Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game You Are An Old Hunter If....

It's called fixed power, hello! lol

...you drop down in cartridge size to get away from recoil.

You're not getting old when your hair turns grey,
You're not getting old when your teeth decay,
But you're getting old when you start to creak
And your mind makes dates your body can't keep.

I remember taking a 20 gauge paper hull and sliding it into a 12 gauge paper hull, with some strike anywhere matches inside. You could take each of the hulls, slice down the sides in 4 places and make a hell of a fire starter.

Many times in SW PA when I was a youngster and hunting ended at five PM, a beagle was on a rabbit and we would sit and build a fire that way for awhile until the dog came around

That's old.

When a LYNCH box call was just about the only box call readily available, and an U-Haul trailer was not needed for the "Absolute Must-Have" equipment to kill a Spring Gobbler! Not to mention the Camo pattern selection was limited to whatever our military was using. Hell, Vietnam "Tiger Stripe" was a game changer back in the day!

Damn! That brings back memories hunting in NC. My first tree stand was a Baker. Never heard of a safety belt back then. Just wrapped your arms around the tree and bear-hugged your way up. I remember once I climbed a big slick barked elm tree. It wasn't long before me and the stand came sliding down. You're right, there was no where to sit. You stood on that little platform until it was time to come down. Crazy I guess.

Bob

Bobcape,
Thanks for the reply....I was beginning to think I bought the only Baker ever sold! Every time I get restless in my Ultra Luxurious Millennium ladder stand, I pinch myself and think of that dreaded Baker stand. Killed a pile of deer using it, lucky as heck I didn't break my own neck!

I guess I'm old.

Paper shotgun shells were standard and the plastic hulls hadn't even come out.

Scopes were newfangled items and hunters debated about whether to get one or not.

Tree stands were "discovered" and came into use well into my hunting life, and everyone in the east seemed to change from still hunting to tree standing.

Whitetail scrapes were "discovered" by the hunting mags well into my hunting life.

No one jigged for salmon.

The Mitchell 300 spinning reel was the new fangled way of the future but nobody in my teenage fishing group could afford one at $20.00.

The compound bow was a new and weird device that came on the scene well into my hunting career. I talked to Jennings several times at his shop in California about his strange new bow but wound up buying a Bear Grizzly - couldn't afford the Kodiak Magnum!

Killed my first archery deer with a Lemonwood bow and cedar arrows. Aluminum and then fiberglass arrows were just coming in.

... you ever owned a see-thru scope mount.

Heck yea.......How Bout one of the Old "Tip-Off" rings where you could flip the scope over when needed? My memory tells me the were possibly Weaver, but I can't be for sure.

I have a set of Redfield Tip Offs ,I had on my Win 88 for quite a few years.

I had a set of the raskels on a savage 325 I think in 22 hornet. Well it works most of the time till you feed loose hay in the wind. Just try flipping field mice with open sights then to have a coyote bust out just so fast, Well flip it!shoot then pull half a bail out from under the contrapsion.

There were no one piece plastic shotgun wads....you used a nitro card wad and two felt wads and topped the shot with a over-shot wad and a roll crimp all in a paper case.

Hercules powders (Unique in my case) came in a nice square can.

Hodgdon 4831 was $1.98 a pound in oval paper and tin containers.

No blaze orange.

No commercial tree-stands at all, and I think tree stands were not legal in Wisconsin at one time?

Your an old hunter when you recalled how you walked 1.5 miles to a one room school in 7th and 8th grade with a rifle, and the teacher put it in a closet behind her desk until school was out for your journey home.

That's a great one.

I can recall a very young cowboy missing the school bus.
A few miles down the road his big brothers car caught up to the bus.
To get the bus drivers attention the older brothers fired their six-guns out the car window into the air and the young fella was transferred onto the bus.

Your a old timer if you remember what wool,leather and wood was used for hunting

With notice given I have road the bus to and from with a 410. in the 5th grade.Camp over deal.

When blue jeans were the only high tech hunting pant on the market red hats meant you were a hunter. magnumbs were not on the market The only packs we carried were a apple and peanut butter sandwich in your pocket. Open sights were as common as scopes. Boots were leather gortex was not invented yet

I am not aging gracefully. Nor is my wife. At her insistence, a few years ago we got a good used pickup with camper (good deal, I must admit). Last year, I got me a new Cabelas tent...

Them hot showers are nice tho....

An old hunter remembers when an 870 was new on the market, and a Ruger 77 was looked at with skepticism....