Hunting

I am also from a family of hunters, though I never hunted anything except assorted tin cans and targets. My dad bought me a bolt-action 22 rifle when I was 12; I recently gave the gun to my son to pass on to my little granddaughter someday. I loved that gun and had it hanging on a rack in my bedroom until I went to college.

My father's rule of hunting and guns... if you shot and killed something you had to eat it. He didn't believe in killing anything simply to watch it die (except for random poisonous snakes.) My brother learned how serious dad was when he had to clean, cook and eat a robin.

My husband has never had any interest in hunting, and only one of our kids is a hunter. (As an aside, my husband and 4 of our 5 kids has their concealed carry permit and own handguns.)

 

I used to hunt and fish a lot when we had kids at home, but no longer do so. All my children in Alaska are hunters and fishermen, and two of the three daughters-in-law are also hunters. I hunted whitetails as a kid, but moose up here, although all three boys up here hunt caribou, of which I am not a particular fan. For Decades we were on the "road kill list" and would salvage animals that were hit by vehicles whenever a trooper called. Nothing beats cleaning a moose on the roadside in the dark at -40. Some of the best meat we got was bear that was a so-called "self-defense" shooting of a yearling black bear in the spring. We also got a cleaned and bagged moose that had been poached, and the troopers waited until they knew the guy had cleaned and butchered it before they busted him and took the meat.
Out youngest son just got a caribou during a winter hunt a couple days ago and he had the entire thing made into hot dogs--his favorite thing.

 

We will go to an indoor or outdoor gun-rifle range, but don't hunt. Have absolutely nothing against hunting and love seeing big/nice mounts, like at Bass Pro and Sportsman's Warehouse.

I got my first weapon, if a Daisy Pump BB Rifle can be called that, when I was a Junior in high school. On the farm, a lot of sparrows would crap all over farm equipment and I was told, by my step-dad "shoot all of them you want". So, at night, a farmer friend of mine and I would go inside our barn, hold a flashlight up against the side of the rifle, point at the roof (boards that hold the roof of the barn up), see the back end of sparrows and shoot. They would come falling down to the barn floor. Cats would get them.

Went thru Small-Arms training/certification at sea in the Navy. M-1, Thompson Machine Gun, 45 pistol and deck-mounted 50 caliber. I never thought a Thompson or 50 caliber were "small arms", but.

After the Navy, never had a firearm until I met my wife. My wife's mother shot a beautiful White-Tail (large rack) when my wife was a little girl. My wife's first firearm was/is a Ruger 10-22 Rifle. Now we have two rifles and two handguns. She knows how to load the magazines and shoot. Pretty darn good shot, if I do say so.

I like elk meat, but when I buy it from Sportsman's Warehouse, there is beef in it. Had duck once somewhere, but it was extremely oily. Love fishing for Rainbow Trout, but mostly do the "catch and release" on them. But, do love fishing from our boat.

 

I never hunted for sport. It was either for food, and/or clothing or as an environmental equalizer. As a kid, it was a few cottontail rabbits, but I never like the taste or skinning them. I only hunted rabbits because they were crop destroyers since the fox, wolf, and coyote populations were low. Coyotes, foxes, and wolves never figured out if they had stuck to rabbits, rats, and squirrels (ground and tree), that they would have lived. Lambs, chickens. and calves were easier and perhaps tastier. My red digger kills are in the thousands. I never made a dent in their out-of-control population and destruction. Of course, many a rattlesnake died, and at this point in life, rattlesnakes, rats, marmots, moles, voles, and mice are the only creatures on my kill list.

I have hunted with a throwing knife, tomahawk, longbow, crossbow, muzzleloader, revolver, and several cartridge rifles. I quit hunting in the early 1980s about the same time I quit butchering my own homegrown meat. When I left the remote mountains, there was no reason for hunting. I see no good reason for city folks hunting and am strongly opposed to trophy hunting. I also find hunting deer, elk, moose, etc., disgusting if the entire animal isn't used. I always kept even the bone and still have some that I use for crafts. Making my own buckskins was fun back in the day, but now it would be punishment.

I never bird hunted as the first time I picked lead pellets out of a spit-roasted quail, that was enough for me. I shot grouse (in the head) with a .22. The only shotgun hunting I enjoyed (enjoyed probably not the right word) was with East Texas (somewhere east of Decatur) cousins when we threw open an old abandoned grain shed filled with huge rats and we blasted and reloaded till the owner arrived and after thanking us, he tossed a diesel soaked lite rag in the shed and burned it down. He later stopped by my great uncles to give us all $5 each (to cover ammo cost) for ridding the shed of rats so they didn't escape to be a problem elsewhere as the rat magnet grain shed was scheduled for burn. I guess that made me a paid assassin. I soothe my conscience in the fact that it was ammo reimbursement although I didn't buy the ammo.

 

Interesting little story and as you imply here not many animals left to hunt since they have lost their habitat to urban sprawl.
We bought a bow & arrow 2 years ago since bullets are harder to come by and the cost. Just in case we needed to hunt to survive.
All I got out of the lessons was whelps on my arm and fetching arrows. Hubby of course did great with it for first time.

 

So, you'd never go into Bass Pro, Sportsman's Warehouse or any other store that had trophy heads displayed or the entire body?

As far as your statement above about city folks and hunting, without a doubt, I'm sure there would be tons of city folks that will totally disagree with you. Even though wife and I do live just inside the city limits, we sure don't consider ourselves as city folks. Absolutely not! Actually, and not to change the thread, we seen a man baling hay in a field right inside the city here. Stunned us so much, I had to take pictures and a video of him doing it. And, there is a guy, across the street from a major grocery store here, that raises some Black Angus cattle. We've seen the cattle grazing, after leaving the store.

 

I used to hunt as a kid but only killed things I ate. Getting a gun at 13 and learning gun safety and how to hunt was a way of life and rite of passage for many of us born of WWII survivors. I had a Stevens semi-auto and a single shot 12 gauge.

 

I never indicated that I would or wouldn't. Having friends that are taxidermists, it doesn't bother me to see trophy heads or the entire animal if the game was taken for a justified reason. As a former cattle rancher, a stuffed wolf or cougar in a sportsman or cattleman's store would be a welcome sight, if it was taken because it was a domestic livestock or ranch dog killer. The idea of killing just for trophies is what I referred to.

Not sure how baling hay in the city limits relates to hunting.