How young is "too young" to start deer hunting?

[Hoseman]

If the kid still believes in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and tooth fairy, they are too young to pull the trigger.
Blows my mind when I hear about how young some children are when they make their 1st kill.

My son is now nine and still believes in all three of the above. He killed his first deer when he was seven. In fact, he killed three that first year. Of course I was with each time and continue to be with him every time he goes for a few more years. Every child is different. Deer hunting is probably the most boring type of hunting for young kids so I do not push him to go with me. He loves spring turkey hunting and I took him on his first duck hunt last year and loved that as well because it has more action.

 

[Chainsaw]

Tap is right; kids still believing in Santa are not ready to hunt or shoot deer. I'm glad I grew up in a different era as many of you have. The many years of "hunting" with other kids with our BB guns for years were priceless, and then we advanced to 22's at around 9 years old but could only carry it with an adult present. Finally at around 12 years old we were all allowed to take our 22's hunting without adults. By then no one ever pointed a gun in another's direction loaded or empty and safeties were on until the second before the gun hit your shoulder to shoot and we ALWAYS unloaded the guns when crossing fences. A lot of winter cottontails were taken those years. Hunting deer was something we could have cared less about.

And at 12 was also when most of us got our first shotguns; they were single shots and after a year or two seldom was a duck or pheasant missed and even Mr. Grouse was at risk once he flushed. It was a cardinal sin to even think of shooting a bird out of a tree or on the ground; any shot at a bird with our shotguns other than flying was simply not acceptable. There was a giant crow roost nearby where thousands of crows came to nightly; every Saturday the adults took the whole gang of us shooting crows. We had hundreds of crow decoys that we had all made together which over the years fooled many a crow. That was something all of us very much enjoyed. I had deer hunted once or twice at age 12 but found it way too slow. Chasing birds from behind our setters, that was real hunting then. And trapping coon and rats was really living. Finally at 17 most of us took up deer hunting annually but only for a few days a year. It wasn't until my late thirties that deer hunting became more interesting. It came easy to all of us "used to be kids". We were all pretty accomplished stillhunters by then having stillhunted and shot untold #'s of rabbits with our 22's and bull frogs with our arrows deer hunting came easy then. And the zillions of hours spent in the woods by then hunting upland game by day and chasing coon at night made us all completely comfortable anywhere in the woods close to the road or in deep far from civilization. All of the woods knowledge and skills that were learned and honed in our childhood and teenage years had us well prepared for deer hunting.

I love deer hunting now but still miss those days of all the other hunting that we as kids chose to do ourselves. It is a different era for sure; kids in most areas I guess no longer get to disappear in the woods with their guns all day without adults. In contrast for us it was the most natural thing in the world to see two or three of us with shotguns walking together down the street on our way to the woods. Of course the guns would be empty and cracked open until we reached the woods.The kids today deer hunting at age 5 or 8 or even 12 will miss a lot of that. Hope it balances out.

 

[Hoosierhunting]

I’ll say this J-Bird my oldest is six and my nephew is 8. The nephew is close, next year not this year. I wouldn’t dream of the 6 year old hunting and if someone really had a 5 year old shoot a deer that’s ridiculous. I respect our individual differences but I find it dumb when I see people pushing their kids into deer hunting at such a young age. Tagging along at any age is fine but I don’t understand the rush to make them deer hunters. Even if the kid wants to the parent should exercise some common sense. I personally believe there’s a lot of value growing up small game hunting. Those squirrels will teach a kid a lot of woodsmanship and have them ready for deer when they’re ready. I’ll never understand the rush. Can’t wait to see the pics of an 8 year old with his first grizzly .....


Sent from my iPhone using Deer Hunter Forum

 

[Jeff H]

Tap is right; kids still believing in Santa are not ready to hunt or shoot deer. I'm glad I grew up in a different era as many of you have. The many years of "hunting" with other kids with our BB guns for years were priceless, and then we advanced to 22's at around 9 years old but could only carry it with an adult present. Finally at around 12 years old we were all allowed to take our 22's hunting without adults. By then no one ever pointed a gun in another's direction loaded or empty and safeties were on until the second before the gun hit your shoulder to shoot and we ALWAYS unloaded the guns when crossing fences. A lot of winter cottontails were taken those years. Hunting deer was something we could have cared less about.

And at 12 was also when most of us got our first shotguns; they were single shots and after a year or two seldom was a duck or pheasant missed and even Mr. Grouse was at risk once he flushed. It was a cardinal sin to even think of shooting a bird out of a tree or on the ground; any shot at a bird with our shotguns other than flying was simply not acceptable. There was a giant crow roost nearby where thousands of crows came to nightly; every Saturday the adults took the whole gang of us shooting crows. We had hundreds of crow decoys that we had all made together which over the years fooled many a crow. That was something all of us very much enjoyed. I had deer hunted once or twice at age 12 but found it way too slow. Chasing birds from behind our setters, that was real hunting then. And trapping coon and rats was really living. Finally at 17 most of us took up deer hunting annually but only for a few days a year. It wasn't until my late thirties that deer hunting became more interesting. It came easy to all of us "used to be kids". We were all pretty accomplished stillhunters by then having stillhunted and shot untold #'s of rabbits with our 22's and bull frogs with our arrows deer hunting came easy then. And the zillions of hours spent in the woods by then hunting upland game by day and chasing coon at night made us all completely comfortable anywhere in the woods close to the road or in deep far from civilization. All of the woods knowledge and skills that were learned and honed in our childhood and teenage years had us well prepared for deer hunting.

I love deer hunting now but still miss those days of all the other hunting that we as kids chose to do ourselves. It is a different era for sure; kids in most areas I guess no longer get to disappear in the woods with their guns all day without adults. In contrast for us it was the most natural thing in the world to see two or three of us with shotguns walking together down the street on our way to the woods. Of course the guns would be empty and cracked open until we reached the woods.The kids today deer hunting at age 5 or 8 or even 12 will miss a lot of that. Hope it balances out.

So much of what you have said parallels my childhood experiences. I used to ride my bike down to the Wolf river bottoms in Tn. with my shotgun over the handlebars (unloaded, chamber open of course). Can you imagine what would happen to a 12 year old doing that today ? I do worry about the next generation, but my parents probably worried about mine as well. Just because it's different doesn't make it bad.

 

[weekender21]

My daughter has tagged along on occasional archery pig hunts since just before her 5th birthday. Even if the pigs showed up an hour into the hunt I could tell this style of hunting was a little slow for her. She enjoyed the field dressing part of the hunt and learned more about biology by age six than most college grads.

She has been shooting a bow in competition and just for fun since she was three. She's eight now and she's still too young to be the "trigger man" in my opinion. She questions Santa, the tooth ferry, and the Easter Bunny but she still believes. I also think that's a great guide.

Like many of you, I was wandering the woods solo at age seven with a pellet rifle in hand. Plenty of small game paid the ultimate price but I didn't kill a deer until age 11.


Sent from my iPhone using Deer Hunter Forum

 

[E_308]

My requirement for my kid was that he had to kill either a squirrel or rabbit before he could go deer hunting. He shot a doe at 8 yo and his first buck this year at 9. Back in my day we didn't have youth seasons and you had to have your hunter ed card before hunting. I shot my first deer at 13. I know a lot of 6 year olds that are hunting deer, but I also know a lot of dad's that are putting in "insurance" shots. I think it is much more important to learn to hunt than to just kill deer. Small game is where they should start.

 

[Gravel Road]

It sounds like my childhood was similar to others here. I started at around age 5 with a Red Ryder, and eventually graduated to a Crosman pump pellet gun. I'd hate to guess how many hours we spent in the local woods and pastures chasing birds and small game. We could name every bird by sound and were skilled at cleaning critters very early. Mom was pretty accommodating, and I can remember putting sparrows inside of the Thanksgiving turkey (not bad taste by the way). Guess it was a poor man's turducken-lol. Eventually we graduated to 22's and shotguns, but couldn't deer hunt until 14yo with a bow or 16yo with a rifle. I couldn't imagine deer hunting at 5-8 years old, and we lived to hunt.

Actually, I feel a little sorry for some of the little ones. They don't get a chance to spend the quality time in the outdoors that a lot of us did, and miss out on that experience. To have to sit in a warm blind and shoot a rifle that is placed on sandbags because the rifle is too heavy to hold just doesn't sound like an exciting hunt.

 

[Familytradition]

I was 8 when I started deer hunting alone. 9 when I killed my first deer. My son is 7 now and he might be able to shoot a deer in 2018, but he won’t be put into a stand by himself that young. I will say I learned a lot by being on my own, but it’s just not how I parent. My son knows what he had to do to earn the right to deer hunt. He must put 10 shots in a row into a 4 inch target at 30 yards. I have a hard time too believing that many young kids kill a deer legally, but I’m sure some do. I think crosssbows, .410, and pistol rounds that legal in Indiana now do give younger kids access to deer hunting. I had to shoot a 20 gauge and pull a bow back to 35 pounds in the 90’s. I was a big strong kid and the the old bear bow that I had didn’t have much let-off. It’s the main reason I never really learned to appreciate bow hunting.


Sent from my iPhone using Deer Hunter Forum

 

[emetzger]

I agree with a lot on here and the importance of hanging out and being outdoors is much more important than pulling a trigger. Mine on the left killed at 10 and the one on the right isn’t ready yet.

Sent from my iPhone using Deer Hunter Forum