Adult onset hunters- who taught you?
 

Guys (and Gals),
Just curious what's the percentage of hunters who didn't learn as a kid. And how you got into it?

Both me and Mike fall into that category as well. It's not always easy to find mentors and I'd say it's much harder to get into than if your father or an uncle mentored you.

I'm curious because we will be interviewing a guy in Vancouver who's taken this on- mentoring adult hunters.

Cheers
John
www.highlanderhunting.podbean.com

I purchased a pellet gun a few years ago from Canadiantire to battle the gopher problem we had. After a few years, I decided I would like to get something with a little more power. I did my research around firearms licensing and went out completed the Non-Restricted and Restricted courses. I then researched what was required to get into hunting. I completed the Online Alberta Hunter Education course, applied for a WIN. I connected with a friend who has been hunting for many years and he has been mentoring me ever since.

Gophers, the gateway drug!

My dad was never into hunting (he did dabble in it in mid-life) but he was an avid fisherman and took us out every chance he could.

We had friends in church who were hunters, and I was enthralled with tales of their adventures as I chewed on moose dinners. I couldn't wait to get into hunting, and was able to get started in earnest as a young adult. My sister did as well; she's an avid crossbow enthusiast and she was instrumental in piquing my interest in archery - which is extending to IncrediGirl and the kids as well.

I take my kids fishing and hunting as often as I can (which isn't as often as I would like to, with work and other commitments!) I take my nephews along when possible too! (The nieces aren't into it... Yet..) :D

I am fortunate that I had a father and an uncle that had me out hunting as soon as it was legal for me to carry. Now I am taking my sons out. They are not legal to carry but they still come and learn the basics. I also still hunt with my father , even though he can't get around well anymore.

My father and uncle showed me the basics when I decided to take it up, but my mentor has been a friend of mine who is an avid hunter and gun enthusiast. He's also a landowner, so to be able to walk the land with him and learn different techniques has been invaluable. I have a few other friends getting into backcountry hunting which I'm hoping to learn more about this year.

I'm sort of half and half. My grandfather used to hunt, and the stories he told me inspired my obsession at a very young age. That being said, it had been over thirty years when I came along. I killed a crazy amount of gophers and magpies with my much bargained for pellet gun. We fished a lot, and drove around in the bush a few times, but the actual hunting of big game was something I learned on my own. He's frequently told me that I'm simply wired for it and didn't need teaching. I've always been grateful for the support though.

Ive noticed something regarding this subject...Those of us who had to struggle and learn on our own are generally far more passionate about it, for far longer, than those who have been spoon fed by their dad on the back 40. The spoon fed guys eventually take it for granted and lose interest, usually associated with an uptick in work or family. Us misfits make everything work around hunting season. See: Jim Shockey, Cam Hanes, Steven Rinella, Ryan Kohler, Cody Robbins. All guys who didn't have a hunter dad growing up. All at the top of their particular hunting interest. Sure it's a generalization and there's probably exceptions, but I think it's like everything else, you only appreciate it when you have to work for it.

I was not raised in a hunting family. Prior to about 12 or 14 years ago I'd characterize my stance as vaguely anti-hunting. I had a cooey .22 when I was young only because I found it in grandma's garage, and I traded it for a pellet gun because my allowance didn't buy much .22 ammo. Plus my friends and I could shoot each other with pellet guns. ;)

Anyway, when my oldest son was old enough for a youth PAL he asked if we could try hunting. I thought it might be a good father and son activity so we took our hunter certification and PAL courses together. We knew no one else who hunted so we learned on our own through trial and error and via this forum, as well as one upland hunting forum in the US. Learned a lot here. So I have a soft spot for newbies with "dumb" questions and requests to be pointed in the general direction of some access or game. I had no one to turn to.

No one in my family hunted, except for a few distant cousins I rarely saw. It was actually this site, that got me into hunting. I got my first bow at 16, and kept reading and watching hunting shows. I shot when I could, which was only 2-3 times per year, if that... Lots of trial and error. Two years ago, I moved to my acreage, and last fall, I got my first animal with my bow.

It was a lot of "try this, then try that"

Eventually I figured it out, but I think I've only scratched the surface.

I grew up with the fortunate circumstance of being born into a family of hunters fishermen and competitive target shooters and coaches .
Never bought a gun of even ammo until I left home.
I have however ,never forgotten the teachings I learned about helping others whenever I can and however I can, and will be hunting until My body is shed and dust ,and my soul returned from whence it came .:)
Cat

I grew up in a none-hunting family; the biggest thing my part of Canada had were rabbits and coyotes. So no opportunity to learn and no one I knew had firearms or were into it. Had a friend who had a savage.270 he wanted to pass on so I took my course, wife suggested I take hunters ed ( i wonder if she regrets it!) so I went for it that October, read and re-read the regs and had two deer in the freezer by November. Since then Ive been mostly solo, reading everything I can get my hands on, listening to podcasts, watching shows and YouTube. A few more deer, countless upland and waterfowl and rabbit, haven't had to buy meat in two years. Not bad for my first two seasons! I definitely feel the difficulty of making mistakes and learning the hard way though. Most times when I see/don't see game I wonder if I'm doing something right, wrong, or pure fluke. I don't have many friends who enjoy the back pack deep country stuff I do, or they're busy schedules make connecting tough...but now I work on a farm and have a young family so I don't get much bush time anymore either. I am waiting for that good back country hunter buddy/mentor though! I'm sure my wife would be happier were i not back packing alone for bear!


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I grew up with hunting. I got to tag along on hunts from an early age.
But no one mentored me. I learned by observing and listening.

I got my first rifle on my 10th birthday I think. That was so long ago I don't remember exactly how old I was. I do remember that it was my sister who gave me that rifle, not my dad.

I shot my first Moose when I was around fifteen years old. I left home when I was 16 and it was before I left home but that's all I can say for sure.

Dad mentored me in trapping but not in hunting, I guess he figured I was doing fine without his help.

Maybe that was because I felt more at home around wild creatures then I did around people. I could kill and eat wild creatures, I liked to eat. A lot!

Come to think of it, I think that's the real reason I liked to hunt.
I remember frying blackbirds on a flat rock and roasting fish on a stick.
So that's the real reason I like to hunt. I like to eat, always have and always do.

Then why aren't you better at it??? :scared0018:

I'm joking, Keg. Joking!

I grew up doing some fishing (just enough to keep me itching for more) but never hunted until adulthood. When I first moved out I had a friend/ room mate who did a bit of hunting, and being broke with nothing else to do I tagged along with him and his father. I shot a few grouse, followed my friend around the bush for miles, and picked his dad's brain since he was the only one who seemed to know what he was doing.

I didn't have the disposable income to really get into hunting until several years later but the lessons I learned from my buddy's dad I never forgot, and I consider him to be the only real mentor I've had. The old guy liked to hunt big timber, he still hunted whitetails, snow tracked his moose, and he saw more game than we ever dreamed of. Through my early years of truck hunting, and later stand hunting cutlines and hay fields I always remembered the old guy and kept poking around in the big timber even though it was generally wasn't that productive. Eventually the pieces fell into place and now I greatly favor hunting the way old John did... wandering the forest looking at tracks. I'll have to track him down one of these days and thank him for the wonderful gift he gave me, he inspired me to hunt, and gave me a lofty goal to shoot for and eventually achieve. For me I never quite get the feeling of being exactly where I belong so much as when I'm sneaking through the timber, no destination in mind, just reading the tracks and following the game trails.

:sHa_sarcasticlol::sHa_sarcasticlol:

LOL cause I'm getting old. :medium-smiley-035:

Dad
 

It was definitely Dad for me.

Took a hunter education course through school (back when that was still offered........not sure it is anymore, which would be a real shame) that gave me the theoretical.

Dad build upon the theoretical by providing the practical :happy0180:

You know, I've been thinking about the new hunters on site and I think back to my early years and how I often struggled with the how where and when of hunting and I realize that even after all the years I still learn something new almost every time I'm out.
And it think, it must be incredibly difficult for people these days who didn't have the opportunities I had.

We have far better access these days, and better equipment.
But we have so much more competition and with many species, a way fewer animals and birds.

I can remember dad shooting Moose from out front step. How often does that happen these days?
I can remember clouds of Ducks descending on our fields. We hardly ever see ducks in the fields around here now.

There are more cities now, and bigger cities, so a lot more people live in cities these days and they have to commute to hunt anything.

We did all our hunting on foot, close to home.

This week I showed a couple from Camrose where to find Elk around here. Not because we have tons of Elk, we don't, and there are a lot of people who hunt these Elk.
But that couple have no place close to where they live, where they can hunt Elk. So we share what we have.

That is the Canadian way. That is the way I was taught to be.
That is what hunting is about. It's about people providing for other people.

Putting a trophy on the wall is a bonus, or it should be. Getting the grand slam is not hunting, it's bragging.

Challenging yourself has always been a part of hunting and I think a healthy part of hunting.
It starts with the learning and develops into other aspects such as stalking methods, antler size, new species sought. All good.
Yet the basis must be providing for oneself or for others or it becomes nothing more then entertainment.
At the expense of a living, feeling, interesting creature that has so much more to offer the world then simple mindless entertainment.

New to hunting and guns at 18. Bro in law mentored me. 14 years later I'm showing him where to go and how to seal the deal. That's come from countless hours studying maps, scouting and just plain sitting in stands. My real break-though came about 6 years ago when I made it a mission to obtain permission and personal friendships with the landowners in my zone.
I'm by no means a master like some on this forum but I do usually obtain my target species each year. Haven't shot a Booner yet but I feel I get closer every year.

In a nutshell, I'm a self taught, studious outdoorsman. I must say I've taken soooooo much out of the various outdoors writers in Alberta. Hunting and fishing. I would say I try my best to model after TJ and his methods as much as possible for one simple reason- they work!

Grew up in an elk hunting house hold chasing then around in the bush been hooked ever since, learned years ago scouting hard pays off,

Friends
 

I've spent my whole life hiking, climbing, kayaking, mountain biking and working in the mountains, but never hunted, nobody in the family hunted. A friend or two was into it, so I took the PAL course, bought a rifle, and shot a deer with help the first year. Then got into bow hunting also. I've shot one elk with a rifle, three with a bow, and a dozen or so deer since I started. A bunch of my friends are now into it also who started later in life. I also used this board to ask about rifles etc., and although the politics here are kinda different the people are often great. Thanks.

Wow. I didnt expect the number of responses this quick.
Also some interesting perspectives for sure.

I found out about this guy in Vancouver about a year ago, who's doing seminars and courses for new adult hunters (I won't say his company name because I dont want people to think we are promoting it). But it's more the idea of people taking a course to learn hunting skills. I mean I wanted to become a better canoeist so I took a course, so I guess it makes sense for hunting too. But somehow hunting is different.

I guess this is how its done now... Should make for an interesting conversation.

cheers
John
www.highlanderhunting.podbean.com

Man, I would have paid for that. Still might. I was disappointed that the Hunter Education Course really didn't teach you to hunt. It's more of a safety and law course, which is fine and necessary, but....

Its an interesting idea for sure, I recently found a blog of a guy who was doing this in the eastern US. Offering guidance from choosing a firearm right up to butchering your deer.

In the long list of lazy, unsafe, and just plain slob hunters I hunted with in the early years (took awhile to learn what types to stay clear of) I'm very glad that I was fortunate enough to be introduced to hunting by a guy that was none of these things. Is that worth money? I dunno.

I wondered about that. I've looked at the literature and it didn't look to me like it taught any of the critical hunting skills like stalking, tracking and butchering.

I wish I had more time, I'd love to offer what little training I could but I've got enough irons in the fire as it is.

In fact I have to sign off and hit the road. I have a gun show to do in Olds this weekend and I'm not even packed yet.

All day I've been tying up loose ends around the yard and popping in here for breaks, and now I'm running behind schedule.

I taught myself a lot of what I know about hunting through years of observations and mistakes. The mistakes teach you the most. After a few decades of hunting alone hunting becomes second nature. The butchering part of hunting came easy as I grew up on the farm where we butchered all our animals and poultry. Knew how to butcher buzzards and beef long before I ever shot a big game animal.

The fortunate part was I was raised in the parklands at a time when there were vast herds of gophers, magpies blackened the skies and Dad and my Uncles would buy 22 shells by the case, 5000 rounds at a time.

It was a time when guns were propped up behind the doors of every farm house. At the age of 5 or 6 (it was before I started going to grade school) Dad would give me a box of whizzbang 22 shorts and a single shot Stevens in the morning and I would wander as far as the big 20 acre bush half a mile away shooting gophers and magpies. My dad only hunted grouse so I was spotting grouse on our chicken runs since I was 4. Shot my first grouse when I was 5. Shot my first coyote at age 10. Dad bought me a husqvarna 30-06 when I was 12. Shot my first big game at 16.

A funny part of the past is......The farmers back then were old school on the land, most of them being the kids of the original homesteaders, so they hunted themselves and welcomed hunters. If you told a farmer you were a hunter back then he would be calling you in the fall telling you to come shoot all the moose or deer off is place. Things have definitely changed.

I have tried to mentor a couple of new hunters but find most are all caught up in these new products and "new and improved" hunting gadgets. Only one was willing to learn my "old ways". The old ways are simple... know your gun, know your animals and know your territory.

There are a lot of adult hunters who could benefit from a mentor. I have seen some field dressed moose with more hair and dirt on the meat than you can imagine.

My boys wanted to hunt so a friend from work showed us the ropes.

This guy we'll be interviewing does the whole thing, marksmanship, scouting, and from what I could tell from the website, processing the animal. The whole thing. Seems like an efficient way to learn the craft really.

When I was a child I learned from my beloved father how to hunt small game. When I grew up I wanted to hunt big game so I am self taught.

But the fundamentals I learned from my father. :)