Your most disturbing shooting/hunting trip?

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BHPshooter

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Okay guys, I went shooting yesterday, and I have to get this off my chest.

Well yesterday, my buddy and I went in to Sportsmans Warehouse, and of course, I spent all of the cash I brought with me. I got some new Hogue wraparound finger-groove grips for my BHP, some electronic muffs, a new hat and a new shirt.

So last night at about 7:00, we decided to go shooting, so I could try out my new grips and earmuffs. We were having a jolly old time, and I was hitting better with my new grips than ever before. My muffs were working very well -- they are so cool!

We soon saw a cottontail rabbit come out of it's hiding place. Now we have our small game licences, so we threw a couple of shots it's way. We were shooting in a natural pit, so there was no way it could have gone anywhere without us seeing. We came up on it, me on the right, my buddy on the left. Well, there it is, so I take quick aim, sure that I'll miss, and fire. It immediately jumped and flailed like it was in a popcorn popper. After a couple seconds, it slowed down enough to see the wound.

The bullet, just some cheap Wolf 9mm, hit it right below and slightly in front of the eye. It blew its face off, literally. Now, wounded rabbits generally scream. This one tried, but for its lack of a face, just made really disgusting gurgling sounds. And if it weren't for my wonderful new earmuffs, I wouldn't have had to hear them. :( :barf: :(

Now, right in accordance with my luck, it was my last shot. The poor thing was there, faceless, squirming. So I yell to my buddy, "Shoot it!" as I run back for some more ammo. Luckily, by the time I got back (about 30 seconds), my friend had put the little guy out of his misery.

There are no words to describe how horrible I felt. :( I still feel terrible about it. What made me feel worst was that I couldn't deliver a humane, clean kill. Worse, I believe that if you shoot something, you should eat it, and if you're not going to eat it (if it is edible), the you shouldn't shoot it. The thing was that, after seeing it like that, I was almost sick, and couldn't even think about eating it. We ended up giving it a resting place where perhaps the poor guy's body won't go to waste.

So that whole thing kind of went against my ethics twice.




Well, now that i have that done with, does anyone have any similar or relatable experiences? Misery loves company.

:( :uhoh: Wes

P.S. Do you think I'm going to hell?
 
Maybe, chaulk it up to some necessary de-sensitizing. I know its kind of gross, but stuff like that happens if you have to hunt for any sort of subsistence or survival or if, heaven forbid, you have to put down a badguy. Also, I try to remember that folks like the pioneers used to have to endure much greater atrocities than a wounded critter out on the plains. A little desensitizing now could help your reaction time later if your focus is required.

I've got a similar rabbit story, too. Lets just say, even shotguns don't have a 100% one shot stop record on rabbits. Until my friend showed me the karate-chop method to the back of the neck, I thought maybe the butt of the shotgun might be effective....uh, not so.

Live and learn. Thats the key.
 
"If trees screamed, would we be so cavalier about cutting them down? We might if they screamed all the time, for no good reason." - Jack Handey

I prefer the native American way of looking at hunting. You respect the life you are about to take, and thank the animal's spirit for sacrificing itself for your continued life and health.

I would hunt for recreation, but I would only take what I could then later use, or sell. Killing an animal just for pleasure and then burying the corpse is not my idea of a good time.
 
That's why I don't hunt anymore. I've been pheasant hunting once since I was a kid. Almost twenty years. I didn't kill any. Just can't deal with it. Sorry if I offend some of you tougher types.

Now fishing....that's another story.

GT
 
YOUR"E GONNA BURN !!!!:evil: :neener: J/K. Before I learned how to shoot up and downhill and at different ranges using a scope, I clipped a small buck high in the shoulders and severed the spinal column. The damn thing cried like a baby. It sounded just like a kid crying. I was so distraught, I nearly fell down a fairly steep hill. I tried to quickly end its suffering by putting a .357 to the animal's CNS. I almost reconsidered my love for hunting that day ! :p Yeah right............ But it did give me more respect for game hunting and my responsibility to humanely and effectively take my quarry.

When in doubt, let it walk. There'll be other opportunities. :cool:

I prefer the native American way of looking at hunting. You respect the life you are about to take, and thank the animal's spirit for sacrificing itself for your continued life and health.
Click to expand...

Beautiful, Definitely how I look at it.
 
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I would hunt for recreation, but I would only take what I could then later use, or sell. Killing an animal just for pleasure and then burying the corpse is not my idea of a good time.
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Which is half of the reason that I had such a hard time with it. I didn't bury it, hoping that some coyotes may need a meal. I really do feel terrible, though.

Maybe, chaulk it up to some necessary de-sensitizing. I know its kind of gross, but stuff like that happens if you have to hunt for any sort of subsistence or survival or if, heaven forbid, you have to put down a badguy.
Click to expand...

And that's exactly what I thought about afterwards -- It was pretty tough looking at a rabbit with it's face blown off, and I can only imagine how tough it would be to look at a BG that you had to shoot in the face. But on the other hand, the rabbit never hurt anyone, and never would have. If I was faced with shooting a violent baddie, I would feel I had a duty to do it. I think that would make it easier to deal with.

*sigh*

Wes
 
Shot a squirrel that was high up in a tree. Didn't realize it was eating something so when I went for a headshot, it shattered the nut and disembowled the critter. Down it fell and it gave out a human screech before running up another tree. I finished it off with a .410.

Like Devonai says, pay respect to that you kill and thank it for giving its life so that yours can continue. Whereas Chinese philosophy talked about harmonizing with nature, the Indians did it.
 
Being a Brit I really haven't done any hunting, was shooting woodpigeon on my cousins' farm when I was about twelve. Hit the thing and ran to finish it, it was drowning in it's own blood. Wasn't too nice to see at twelve, as a city boy was quite guilty for a while. My six year old cousin caught up with us and picked the thing up by its head and swung it around, little barbarian that he was. Since then not been hunting but have seen nastier things happen to humans.
 
Well, just one more thing to make you feel worse than you already feel:

Regardless of whether or not you had your SG license, COTTONTAIL rabbits are NOT in season presently. Check your upland game proclaimation and you'll see that the season doesn't start until September typically. I don't have the current one handy, but I'd be willing to bet you've just committed a game violation. :( :mad: Don't remember the Hunter Ed class video where the admonition was "you don't practice on wildlife!", eh?

I don't mean to be a hardass, but as a HE instructor I find this to be particularly bad behavior. I can't always remember you guys' "rule numbering" system, but something about "know your target" comes to mind. Ethics is how you behave when no one's there, concience is how you feel afterwards.

Off my soapbox now.

Doug444
 
Out of season - not good.
Headshot with pistol- not bad
Wasting more ammo on a wounded rabbit - very bad- that's why you wear shoes.
 
Pheasant hunting with college roommate many years ago. He was carryin' 16 gauge with safety off and finger inside of trigger guard. Stepped in unseen badger hole and came within inches of blowing HIS face off. End of that hunt. And end of huntin' forever with him.
 
I came close to stopping hunting once after I saw a guy tormenting a wounded antelope. (kicking it etc)

I have never come closer to firing a shot in anger in my life.

I got really mad at a guy I know who shot a coyote 'just to hear it howl'.

I'm not dumping on rancers doing predator control or anyone that made a mistake.

You made a mistake, you feel remorse about it. That's a step in the right direction. You have a duty as a hunter, in my opinion, to make as swift and clean a kill as possible. If you don't eat what you kill, you should still try to kill it cleanly.

But jerk-off sadistic bloodlust rambo wannabes just make me :cuss: :fire: wish I had windego powers.
 
I only do varmint control around the farm right now. Mostly trap and shoot.
There have been times when an animal didn't die as quickly as I would have liked it too (Every time really, they make it look so much better on TV :rolleyes: )
The important thing is to finish the job rather than freeze up and let it suffer. Sounds like you did your best at that.
And to try and figure out if there was anything you did wrong, that should be done differently in the future. A head shot with a 9mm should put a rabbit down nicely. Most folks hunt them with .22LR . You basically just had bad luck.
I think your biggest problem is that you didn't really intend to kill it and surprised yourself. "took quick aim, expecting to miss". That is your only problem. Only shoot at an animal if you plan to kill it, and are confident that you can.

Don't be so hard on yourself though, it really didn't turn out that bad in the end. Lots of people do things a lot worse every day.
 
The ongoing discussion over several threads concerning hunting ethics forces me to ask: If it is okay kill animals for enjoyment, as many varmint hunters do (whether they admit it or not), why is it not okay to enjoy an animal suffering, too? Scads of varmint hunters whack groundhogs, prairie dogs, etc. for enjoyment. When I was a kid, in the pre-sanitary landfill days, some guys went to the dump just to shoot rats. Other examples are available. The beneficial aspects from killing these animals was incidental to the enjoyment of shooting/killing them. So, again, why is it okay to enjoy death but not pain?
As it happens, I enjoy neither. I am an avid hunter, but I eat what I shoot and go to great lengths to ensure a clean kill. The kill itself is not a pleasure to me, but is unavoidable in the quest for meat. Now, I am a biologist and not sentimental about animals. I am curious about shooters, though.
 
Personally, I prefer not to hunt unless I'm gonna eat the animal. Pest control is definitely an exception.

I always try to take the animal as quickly and humanely as possible, mostly for my own sake. Predatory animals do the same thing, because if they end the encounter quickly, there is less chance they will be injured or killed.

For example, a pack of lions killing a zebra, etc. But sometimes it takes several minutes, or maybe half an hour to take down a very large animal. The lions do not feel remorse for having inflicted pain on their prey. They are just happy that they have a great meal!

We are of course different that other animals. We can, and probably should, feel remorse for inflicting pain when it is unnecessary.

So, what does all of this mean? If you are hunting, try to be as efficient as possible. But if the kill is not as clean as you would like, don't dwell on it. Don't lose sleep over it. If you hesitate in the field, you may lose your opportunity for a meal. Just try to figure out what you did wrong and be sure not to do it again.

Stinger
 
One of my chores as a little kid was to go to my grandmother's chickenyard and catch and kill Sunday dinner. And, on a farm in those days, if you wanted bacon or ham, you slaughtered a hog (maybeso once or twice a year, depending on family size.)

I learned early on, then, that if you want to eat, something's gonna die.

At the same time, I learned not to be cruel to animals, via, "You leave that cat alone!" and suchlike. :)

The years went by and I learned about the ethics of the interactions between people and animals. I've given a good bit of thought to the whole issue of varmints...

Jeff Cooper recommends Sr. Ortega y Gasset as good reading about the ethics of hunting, and I concur...

At any rate, anybody can make a mistake. So? Smart folks work at not making the same mistake twice. One way of looking at it is that thefumegator's mistake was in using his last cartridge. Anybody can make a bad hit, but a quick coup de grace gives a certain degree of redemption.

Art
 
Regardless of whether or not you had your SG license, COTTONTAIL rabbits are NOT in season presently. Check your upland game proclaimation and you'll see that the season doesn't start until September typically. I don't have the current one handy, but I'd be willing to bet you've just committed a game violation. Don't remember the Hunter Ed class video where the admonition was "you don't practice on wildlife!", eh?
Click to expand...

Please, let me clarify. I left this out of my original post out of consideration for those who fall asleep easily.

When the rabbit came out, my buddy said "It's a Jack!" Once I did hit it, I still thought it was a jack -- looked just like one. Mottled brown color, but just a little fluffy white ball for a tail. Now the reason this threw me is because I had pet bunnies as a kid, we got them as an Easter present. The "cottontail" that we had was all white. I always thought that a cottontail was all white. I still thought that until my friend said, "Oh, that's a cottontail!"

So, while ignorance still is no excuse, and I am still in the wrong, it was an honest misinformed mistake. I thought it was a jackrabbit. I know better now.

Wes
 
The most disturbing thing I ever saw while hunting was several deer carcases that were thrown into a ditch to rot with only the tenderloin cut out. That's just wrong!
 
Well, here it is.

A couple of years back, I went back East to visit my wife's relatives. Her uncle had sold me a custom .220 Swift, and I took it groundhog hunting (with the land owner's permission). Ended up making the only kill of the day--a nice offhand 150 yard snapshot, with the groundhog just barely showing his head above ground. The landowner wanted the land cleared because the 'hogs were raising hell with his crops and animals (holes for them to step in). So, this was all OK by me.

We were on the way back, on this dirt road when the whole convoy (about five trucks) came to a slow stop. I saw everyone getting out slowly, and saw a guy in the lead truck slowly resting his rifle on the hood. The rifle was pointing across the truck, and I looked to where it was pointed.

There, about 75 yards off was the cutest fox I ever saw. It was actually playing--PLAYING--with an ear of corn, tossing it about. I smiled for a second--then put two and two together.

Oh, NO!

Just then, the guy took the shot. The fox started to run in circles, snapping at its gut. I was horrified; everyone else was laughing!

The idiot took another shot. Now, the fox was dragging itself on the ground.

I actually had a round chambered in my Swift. I was seriously going to put one right in that guy's a**, call it an accident, and see how he liked being shot for fun.

Our great white hunter finally strode up to the fox and put it out of its suffering after about 5 minutes with a head shot.

I was really sickened by the whole affair.
 
Perhaps the saddest thing I've ever seen while hunting was in Africa, when our PH took us to find a blue wildebeest that had been wounded by a previous client. We found it dead and partially eaten, but the worst part was that we discovered that the hunter had shot it in the head, breaking the lower jaw but hitting nothing vital. The poor beast had wandered around horribly wounded for days, unable to eat or drink, until it died from dehydration and/or starvation, or was taken down by a predator in its weakened state. Very sad.
 
Slingster, lemme change the frame of reference for you. Back some dozen or so years, a fellow came out to Terlingua to hunt mule deer. He had excellent luck; he headed out to hunt around noon, and by 3PM had a nice buck on the ground.

Approaching the deer, he saw bald patches and claw marks on the deer. A lion had jumped it, but hadn't been able to kill it. However, the deer had been driven into the ground so hard that the lower gum-bone was broken loose, with the teeth just flopping.

The deer had been unable to eat for a week or so (judging by the scabs on the claw marks). "He was dead and just didn't know it."

On one hunt, I shot a quail. I followed the rest of the covey and then came back to the downed bird. A hawksbill shrike had found it. He had started eating on the wounded, but not yet dead, bird.

The crux of it all is that people have volition. With knowledge and ethics we don't do cruel and stupid things to animals. Or each other, for that matter.

Art

"Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement."--Anon.
 
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