When did you start?

9x56MS said:

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.

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NO, back then we didn't have many deer in North Arkansas. The state deer population was about 125,000 when I was a teen. Fewer than that when Gramps was alive. He didn't even own a rifle bigger than a single shot 22. He either borrowed a rifle or took a s shotgun. I can remember only one deer that he shot at with a slug and lost it. Most of his hunting stories were about turkeys. He loved to hunt turkeys but we didn't have them when I was a teen. I saw my first turkey in Missouri in 1970.

I don't remember the very first hunt, but probably riding around in my dad's '53 Chevy shooting rabbits out the window with a single shot .22 when there was snow on the ground. Road hunting was my dad's favorite since he had severe foot/ankle problems that prevented walking much. Do remember shooting my first squirrel with my dad's Iver Johnson 410 single shot. I stayed with the car while my dad and brother were picking up corn that was missed by the corn picker. I was sitting on the fender of the car when a squirrel walked by in the brush a few yards away. I fetched the 410 from the car and using both hands managed to get it cocked. It was an easy shot. The shot scared the crap out of my dad so he and my brother came running. I proudly displayed my squirrel, which turned out to be grizzled and very old with no tail.

I grew up out in the swaps in the pine barrens of nj went out there with pop since I could remember. Didn't take up hunting til I was 34. Pop grew up hunting, but the woods experience of Vietnam altered his opinion on being in the woods with folks with weapons around him.
Taught me to shoot. BB guns at 9 rimfires 10 muzzleloaders at 11.
I gleamed most of my hunting knowledge from my uncle's, but ironically have always hunted alone.
My son is starting to show interest,at 13 but is not a fan of fire arms. When he is ready he will join me, he loves rhe woods.

Still haven't. In my 50th decade on this planet. Grew up in the concrete jungle, been in TX for 16 years, still haven't. But then I'm anti-social by nature - necessity more than desire. LOL

Hunting can be done on your own-indeed, I prefer doing it that way.

Wait, 50th decade? You're 500 years old?!

TarDevil said:

I wish I could remember. I wandered all over my county with my 16 ga SxS, harvesting squirrels and rabbit. When I ran out of daylight I laid down and slept, unless I was close to a friend's house and sheltered there.

Hunted deer with my dad quite a bit as a young teenager. Got away from firearms and hunting until the last couple decades.

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It is amazing how each of us can have such different experiences. I didn’t think my upbringing was overly sheltered, but your story is so different it is kind of shocking. Spending the night out alone in the woods as a child!

entropy said:

Hunting can be done on your own-indeed, I prefer doing it that way.

Wait, 50th decade? You're 500 years old?!

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LOL, sometimes it feels as though I am. Hahaha

Sundance1908 said:

Still haven't. In my 50th decade on this planet.

But then I'm anti-social by nature. LOL

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I’d be anti-social too, if I’d just turned 490.

I killed my first deer at 9, but don't really remember when I started going with my dad.

my oldest son was going with me, unarmed, at probably 6-7, normally rabbit and squirrel hunting. When he was 8-9 I started letting him carry a rifle when deer hunting and he killed his first deer that year. At 11 he finished 2nd in a local long range (600 yard) charity shoot. By 12 he was hunting by himself and I was having to put limits on him because he would kill anything. He was probably the safest person I ever saw handle a gun.

my youngest I finally made go with me a few times at about 10-11 I could tell he was miserable even though he pretended to be having a good time, he’s almost 18 now and hasn’t killed anything and has no interest in hunting at all, which is fine, people are different.


one thing I will not do is go duck hunting with a kid below about 17-18. I’m sure some are some out there that can do it safely but I’ve seen to many close calls, some very close. I don’t have stats but I fully believe duck hunting is the most dangerous hunting you can do in the lower 48.

DeepSouth said:

one thing I will not do is go duck hunting with a kid below about 17-18. I’m sure some are some out there that can do it safely but I’ve seen to many close calls, some very close. I don’t have stats but I fully believe duck hunting is the most dangerous hunting you can do in the lower 48.

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I disagree. I don't know of anyone who was killed duck hunting because of the lack of gun safety. However, I personally know of 3 people who were killed or blinded while turkey hunting.

I was still restricted to pellet guns and had to lean my Benjamin up against a tree to pump it and would regularly get calls from my Grandfather to come take out something in his garden and once a bluejay making a nest, in a tree above his grill, with his hair. Not sure how old I was but likely single digit.

Mine was too young when she decided she was going. Making so much noise I started packing up and she asked, “why”. I told her, she was making so much noise there probably were not any deer with in miles of us. She then said, “What about that one?” I turned to see her pointing out the window at a doe that had just passed under the blind and looking in, must have been curious as to what the ruckus was about.

I started hunting rabbits and squirrels in our fruit orchard around 7 years old, double barrel sears & roebuck 12ga. About 8 or 9 , I got to start using Win model 62 pump .22lr. Killed my first deer at 11yrs old, 12ga Browning A5 and a slug.

I was 25 when I started hunting. I was the city boy who never held a firearm that married the farmer's daughter. It was her father that taught me to shoot and having grown up deer hunting with her older brother and dad it was SHE that got me into hunting. I later added competitive rifle and handgun shooting and have enjoyed a lifetime of pleasure both hunting and shooting.

Patocazador said:

I disagree. I don't know of anyone who was killed duck hunting because of the lack of gun safety. However, I personally know of 3 people who were killed or blinded while turkey hunting.

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That is a very legitimate point and you well be right. I know 2 people who have died duck hunting, though only one was gun related. But to your point, I have heard several horror stories from turkey hunters, just none I personally knew.

Dove hunting is no safe hunt when carried out improperly either.

I guess anytime careless people hunt together it get dangerous.


I’ve just seen so many shotguns go off within a couple feet of someone’s head too put the fear in me, theirs only about 2-3 people in the world I’ll duck hunt with.

1958, Cairo, IL, along the Mississippi River. Ducks.
Dad, uncle, and friends had a lodge and blinds along the river in the reeds.
While I slept, they all played cards and drank whiskey. A very bad example that I never repeated.
My first duck was a Teal using a Remington 20ga.

wombat13 said:

but your story is so different it is kind of shocking.

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Really?
I wasn't always alone...that's the way most my friends were.
Even after I started driving I kept a sleeping bag in my car. The only time it angered my parents was when I came home really late and slept in the front yard. Dad would tell me to at least sleep in the back, out of sight.

I had $5. I knew nothing about guns. I knew nothing about hunting. No one in my family hunted. No one in my family owned a gun. I walked into a hardware store. There on the rack was a 410. I asked how much it was. $20. I gave the man my $5 to put the gun on layaway. Two weeks later, after helping my dad at work " construction" he started to hand me my pay. I asked if I could get my gun out of layaway. First he knew about it. We stopped by the hardware and picked up my gun. I went rabbit hunting with my new gun. I knew nothing about guns. Nothing about hunting. Nothing about hunting laws. I brought home my first rabbit. That was over 65 years ago. Since I've learned all the hunting laws in the two states I've hunted. Since, I've never been without a gun. Since I've hunted practically every weekend. Since I've taught myself to disassemble, repair, refinish and reassemble most lever actions, pumps and semi autos. Moral of the story?? $20 even $5 was a lot of money to me back then. But it was worth it.

I started out with BB guns also, then graduated to .22s when I was a kid. My first real hunt was at 12, age of legal hunting in PA.
I hunted with a 16 ga with slugs, still have the ammo. Never got to shoot it. All the deer we saw were out of range for me.
I remember Dad, with his model 70, and Mom, with her 30-30 Marlin, both taking deer off the front porch of our house.
We hunted for meat, never saw an antler set hanging around for as long as I can remember.
We raised Pheasants for the State Game Commission and had about 500 chicks every spring. Dad had a Weimaraner that lived to hunt pheasants.
We didn't get to shoot at them very often though either because the dog got to where he could catch them in the air when they launched. He got lots of practice because we usually got our limit by barely leaving the yard.
Turkey hunting, I lived for. I didn't use a blind or camo. I would catch them coming down out of the roost in the morning and when they hit the ground, I would leave them have it. I would just find some natural cover and wait them out.
Wild turkey was my favorite dish of all.