[Nes]

When you went on your first hunting trip? I started going as soon as I could keep up.. :D :D

[john]

??? dont knowthe exact age. but i was old enough to eat cornbread an butter without choke.:D :D

[Antlurz]

Probably five or six. At any rate, it was as soon as Dad figured I was big enough to get down in the ditch with the dogs to root out the rabbits. :D I think I carried a BB gun for the next three or four years. Started packing a Mossberg bolt action .410 at either 9 or 10 years old. That .410 brought home a LOT of game over the next several years. I hunted with it till I got out of the Navy, and for another year or two.

In fact, I never ever did feel undergunned with a .410, and still wouldn't even today....

Since the MV of a .410 was faster than a 12 ga., the correct choke would reach out farther than a 12 to touch a distance pheasant... On a per-pellet basis, it hits harder than a 12.

Ron

[Nes]

Dad was a Quail hunter so it meant a lot of walking. I carried a bb gun too.

[Antlurz]

After you become proficent shooting quail, pheasants are like shooting turtles in a wash tub.

[Redrum]

20...Only been 3 times...got tired of freezing my butt off in E. TN Hills.....

[RED DOG-40]

Never been on a "Hunting Trip"
But I've been hunt'n since I was, "knee high to a grasshopper"....:D

[Nes]

I use the term hunting trip for walking out in the pasture. :D :D I take very few "Hunting Trips." Probably 5 in the last 50 years. :D I do all my hunting local. Like alot of you, actual trips to go hunt game that I know very little about or areas, never has interested me very much. I do like to go on out in SW Kansas to pheasant hunt. We have Deer, Turkey, Quail, Ducks, Geese, Hogs, Rabbits, Dove and several more things I like to hunt all right here. :up: :up: :up: Picking up a firearm and walking 1/4 mile to the river, I call a hunting trip. :D :D :D :D :D :D

Nes

[RED DOG-40]

"Picking up a firearm and walking 1/4 mile to the river, I call a hunting trip."

..:goodpost::agreed:......

[SBF]

I was 16. Nobody in my immediate family hunted or was "into" guns. I had an uncle that was a big time hunter who lived in California. I would only see him once or twice a year. I'm used to love listening to his hunting stories and seeing his pictures. I think I ordered every gun manufacturer catalog in existence at the time :D. I know I wore out a few Browning catalogs as a kid. My uncle was a big Browning fan so at that age so was I :D
I did the hunter safety course at 15 and my dad bought me a Marlin Model 60 .22 (still have it). I used to always hunt by myself as a kid. I never bagged that much game but what I did Mom would fix up for me. My uncle gave me a NIB Smith & Wesson Model 1000M 20 gauge when I turned 16. Still have that one too. I mostly hunted upland game/birds.
I don't hunt too much now, never enough time with two youngin's around. I can't wait till they get old enough to go out with me. It'll be nice to get them out in the fields, for their sake and mine.

[Nes]

Nothing like it SBF. :up: :up: :up: :up:

[Nes]

Quail or Dove?

[SBF]

Quail or Dove?

Quail

[Antlurz]

Never ate a dove, but they would have to go a long ways to beat eating a brace of quail. No finer eatin' have I ever experienced...

I'm under the understanding they are dark meat, and I've yet to eat any dark fowl that I really enjoyed.

Ron

[Nes]

They have dark meat but its different. We really like them.

[480ruger]

I was eleven and used my moms 30-30, I think the first few years all I did was beat the brush because I didn't know what quiet ment and I always walked to fast.
Bob

[dison]

I think we all made way too much noise when we started. I was about 5 or 6 when I first started going with my dad, and 8 or 9 when I was first allowed to carry my dads single shot Winchester 20 gauge.

[Pho-tog]

I haven't ever gone yet. I think it's cuz the first (and ONLY) time the hubby took me out shooting, I out shot him. And he even admitted to people I'm a better shot. At that point, he hadn't got a deer yet and knew that if he took me, and I got one, he'd never live it down. :) Still trying to convince him, but he just won't take me.

[Popeye]

About 7.

[MtJerry]

I honestly can't remember ... If I had a nickle for every critter (squirrel, rabbit, dove off the powerline, etc ...) I've taken with my old Sheridan pump pellet rifle, I be able to afford a "fancy hunting trip." :D I got that for Chirstmas in 1969 at the age of 8.

The first "license required" hunting trip I took was deer hunting with my dad at the age of 12. Had a single-shot 20 gauge (00 buckshot) and we were hunting on the Eglin AFB Reserve for deer with my uncle's dogs.

[Rabbi]

I was fourteen. Hunted with a neighbor and some friends because there were no hunters in my family. My father would drive me out to the fields, woods or rivers and lakes for fishing and then sit in his car reading, drinking fortified coffee while I hunted or fished.

My mother cleaned and cooked my game and both parents loved the fact that I was an outdoorsman but just had no interest in it for themselves. Next best thing to hunting with family. The handicap was that I had to learn a lot of woodscraft on my own rather than be taught by somebody which really slows the process.

There are still a lot of occasions when I take a camp chair and go sit in the woods to watch game when I am not hunting. I've learned a lot about wild game behavior outside of hunting season just by sitting quietly and watching.

[Mapanggulo]

I haven't ever gone hunting, unless you count shooting prairie dogs :cry:

Spent...most all my life moving around as a military brat, and then joining and doing the same after high-school. Would love to hunt now though...


EDITED ADDITION: IF anyone within Kansas or a neighboring state wants to take me hunting...I'm game !! :D :D

[Antlurz]

Still trying to convince him, but he just won't take me.Turn the tables on him. During the next season, tell him you are going hunting, and that if wants to come along, he would be welcome. Then go out and buy a hunting license and a gun. Let him know you are serious.

I'm guessing his ego is the problem, and if he knows you are serious and would go without him, that would hurt his ego even worse, so he'll come around.

If he won't go along with it, trade him for a fishing boat.

Ron

[Marinesg1012]

I was 8-9 when i went bow hunting with dad, it was my birthday and I was bumming about something so we went out.

Thought every squrril was a deer and I wouldnt shut up :D but I was there.

Started trapping on my own at age 10 and was hunting and trapping ever season til I joined the Marines, after that I only went once :(

[jimjimwolf]

Went through hunter safety course at 10 and started hunting pheasant on the farm I grew up on in Calif.

Jim

[John Henry]

Think I was about 8 the first time I went out, with Grandfather, after whitetails.
I was 11 before I actually got one ..... Not much in the way of bird hunters in the family.

[Vibe]

I know I couldn't see above the sage grass. Dad raised me hunting quail here in Arkansas, but my first shot at agame was at a rabbit, with Dads 1100. Busted my lip, but I didn't care, we had a rabbit for the pot and I'd gotten him. I was about 6. Eventually got to where I could drop 2 birds on a covy rise with the single shot Stevens 20 - that's with 2 shots (and sometimes 3). Reloading on the fly got to be quite natural.

[hntrss2]

I was 22. I got to be "bird dog" during pheasant hunting :D :D . I was real good at flushing the birds out and pointing, saying "there he goes!" :D :D But I have always loved the G.O.D.'s!!! So hunting came quite naturally to me and I not only love it but crave it :D

[BountyHunter]

Never been. Always wanted to go but my dad gave it up about the time I was old enough to go. I have not yet found any body willing to take me and teach me what I need to know. But I will keep looking.

[Tenspot]

Pho - Tog, being from MI, you need to watch the movie "Escanaba in da Moonlight" Kind of fits.


Dad started taking me coon huntin, trappin, and on overnight catfishin ventures when I was 5-6 yo. Also did the BB gun thing. My son is 7, startin him with a bow when he was 3, compound bow when he was 5 - he can shoot ! Been takin him Duck and Pheasant hunting since 5. Fishing since 1.

[t driver]

36 now and have yet to go. My dad never did stuff like that with me. :(

[Rabbi]

Please folks, don't deny yourself of this wonderful pastime for another season.

Call your local sportsmen's club or shooting range and tell them you want to learn about and go hunting. There are a ton of people like me who would happily get a newcomer involved with hunting. It's an honor to help a newly enfranchised hunter get into the sport.

Hunters, anybody feel like me? Wouldn't you help a rookie get started?

Rabbi

[pyrguy]

Hunting and fishing was something I always did. Grew up in south Lousiana. I'm one of those Cajun boys. :D

[Marinesg1012]

Please folks, don't deny yourself of this wonderful pastime for another season.

Call your local sportsmen's club or shooting range and tell them you want to learn about and go hunting. There are a ton of people like me who would happily get a newcomer involved with hunting. It's an honor to help a newly enfranchised hunter get into the sport.

Hunters, anybody feel like me? Wouldn't you help a rookie get started?

Rabbi

I love showing people how to hunt, shoot, fish, trap, whatever I can, even if I am not any good at it, (see all of the mentioned examples :D) I would still jump at the chance to help someone else get into it.

[Nes]

What Rabbi said. We help anyone who is interested around here. One of the best ways to get started here is to take the hunter safety course. There will be a lot of folks there that will help you get started. Check out your states web sites on hunting seasons, safety courses, fishing news etc. Here in Oklahoma just by clicking on the Oklahoma Wildlife Department you get tons of info and links to other sites that will tell you almost anything you want to know about hunting, fishing, shooting activitys or just where to go to see for yourself the wonders of the Great Outdoors. Your state has all of these things on line too I am sure.

Nes

[Tenspot]

For the past 7-8 years I have tried to introduce at least 1-2 people a year to a shooting /hunting activity. I have been able to do it too! Join a local club, make friends, ask quetions. THe Hunters Ed is a good suggestion too. I teach - meet a lot of people watneing to get going there.


PS: Took my son out turkey calling at O dark thirty this AM. We saw 13, 4 were Toms. Had a hen within 5 yds before she spooked, we were sittin against two trees. He had a blast - so did I! He was up and in the can before I crawled out of bed even - ah the energy of a 7yo.

[Plinker]

Nine or ten I think.
Had an Uncle that would take my cuzz and me squirrel hunt'n from time to time,although he really wasn't into hunt'n that much.

Nice thing, I can still walk these same woods today and hunt,although
the country has changed alot since then. There are still a few places
without a house in the middle of them,but there are fewer all the time.