Opening day, first experience hunting

[Predat-Her]

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I went out with my cousin yesterday on the first day of squirrel season here. I've never hunted before and I'm a vegetarian so I had no idea what to expect or how I would feel. He had his shotgun and I used his .22 and we were out in the woods for a good 2 and a half hours or so, just walking the trails and looking for squirrels.

About 40 minutes into our trek we were coming up a trail and at the top of the trail was a broken down cabin. I was pretty focused on the cabin but when I turned my head, I could see a squirrel just getting ready to climb a tree about 20 feet away from us. My cousin, an avid hunter who obviously had superior reflexes to me, flicked the safety off his shot gun and pulled the trigger all in a flash, and a round of bird-shot knocked the squirrel down in his tracks. It had all happened so fast I hadn't really registered it, but as we walked up to the squirrel, who's bottom jaw had been unceremoniously blown off, I felt a sense of remorse, as this squirrel had just died because of us, but also a sense of accomplishment and happiness, at the fact that this squirrel hadn't suffered and that we probably spared it from a much crueler fate down the line.
 
Later on, we spent 15 minutes stalking a single squirrel and finally my cousin got him in his sights and dropped him with a heart shot.

I won't include a picture of the first squirrel, as it is pretty gruesome, but I will include a picture of the second squirrel we bagged. One thing I noticed about hunting is that before, when I simply went for walks in the woods, I didn't really see things like I did when I was hunting, I was merely an observer. When I was hunting, I was listening, instinctively I was walking slower, talking in a lower, quieter tone, constantly scanning the trail and the trees, my mind was racing. I didn't do any shooting myself, but I have a better respect and an understanding of hunting now and can't wait to get out again.

[bohicajuan]

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The real word is not like a Disney movie. Animals live in a violent world of being killed, eatten or dying from hunger or lack of water. Few if any live to a ripe old age and die peacefully in their sleep. You acted out a drama between predator and prey that is millions of years old, and despite what new age, uneducated, simplistic morons contend, will continue until the end of time.

[MOSPARKY]

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Congratulations.. you are now on your way to becomeing a sportsman/outdoors person.
 As you are discovering hunting is not about killing. A little meat for the pot is like a sucker from the doctors office. A mere token of the experience. A successful hunt does not have to conclude with a bulgeing game bag. In fact many(most) of my hunts, I come home empty handed with the same shells I left with, but nearly all have been successful.
 The hunt makes you slow down, listen more, look more carefully and pay closer attention to your surroundings. There is alot more going on in the wood than someone just passing thru will ever notice.
 Most Hunters are not the bloodthirsty bufoons Some would have you beleive and as Bo said life in the wild ain't like disney. Nature is full of checks and balances. Like it or not we as humans are a part of that system. When we don't fulfil our part, nature takes over and no.. it's not painless, merciful and often not quick either.

[Predat-Her]

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The real word is not like a Disney movie. Animals live in a violent world of being killed, eatten or dying from hunger or lack of water. Few if any live to a ripe old age and die peacefully in their sleep. You acted out a drama between predator and prey that is millions of years old, and despite what new age, uneducated, simplistic morons contend, will continue until the end of time.

I understand that now, and squirrels have between a 75-50% mortality rate in the wild, not counting hunting as a factor, and they include  severe winters, inadequate food, parasites, disease, collisions with vehicles, habitat loss, poisons, and predation by wild canines, raptors, and domestic dogs and cats. So statistically, they are destined to meet a violent and painful end. To me, I would rather take a bullet to the head and die instantly than have to suffer through any of the above deaths, so in my opinion, I'm doing the squirrel a big favor and gaining a meal in the process and a better understanding of life and death. We just live in a world where everyone is so disconnected from their food and reality and I'm just tired of living like that, it's not natural, hunting and being out in the woods is natural, and I can feel that now.

[Predat-Her]

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Congratulations.. you are now on your way to becomeing a sportsman/outdoors person.
 As you are discovering hunting is not about killing. A little meat for the pot is like a sucker from the doctors office. A mere token of the experience. A successful hunt does not have to conclude with a bulgeing game bag. In fact many(most) of my hunts, I come home empty handed with the same shells I left with, but nearly all have been successful.
 The hunt makes you slow down, listen more, look more carefully and pay closer attention to your surroundings. There is alot more going on in the wood than someone just passing thru will ever notice.
 Most Hunters are not the bloodthirsty bufoons Some would have you beleive and as Bo said life in the wild ain't like disney. Nature is full of checks and balances. Like it or not we as humans are a part of that system. When we don't fulfil our part, nature takes over and no.. it's not painless, merciful and often not quick either.

I would have been just as happy to leave the woods empty handed as I was that we left with two squirrels. To me, it's about the experience, it's not about the killing, and I couldn't have asked for a better teacher than my cousin. He's a great shot, and very ethical and told me as we were walking through the woods that a friend of his that sometimes tags along to go hunting makes him nervous because that friend is so trigger happy he'll shoot at anything, and he shoots to wound, not to kill, and my cousin doesn't like that at all and neither do I. I think I'm just doing my part to ensure a squirrel meets a humane end and goes to use.

[John Andrews]

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  Nice going, Pre-dat! Hunting is a learning curve, a never ending learning curve.

You are learning it's not all about killing, a big lesson some people are slower to learn.

[bohicajuan]

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Hunting for 98% of us is about enjoying the outdoors, with killing of an animal being the proverbial icing on the cake. You should in all times of hunting go for the most humane kill, but that will not always be a head shot.

In fact in in some instances it is not possible or advised. As a bowhunter a head shot would not be your intent. In hunting just like in self defense you shoot for a center mass area of the heart and lungs to ensure a quick humane kill. Such a shot ensures quick clean kills and will not damage the meat.

This also ensures that if the animal is say a trophy deer and you wish to have a taxidermist mount it, you will have left the head intact for that purpose.

At no time should you apologize or make excuses for having a trophy on your wall. Likewise, you are the one to determine what constitutes a trophy. It can be anything you feel proud in having taken, and don't allow yourself to be told otherwise.

The great thing about hunting is that it is made up of individuals. As individuals we all agree to an ethos of the sport. However; depending where you live and how you are raised will often color our perception. The thing to never forget is that, if it is legal to hunt a certain way, then it is not your place or mine to criticize or condemn them.

You will find here at GP we are big on using dogs and using bows and cross bows. Some people who say they are hunters don't approve of those methods. But to us, if its legal where you hunt, then we support it. Very simple.

[John Andrews]

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  Well said, bo!

[Big58cal]

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Congrats on the hunt and the squirrels. 
 
There's a quote by Fred Bear that is pretty appropriate, "Nature's law of tooth and claw is far crueler than any death I could ever impose."  A year or so ago there was a bunch of trail cam pictures floating around the internet where a bunch of coyotes had been after a deer.  It took several hours for them to get the deer down, but when they did, they were eating on him while he was still alive.  Any way you go at it, my bullet or arrow is a whole lot more humane than that.
 
The first time I took my little boy squirrel hunting (I think he was 6), in spite of his best efforts, we finally found an old deaf dumb and blind fox squirrel that I shot.  The .17 HMR that I shoot will pretty well blow half of their head off and this one was no exception.  When we went to pick it up I handed it to him.  You could tell that all of the blood was having an impact on him.  He said, "Daddy, it's still warm."  "Well yeah bud, it was alive just a little while ago but I shot it so that we could have something to eat.  The Good Lord put animals on this earth so that different animals would have something to eat and we're no exception."  I had had him out shooting some of my guns before, but the squirrel missing part of it's head and all of the blood really drove home the points that I had been making to him about being safe with guns.  Even at 6 years old, you could tell that he was understanding. 

[John Andrews]

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  That's a good thing, starting a youngster before he develops a lot of negative ideas about hunting, opinions from antis and other outside influences.

I remember being with my dad hunting when I was 4 years old. I made an excellent rabbit dog and game carrier for the rabbits, squirrels, and quail. We were also popping tincans with his service .38 pistol and shooting his pump up pellet guns. A year later, I was hunting with a pellet gun and soon graduated to a .22 rifle.

What was most important, dad instilled solid gun safety into us as soon as we could understand the concepts. He also taught us to aim small, shoot small. We used stike anywhere wood matches for targets. The object was to light the match, not just hit the match head.