said:

Where are you at?

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Georgia, about 20 minutes from downtown atlanta.

jmorris said:

Made so much noise in the blind I started gathering stuff up to leave. She asked why and I told her she was making so much noise there probably not a deer within miles. She then said, “well what about that one?”, pointing at a doe about 20 yards away looking at us

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That's good stuff right there. lol

bsparker said:

How old were you or how old were your kids on a first hunt? What’d you hunt and how’d it go?

I have been going out in the woods since I can remember. but the age I was when I carried my own rifle and actually sat For deer by myself is a little fuzzy. Probably around 13 after clearing hunter safety. I also can’t remember when I started going with my dad and just sitting with him to learn the ropes. (I’m talking about more than just walking for squirrels)

I’ve got a five year old who always wants to go with me. While I don’t anticipate getting much with him wiggling beside me. It got me thinking, when do you start taking kids out into the cold to get a taste for deer hunting?

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I took my 1 1/2 year old and sat in a heated blind. He enjoyed looking at the deer that I let walk. I will probably take him again this year even though he's well in the chatter phase.
My first memory was around 2 going quail hunting with my Grandpa and father. It's one of two memories I have of him.
My first real hunt was squirrels at 6 with a410.

My dad was no hunter more of a ham radio and electronics guy. He started taking me because I begged him to. I was 13 and my uncle who owned a pawnshop sent me a little break over .410 we shot squirrels as much as I could get him out. We never deer hunted together. Dad wouldn’t know where to start breaking down a deer.

I started taking my 3 oldest sons as soon as they could walk and pass the test of sitting in our living room “hunting”. They all passed and have been sitting with me since they were 3-4. I remember when they were just following behind me tripping over every twig or clump of grass along the way. Now they’re filling there own tags and helping to keep the freezer full.

Five is old enough my friend. Get that boy (or girl) out there wiggles or not. You’ll make memory’s and that’s way more important than a trophy. Most of the time mine would just fall asleep but there was that time a buck walked in and one of them woke up with some racket. Had to shoot that buck on the run.... I got ‘em and they love to recount the tale with me.

I started shooting at doves with a single 410 when I was 9. Actually got one on my first hunt. That was what most of our hunting consisted of growing up. Hunted a little bit of deer with hogs as a teenager (Fl) but didn't really start sitting on a stand until I was in my 20's in the army at Ft Campbell.

50-something and I still haven't started...

Got the rifle and the land, and the required certificate for the license, for a few years now, just don't know how or where to begin. I've invited some locals to come hunt my land, my only request is to show me the ropes, nobody's taken me up on it yet.

23tony said:

50-something and I still haven't started...

Got the rifle and the land, and the required certificate for the license, for a few years now, just don't know how or where to begin. I've invited some locals to come hunt my land, my only request is to show me the ropes, nobody's taken me up on it yet.

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Where are you? If you're in southern Idaho, I'll take you up on it. Probably not on your land though - I already have favorite places for everything I hunt.

.308 Norma said:

Where are you? If you're in southern Idaho, I'll take you up on it. Probably not on your land though - I already have favorite places for everything I hunt.

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North Carolina, just outside Raleigh to the NE.

Not totally set on it being my own land, but there's a lot of deer around here. I literally could just sit in my dining room with an open window.

23tony said:

North Carolina, just outside Raleigh to the NE.
Not totally set on it being my own land, but there's a lot of deer around here. I literally could just sit in my dining room with an open window.

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Find a tree near your dining room window, use a climbing or ladder stand, get up it, and shoot a deer. I learned on my own but it took a while. You can do the same.

If I were closer, I'd show you the ropes but you can do it yourself. Deer are not supernatural beings as I once thought. Just find where they like to go and get downwind of them. That's all you need to know to be a successful deer hunter.

I'd been shooting various firearms since I was 5. Deer camp was sacred though on the family farm up north. No kids. No wives.

I got to go to deer camp when I was 12 after passing my firearm safety course. I came under dressed back when winter seemed colder. Froze but still managed to fall asleep in my AM stand.

For the evening hunt I was rested and alert. Shot a real nice doe at just under 200 yards with a pre-64 30-30 lever.

I was about shaking in my proud moment walking up to it and waiting for my Dad to come find us in the field. I still remember him showing up smiling.

Then he hands me his knife and says "I'm only showing you this once, start cutting here..." and so on. Man was that a crash course.

Upland hunting was king here in the late 60s, early 70s. My dad and grandpa always had bird dogs. We hunted quail nearly every day of the season. (Really.)
I carried a bb gun for a year or two. Then it was a 20ga LC Smith sxs.
My parents gave me a 12ga 1100 firmy 8th grade graduation.
I hunted by myself and tagged a doe that fall. (1977)
So......13 years old.

bsparker said:

Agreed. Just get started. I've found with taking a few new guys that the biggest things they need some help with is field dressing and finding a good spot. Sound like you got the spot figured out. YouTube field dressing a deer and after your second or third it'll be a bit easier and you'll hack up less of the meat. First guy I talked through it, he wanted to do it himself without seeing it first, held the knife wrong and cut the backstrap all up.

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It's the field dressing that's been what's held me back, just really unsure of myself on that. I guess I just need to get over it. Thanks for the encouragement!

I took up hunting when I was in my mid 40s. My dad wasn't much into it; he preferred trout fishing.

23tony said:

It's the field dressing that's been what's held me back, just really unsure of myself on that. I guess I just need to get over it. Thanks for the encouragement!

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For me it's not as bad as cleaning a mess of fish on a hot day. Watch a few YouTube videos before you try your first one.

I was about 7 or 8 when my dad started taking me deer hunting! I was armed with my trusty Daisy Red Rider BB gun. When I turned 16 and had passed the hunter safety course I carried my dads first hunting rifle, which he bought off of one of my uncles for $12.00, a Winchester 94 in 30-30! He paid with early 1950's dollars.

1963 I killed my first rabbit with a fiberglass bow my Dad had given me and wooden arrows I re-fashened from broken ones he used for deer hunting. Mom was not happy. When Dad got home from work he showed me how to clean it then gave me my first pocket knife. We ate that rabbit for dinner. Been a hunter ever since.

My grandfather took me squirrel hunting at around 10. Went on my first deer hunt at 13. I was on my own at 14 when gramps had his stroke. He was gone when I shot my first deer at 15. Gramps hunted deer nearly every year for 40 years and never killed a deer. Now at the same age as he was I have taken over 200. My, how times have changed.

Captcurt said:

Gramps hunted deer nearly every year for 40 years and never killed a deer. .

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Hunting doesn't always include killing something.

7.....Roaming the back 40 with a 20 ga H&R single shot........9 when I killed my first deer with the same gun.

For me, 7 or 8, pheasant hunting. First kill on a hunt; a fox caught in a trap. (Pheasant hunting on a friend of my Dad's farm) Duck hunting right after taking Hunter Safety (MN, 1975) first duck-a bufflehead drake with a 20 ga. bolt action Savage.
I bought my deer rifle from my aunt at 14, learned to load for it, (started loading shotgun shells at 9) Dad wouldn't let me hunt with it until my accuracy met his expectations the next year.

My older son shot his first 'game', a woodchuck, at 7. (Unlike me he spent much of his youth growing up on a farm) He would patrol the farm we lived on , and Grandpa's farm for coyotes, woodchucks and other vermin from then until he started bowhunting at 14. Got his first doe with a bow at 15

He got his first buck the next fall with his 870 and slugs:

His younger brother isn't as much the hunter, but he's gone pheasant hunting;

And did deer hunt with me a couple times, both bow and gun, didn't get any. (missed a doe at 60 yards 5 times with my AMD-65) Hopefully he gets one hunting with his future father-in-law next fall.

Captcurt said:

My grandfather took me squirrel hunting at around 10. Went on my first deer hunt at 13. I was on my own at 14 when gramps had his stroke. He was gone when I shot my first deer at 15. Gramps hunted deer nearly every year for 40 years and never killed a deer. Now at the same age as he was I have taken over 200. My, how times have changed.

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Maybe it wasn't game he was hunting for. There are days now when I just happen to be carrying a gun on my walks through the woods. I guess the enlightened call it communing with nature.