Hunting with the boy

I had a deal with my son when he was about 2 years old, when he grew as tall as my armpit he could come deer hunting with me, being a tall fella myself I thought he would be 10 or so before he fitted the bill.

He obviously took that deal on board and ate all his veges and has reached that lofty height at age 7!!

Fair enough I says so we went for a local hunt. After a 40 min walk or so we heard a stag roar along the face we were on so put in the stalk, it was the first stag he had heard roaring so his eyes were like dinnerplates!, when we got in a bit closer it clammed up, we crossed down into the gully and across a swamp and started up the other side seeing a bit of deer sign as we went along. Partway up the next face the stag where we had come from started up again so we devised a plan to circle back around the gully head and try to get above him as the wind was likely to shift. We kept going up the steep face and I promised Jack a breather on the next highpoint which looked down a forestry road.

When we got there I fished around in the bag for a muesli bar and handed to Jack, He wandered around eating it while I tried to find one for me. Jack started whispering at me and I wondered what the hell he was on about and thought he was saying "Here here", transpires he had spotted a hind and yearling down the track and was whispering "deer deer"!

Holy shit, good boy. I hit the deck and Jack dived in behind me covering his ears, sure enough two deer standing in the shadows on a corner of the road, not that easy to see so I was pretty impressed with my little hunter. As I looked through the scope I reminded myself to take my time and hit the bloody thing!!

At the shot at about 100yds I lost sight picture but I neednt have worried as my little hunter was spotting the shot and declared that I had hit it, the yearling did not hang around.

We went down and it had just flopped into the grass at the side of the road, narrowly avoiding rolling down the steep hill- bonus!!

We had a butchery and anatomy lesson, he was most impressed with the voice box and windpipe.

Jacks Hind- good spotting son!!
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Jack loaded up the daypack and carried that out with the rifle. I showed him how to make a pack and then carried the hind out.

Photo makes her look bony but she is in great nick.

To say I was a very proud dad would be an understatement

good job young fell on out spotting dad .well done to bth of you.

Great spotting Jack. The pressure will on for a shot now.

Nice :cool:

Good stuff mate. Always great to see kids out in the bush instead of inside on the Playstation :D

Nice one Steve, love the take a kid hunting threads:thumbsup:
Need to find a easy spot for my boy but a we while off yet he is only up to my waist:D

Nice one Steve, Jack will remember you taking him there for the rest of his life, being a Dad has to be the best job in the world !!!

awesome. I've started taking my 13yr old. Got him a JW-15 in Spring and we go out for bunnies. Now he's come on a goat hunt and this weekend we're going for Wallabies.

Very cool

Shot mate . Best memories from my childhood are the old man taking me out for a deer or pig. Very cool.

Wish my oldman was a hunter and we could've done that.
Good stuff fullas.

Cheers fellas, While skinning it out on Saturday I found the Barnes TSX bullet. This is only the second I have recovered in 6 years of shooting Barnes and the first recovered from an animal (the other went through the shoulders of a fallow stag then about 14 inches into a dirt bank and still retained 120grains!!)

This bullet entered the brisket as the hind was facing us, it travelled the length of her internally wiping out lungs and missing the gutbag coming to rest against the skin just forward of the back leg.

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Yesterday I took Jack out to do some target shooting with the brno .22. this was his first time shooting with a scope- he loved it and did some great shooting, I do need to get a spare stock for the brno and shorten for him though.

Must be a Buzz, you'll be especially pleased it all went well for his first time.

What a perfect sounding shot. It's awesome that he gets to keep the bullet as a momento. Solid copper huh? That's interesting.

Your kid is lucky his old man is into hunting. It'd make it a lot easier to get into it.

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Originally Posted by jakewire

Must be a Buzz, you'll be especially pleased it all went well for his first time.

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Hell yes, I would not have lived down a miss, he's a competitive little bugger lol

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Originally Posted by RimfireNZ

What a perfect sounding shot. It's awesome that he gets to keep the bullet as a momento. Solid copper huh? That's interesting.

Your kid is lucky his old man is into hunting. It'd make it a lot easier to get into it.

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Yep, solid copper. I have been super impressed with their performance on game.

My dad was never into hunting, as a young fella I managed to talk him into going hunting twice but that was like pulling teeth and never had any results, he put me onto a friend of his who hunted which was a help but as a teen I learnt the hard way- by making heaps of mistakes, hunting wrong areas at the wrong times.

Its really apparent that kids with a hunting parent and a good pool of role model adult hunters will be far more successful from earlier on.

Same here, my father had a severely dibilitating moterbike accident when I was 4 yrs old so success was a long time coming for me....I really had to wait until I was 16 and got my licence to even go hunting deer and goats for the first time...... I dont know what I was upto back then but my first deer took 2 years..... Mind you hundreds upon hundreds of goats met their bitter end during that period :) All I ever wanted was someone to take me hunting growing up but we didnt really know anyone... But im proud I learnt the hardway..

My dad would never have called himself a hunter and he was a very average shot but he would have taken more animals than most people on here put together and doubled, my Mum was the same but she could shoot a bit,I'm nearly 50 and I'm still making mistakes( probably to much talking and not enough listening)difference is it seemed to matter back in the beginning now just makes me laugh at myself D.:

Yep, as long as I've got venison in the freezer I can find mistakes funny too lol

Got to love getting out there with the kids its just the best! their first kills will be next 8)

My critters have not been out enough latley and are gutted the next two trips they can't come with sports on etc

My Father was always too busy on the farm to hunt but a few rabbit hunts was enough to get me keen, So me and a mate who lost his dad found our way to the bush and found what it was all about.... found the bulls that made a racket on the back of a place he later worked were actualy stags...Big learning curve as I wasn't a book reader and no Forums back then :P