What not to take hunting

[SixteenGauge]

I bring:
A firearm
Ammunition
My phone
A flashlight
Weather-suitable clothing
A blaze orange vest
A folding chair
A knife
And a water bottle

I like the minimalist approach.

 

[Lnf Crzr]

When I Went to Africa for Two months as a Assistant to a PH…. I brought a lot. Then one day I went to help a friend of the PH ,as he asked me to.

I Was on a private farm (11,000 Acres) Had a day pack with multitude of different items, Range finder,beef jerky, Sun glasses,gps, Med kit ,Misc what not.

A Farm Girl walks out with a Knife, Rifle and Binos…. Says “Hey Yankee, leave all that and grab your rifle- I’ve got everything we need”


And she did.

I took my 375 AI with the beef jerky - Didn’t need anything else That day ,except my knife (Swiss Army) for the tooth pick after dinner.

My Ph was a good guy.
Ps- Yes ,She was not unattractive

 

[Jack Ryan]

Today I carried a rifle, 4 bullets, a tree stand and the cloths I was wearing, and my Leatherman.

 

[H&Hhunter]

Even though this thread is about what NOT to take hunting, this reminds me of something: DISPOSABLE FULL-SLEEVE VETERINARY GLOVES (insemination gloves). The best invention ever.

At a feed store or ranch/ farm supply the gloves you’re looking for are OB selves.

 

[H&Hhunter]

When I Went to Africa for Two months as a Assistant to a PH…. I brought a lot. Then one day I went to help a friend of the PH ,as he asked me to.

I Was on a private farm (11,000 Acres) Had a day pack with multitude of different items, Range finder,beef jerky, Sun glasses,gps, Med kit ,Misc what not.

A Farm Girl walks out with a Knife, Rifle and Binos…. Says “Hey Yankee, leave all that and grab your rifle- I’ve got everything we need”


And she did.

I took my 375 AI with the beef jerky - Didn’t need anything else That day ,except my knife (Swiss Army) for the tooth pick after dinner.

My Ph was a good guy.
Ps- Yes ,She was not unattractive

When I’m hunting Africa on a game farm like you’ve described I carry a rifle, ammo and binos. When I’m hunting a lease in Texas it’s the same.

When I’m hunting free range wild Africa on a massive hunting blocks of several hundred thousand acres or more. I still only carry a rifle, ammo and small binos. Because the trackers are carrying water and assorted other stuff. If I was hunting it solo my pack would include some needed stuff.

 

[PonyKiller]

I don't want to get into the whole, long embarrassing story. I’ll just say that the very second I closed the locked door on our grandson Aaron’s truck on opening day this year, I started wishing I was carrying a spare set of keys.
Yep! About 2:00 in the afternoon that day, I locked Aaron’s keys, as well as his rifle, in his truck. We tried for a while to get into it, but finally ended up just driving back to town in my truck (about 45 minutes each way) to fetch Aaron’s spare keys.
At any rate, as far as what we carry while hunting goes, my wife always carries spare truck keys even though I usually do all of the driving. On opening day of deer season this year, our grandson, Aaron was hunting with us, but driving his own truck. It would have been nice if either my wife or I would have been carrying a spare set of keys to it. Even one of those magnetic “Hide-A-Key” boxes somewhere on Aaron's truck might have saved us some grief.

The only time I have ever locked myself out of a vehicle as an adult, was middle of January season in the snow a few years back. Actually jimmied the slide window in the back open, but would have needed. A: deVinci, B: mechanical engineer c: magician or D: 8# sledge hammer to get 6" 200lbs of me through that 14"x14" window to reach something to get a door open. So a phone call to my father and a long walk of shame to the road from the woods is what got me sprung.

 

[Lnf Crzr]

Quality weapon
Quality knife
Quality Clothes
Quality thinking

As stated,Anything else is extra to carry when dragging out the deer

 

[Random 8]

I'm late to this party. Looks like it was a rager! Also appears to have changed into a "what to bring" thread. I'm bored this morning, and I'd rather receive a Ghost Pepper enema than go anywhere near the kitchen where she who must be obeyed is holding court, so I'll play both!

I take a lot of new hunters out in the woods. Our family and close friends are blessed with a lot of strays, either kids' friends, boyfriends of questionable background who didn't grow up hunting, and other such riff raff. I'm known as the patient one, and the gun guy who introduced them to proper shooting, so I usually get the job of at least prepping them for deer season. I've seen some interesting things brought up for "The Hunt." I'll try to make a short list.

1. Remington Sendero 7mmRM with Leupold 4x12 (for tight cover hunting). This was brought by one of the sketchy boyfriends. He was some sort of computer guy with rich parents. He fell in love with one of my cousins, and the concept of being an outdoorsman. He was blessed with a mighty inferiority complex, and wished to outdo the clan of Jack Pine Savages he was attempting to join at Jack Pine Savagery. Despite numerous "suggestions" that he buy a rifle that was short and light, or at least "standard" size and weight, and offers to borrow some of the old but serviceable warhorses accumulated by senior hunters over some 80 years of hunting central MN brushlands, he insisted on getting what Field and Stream suggested for beanfield hunting.

2. Same dude. 10" Rambo knife. He had the real deal. It was a quality blade, not one of the Chinese or Taiwan knock offs. An exact reproduction of the knife used by Rambo in "first blood." He spent a lot of time showing it off, carrying it around, and snagging it on brush. When he did shoot a deer on a drive, and got the privilege of gutting his first deer with most of the senior party members watching and snickering, the Rambo knife was not allowed other than just at the start for a good laugh. He used my well broken in Mora belt knife to finish the job.

3. Camelback style hydration system. I could see the utility hunting the high desert. Northwoods MN at well below freezing, not so much. This was a stray kid who was a bit of an athlete.

4. Tennis shoes. Another stray kid. Yeah, not so much. Fortunately he fit pretty well in my wife's boots, and we always have a spare work set at camp. This one actually turned into a pretty good outdoorsman and a good man in general. He's married to my second cousin now, and takes their own kids and other strays out for mostly successful hunts. He's working on buying a good sized piece of woods and farmland, so I have my fingers crossed there!

5. Battery heated socks. This was a senior guy at camp, who was always a bit gadget happy. Perhaps now technology has improved. In the mid 80's, the poor guy suffered minor burns on his feet, as his boots insulated too well and overheated before he could get them off. He hit the off switch when they became uncomfortable, but the latent heat just kept building.

What I take hunting. Appropriate clothes, coffee, coffee, coffee, snuff, snacks, flagging tape, compass, rifle, knife, pickup truck. I really should leave the smart phone at camp, but it's an unhealthy addiction. I know how to pick my door locks with a piece of fence wire, but I do keep a spare key at camp.

 

[Tirod]

My spare key is under the truck - and won't start the ignition. I'm not paying $75 for an electronic key under there. Nope. My habit is to triple check where the keys are every time I lock and close the door. I just forgot to do that one time with my wife . . . oh well. My son brought me the spare and we promptly fixed the problem at the hardware store across the street.

This last day of hunting I left the spare mag in the truck and carried some first aid supplies, which included an Ontario "strap" cutter. I decided to exercise it as a gutting blade should some deer volunteer for the experiment. Then the temps went into the upper 60's, wind rose to 15-25 and I called it a day. Here, the deer bed down at that point and snooze. The cattle weren't, tho, which made me question that.

I also threw in a reel of paracord as I realized I had no way to drag out a deer and a travois would be worth the effort. Plenty of ten foot saplings in that area.I also took the binoculars, some 6x30 Yosemite's. The molded in place lens construction is similar to Steiner and Leupold does have them made offshore, but they are good glass, lightweight and affordable. Unlike my older alloy framed nocs they carried well.

One thing I should have left out was the extra layer of waffle fleece, especially after 9 AM. I had dropped the fleece jacket already, over 55F is no place to over insulate. Of course, later this year, 45F would be a blessing by noon in December or Jan. Layering is a good thing, and I finally remembered to unzip the pit vents on the soft shell, which made a big difference. All this newfangled gear is so convenient compared to a field jacket, liner, and an extra helping of suffering with it. Something new every year . . .

 

[EMC45]

What I would take: 2 knives (razor sharp), snacks (jerky, granola, cookies), Para cord, BIC lighter, a couple waters, rubber gloves and a partial roll of striking paper.

 

[Lnf Crzr]

Today……..Took a Rifle, ammo ,Flashlight (Surefire), Knife x2, Range finder /Monocular,Phone (Mapping locations) that I’m typing on now and Lots of Wool!