Who’s the person who got you out in the woods and into this awesome addiction we call bow hunting or any type of outdoor activity be fishing camping
My maternal grandfather. Took me walking in the woods when I was about 8, looking for deer and deer signs (tracks, beds, rubs, scrapes, etc...). Then got me into shooting around 12... first targets, then woodchucks, and at 16 deer. He made me call all my shots before pulling the trigger.
I grew up with an out doors mother who decided to never get her drivers licence. We walked EVERYWHERE. her Dad and his wife both hunted...grandpa took.me trout and carp fishing often. I grew up in a neighborhood where I was just about the only girl. So I played football , base ball, and war with the guys. As we got older they'd take me squirrel hunting with them. Then I married into a hunting family. I shot recurve at summer camp and school growing up. When we moved out to this house , we moved into a total hunting area. Husbands and some wives. One guy we called the great white hunter. He bow hunted and would use his, then his wife's tags. Bag a buck and drive it around the neighborhood hood bragging. Saying he was a real hunter and bow hunting was real hunting and gun season just shooting. Well he just ticked me right off. So I borrowed a 45# Kodiak recurve that was 50 yrs old. Practiced like mad and went out the second year I took my first bow deer, a 7 pt buck. Shooting a recurve,instinctive and shooting fingers. The Great white hunter never stopped by with a buck bragging again. I was hooked and have bow hunted ever since.
Excuse errors..this devise is on it's last leg and does what ever it wants...Lol Some times I can't catch all it's rewrites.
My dad got me into hunting, started with small game and gravitated to deer. Went to camp to squirrel hunt and had tons of good times. Shot my first doe and buck with him with a gun. I pushed the issue to get into archery, he was receptive and he bought himself a compound (PSE-the beast) and bought me a Hoyt youth bow. We practiced together and got good together. Was a great time. He never did kill anything with the bow and neither did I with my Hoyt but we sure flung some arrows and had fun. He doesn’t hunt as much as he used to but I still drag him out for gun season. Deer don’t matter, it’s about the moments with the people ya love to be around and making memories. I hope I’m half the man he is!
Great story OND. I remember my dad would drop ,e n my brother off in the morning in a small town (Georgetown) Mn and say, "be at uncle Elmer's " at dark. Bout 6_8 miles away. Bro n I each had a .22 and a brick of rounds. Was not uncommon to go through a brick a day shooting jackrabbit. The GREAT old days when a boy could just go and be a boy. Damn, them were the days!
I come from a long line of hunter. My grandfather was a farmer and he love the outdoors. He always had bird and coon dogs. Unfortunately I was too young to get to hunt with him much. He had quail, grouse, rabbits and squirrel to hunt on the farm. His passion was bird hunting. My dad raised and sold bird dogs and we always had a kennel full of upcoming pups to train. He had his own business and would take off November and December every year just to bird hunt and sell dogs. Once again I was too young to get to bird hunt with him much. My older brother on the other hand got to take advantage of the golden years of bird hunting in Indiana. I just got the pleasure of cleaning lots of birds. I got my first BB gun at 7, shot gun at 8 and my first bow at 10. It was a Sears’s fiberglass recurve. I wore that thing out. I worked summers de-tassling corn and bought a 20 gauge Browning semi auto with the money I made at 14. I took my first deer with it that year with my dad sitting by my side. Sports and girls got into the way in my early bowing career. I bought a Bear Polar LTD at 17 and took it took me 5 years to take a deer with it. I started seriously archery hunting around the time I got married. My Grandma on the other hand was my best fishing buddy. My passion for archery hunting is still strong but I have moved through several stages over the years from just killing deer to be more selective to getting others involved in the sport. I guess my Grand parents and Dad were my inspiration!
Magazines, not kidding. I grew up fishing. I'd pick up every hunting magazine I could and read. I had no idea what I was doing but it was fun as hell!
My old man. In Michigan, deer hunting is serious family business and back when I was growing up there, you could not hunt until age 14. So Every year my dad would go to Deer Camp with his older brother, and my grandpa. Seemed like 4-5 days later Dad would come home with a little scrub buck and ice in his mustache. I would beg to go but was told I was 'too young'. Then we moved to Indiana and youth hunting was allowed at 12. Dad didn't have the 'deer camp' so started taking me and I was hooked the first time I went.
Grandpa and uncle got me started deer hunting at 8 or 9. I would sit with Gpa in the stand. Then at 10 i was legal to get my hunters ed and license. Shot my first deer that fall. They also got me small game and bird hunting. My uncle was big into waterfowl in southern illinois in the late 80’s and 90’s so that was pretty awesome to tag along for that. My dad liked to pheasant hunt here and there but was more into building motorcycles and flying airplanes. Bow hunting and Turkey hunting i just kinda broke into on my own.
Dad and Uncle's started the passion , also remember them coming home from deer camps, great stories. 1960's Too young to go, started rabbit hunting when I could keep up. Given a stick to beat the brush, let the beagles run, if we got to right spot, catch rabbit in the open, was given the gun to shoot. Great memories. Didn't kill my first buck till I was 30, shotgun. Didn't start Bow hunting till 20 years ago, now its mostly what I do. Lost my father 22 yrs ago, he would love where we live, bucks in back yard everyday.
Was blessed to have a dad who hunted. Took me waterfowl hunting mostly. Went with my uncle as well. Step dad got me into deer hunting and bow hunting about 15 years ago.
My dad started taking me hunting and fishing before I even got out of diapers. By the time I started Kindergarten, I’d swum through swamps behind my dad to get to a stand and sit with him. I got to watch him shoot deer until I was old enough to sit alone. I’ve shot my four largest bucks on hunts with my dad. So many memories… I had one of my coolest hunts ever a few weeks ago. I shot a 93 inch ten point (monster for the Everglades) with my two boys (11 and 7) and my 5 year old girl watching. Thanks Dad. Sent from my iPhone using Bowhunting.com Forums
My then boyfriend (now husband). He hunted anything and everything. I'd go days without seeing him. I figured if I wanted to see him more, I probably should start hunting. It's been a rough go. He's way more passionate about it then I and tries to push too much onto me when I'm just in it for the fun. So now he mainly focuses on hunting Ohio and I hunt Pennsylvania and it works out much better. 13 years and going lol.
I can't remember not being in love with the Outdoors. Even though I grew up in the city, Rochester, NY, we went camping in the Thousand Islands or even up into the wild of Canada. My grandparents lived on one of the Finger Lakes and we spent a ton of time there. Now, to get to hunting and fishing, whenever my Father got out his firearms and I mean whenever, he would teach us something about them, handguns, shotguns and rifles. From care to marksmanship and it paid off. My family is blessed with an ability to shoot and shoot well, be it handgun, rifle or bow. I have the trophies on the shelves, on the wall and pinned to my uniform when I was serving. I taught my son the same way and we have taught my 3 grandsons the same way. They all have their own bows, the oldest took his first deer last year, actually he got 2. One more than I did, lol. One story, about 4 years ago, I was recovering from surgery and could barely get in the woods but was able to take a same deer on Thanksgiving Day. My son and all 3 grandsons came out to help harvest the deer. At the time, the youngest one was only 2 1/2 years old and he stood there holding the rear legs so his Dad could use his knife on the deer. My grandsons are ALL BOY!!!!! Now that I'm retired from the Thin Blue Line I spend a lot of mornings on the quiet lakes of Upstate NY, PLEASE REMEMBER THAT MOST OF NEW YORK IS NOT NEW YORK CITY!!!!!!!!!
My dad and my uncle, mostly dad though. My dad started bowhunting in the late 60s with a recurve. He hunted a lot and wasn't very successful other than shotgun season. I still remember a fall day in 1988, my dad finally took his first deer with a bow. I was in the woods in a different stand, bowhunting alone at 13. He walked up to me with a big smile and told me he had killed a doe. I'll never forget how excited he was after roughly 20 years to finally get his first deer with his bow. I killed my first deer (shotgun season) in the same spot a few weeks later from his stand, another great memory. My uncle was a more serious hunter and didn't have much patience for the kid (me) at deer camp, so I learned everything I could from dad by following him around and reading his copies of field and stream, sports afield and outdoor life. Time went on, I grew up and before long, my oldest son was tagging along on hunts me and dad. He's been gone 11 years now. My uncle gave up hunting after dad passed, saying it just didn't seem the same without him there. I agree, something is missing, but I keep on and take my kids every chance I get. I hope someday they can say that they learned a lot from me.
@Justin got me into hunting. When I saw that one could become a millionaire and get to work with the likes of Todd I was sold. In Venatione Veritas
