There have been several "when I was a kid" deer hunting stories in the pump action rifle threat, so I thought to myself, why not start a thread for these stories.

When I was 12 it was my first year deer hunting. It was 1979 and we hunted in the national forest and stayed in a camper.

I got to go to camp for Thanksgiving weekend. We didn't see anything those 3 days. The following Saturday was the 1st of December and it was the only doe day of the season. On the Friday evening before doe day we pulled the camper up and spent the night. We were up early that Saturday and came outside to several inches of fresh snow.

I still remember every detail of that morning from climbing that ridge to dad dropping me off at the top. He had a stand about 100 yards below where he could keep an eye on me.

Dad had sporterized a 93 Mauser for me but let me carry his Marlin 35 that morning while he took his Model 70 270. This will become an important detail soon.

As soon as he dropped me off I sprayed myself down with G96 Apple deer lure. I hadn't been there 15 minutes when a huge old doe and her fawn from the spring walked right on top of me. I centered the crosshairs on the big does chest and cocked the rifle. With the click all hell broke loose. They ran right down the hollow to dad where he busted the big doe with the 270. She started flopping in the snow and the other one started running back up the other ridge and I started throwing lead at her. I missed clean

At that point in my life watching that doe go down in spectacular fashion was coolest thing I'd ever seen.

That day is what made me want to be a deer hunter and I'll never forget it. It's one of both mine and my dads favorite hunting memories.

I was born in 1970.

I'm still a kid.

1971 here, so I guess I'm still a kid too. Good thing, since I killed my first deer in 2007. I didn't deer hunt when I was younger, so I'll just have to enjoy everyone else's stories.

I was born in the mid-1950s and if you ask my Wife, I'm 16 going on 60.

Looking at our deer population now, it's hard to imagine that
we didn't always have them, even though I witnessed it growing up. We just didn't have any deer to speak of here in this corner of the state. Not sure the truth of the matter, but I was always told that they were hunted to nigh extinction during the depression and didn't recover until stocking programs
that started in the sixties.

I believe we had no deer season when I was born, opened back up in 1969 or so? Anyhow, when I started hunting at 7 years old,
we called it deer hunting but it was more just trudging around hoping to see a track in the mud, and suffering cold weather with no suitable cloths. Anyone else remember cheap un-insulated rubber boots two sizes too big, with 6 or 8 layers of socks? You put on long johns if you had them, then your smallest pair of jeans, layering another pair or two of looser ones over them.

The only time we saw deer was in the Summer. We kept a pair of binoculars in the window, and if you saw one or two come out in the field half mile away, it was something to get on the party line phone and tell all the neighbors. "Guess what we just saw!"

What I remember most was the so-called stands - a scant few boards or maybe a hardwood pallet perched nose-bleed high in some huge old oak tree. Steps would be chunks of scrap 2x4 nailed on, or more commonly cotton picker spindles driven into the trunk. The spindles were usually better to climb, but completely unforgiving if you slipped and hit one with the inside of your leg. I have never liked heights, so that was terrifying to me. I remember climbing one on the top of a deep hollow, that the spikes circled the tree as you went up.
You started off on the high side, but by time you reached the platform you'd added another 20 feet to your elevation by the ground under you sloping down and away. If you fell, probably 50 feet down. Screwed up my courage and climbed up into that monstrosity, rifle slung across my back - none of us had yet thought of a pull up rope. About the time I had gotten thoroughly cold and stiff, the wind came up and the big oak started swaying violently. As scared as I've ever been climbing down from there.

Lord, it's a wonder any of us survived the dumb stuff we did.
I could go on, but that's enough of a start for now.

I may have shared this one before:

I was hunting one morning when I was 13 or so and managed to shoot a whitetail doe about 170-180yds from my stand. It dropped right there with a shoulder shot from my .243win. Within a few minutes, crows were circling the carcass. To my disbelief, one flew down and lit on the deer, where it began pecking on the exit wound. As the deer had fallen lengthwise in relation to me, hitting the crow in the body would wind up hitting the deer also. So it was a headshot or nothing.

The old-timers at the hunting camp got a big kick out of it all.....

Ok,I'll give it a whirl. When I was a kid hunting season was cause for little or no sleep the night before opening day. Small game,big game,it didn't matter. Deer season was bigger than Christmas. School was a buzz with anticipation.

Being from a rural community,school was made up of primarily hunters. Talk of boys graduating from their "starter rifles" to grown up models was always in the air. Some of the boys started with sporterized Krags and Springfields. The rifles their older brothers transitioned through. Rights of passage if you will. 30/30s,32 Specials, the 270, and the bad boy of the bush the "Ought six" were all well represented. A 13 year old seated behind the controls of the family "06" was always held in high regard.

First timers were all ears when the older boys talked. The first buck stories always held their attention. In those days you had to wait to be 12 to hunt. After completing the hunters education course. No mentor program then. It meant something to become of age to actually go out with the clan. Fathers,uncles,in-laws,out-laws. This is the memory of my youth that drove me to a complete and unabashed love of the sport. Pac boots,Woolrich coats,gangs of hunters taking stands (not in trees),and organized drives. Groups of hunters circling the bed of a pick up to count the points of a buck,and recount the drive he came off of.

The local Grange hall put on an all day breakfast the first day. Pancakes and sausage was the order of the day. The conversation in that building was nothing short of electric to a 13 year old. More deer were shot in that room than the woods I'd bet. All ages were represented there. I do miss it.

It was a special time.I was 13. A brand new M94 30/30 in hand. The year before,my first season,it was a single shot 20ga and slugs. Now I was in the big time. I felt I could feed the world holding that Winchester. And that flame hasn't died yet. You all know what I'm talking about. A love of hunting and the traditions that surround it. It isn't so much a single story from when I was a kid,but the whole time and place.

Some great stuff here.. Enjoy every bit of it..

I started deer hunting before hunted ed. required.. I remember as 6 said the talk in school before deer season opened.. Some of the guys had doe license for that year.. I didn't and wouldn't for a couple years..

My first season was with my grandfather.. He had a model 54 .30-06 with factory iron sights.. His ammo was left over stuff from the last 30 years hunting.. No two bullets looked the same... He had shot lots of bucks, but the ranges were short, so about anything would do..

As I got into school the boys talked of the rifles they had for the coming hunt.. A very few hunted with slugs, mostly til they got their first rifle..I had my dad's .32 spl. carbine.. He wasn't a serious hunter, but my grandfather had been.. I remember some of the guys of course had .30-30's.. The .300 Savage was very popular in those days.. One of my good friends was using a .222 for his first season.. Later he switched to a .30-30 and an original Springfield in 06.. He also used his dad's 721 .270..

After I was about 15, I started using my grandfathers 06.. Later had it custom stocked, and put a good scope on it..

Some of the guys I met while hunting, became good friends.. As I grew up.. One had been in heavy fighting in WW2.. He always carried a handgun.. Sometimes two.. He shot at least one deer with a 1917 .45 ACP.. He told me he had killed 23 bucks with his Remington pump in .35 Remington.. By the time I got to know him pretty well, he had bought a 721 on close out from a local store.. It was in .300 H & H.. He shot 4 or 5 bucks with it them had it chambered to a wildcat similar to .300 wea. At times he still carried his .35.. He was one of the few, maybe the only one, that killed a buck each fall.

Another good friend was farmer.. His choice was a model 70 in .270.. During the summer he kept the 'chucks out of his pasture with it.. Come deer season, he was a deadly shot..

Another good friend used a .30-30, then a nice prewar model 70 .30-06.. He and I made many hunts together.. When the .264 hit the market, he bought one and killed quite a few deer with it.. He also used a 760 with open sights in a .270 when participating in drives..

He built the first elevated tree stand in the country.. A little house in the top of an oak tree.. Now they are common.. Times have changed, most of the old guard are gone.. Deer hunting has changed also.. Those days we hunted anywhere we liked.. Now most of the country is posted, and leasing is becoming the new thing.. Sad, but true.

When I was a kid.......aw man, how I remember my first hunt. We drove from the Youngstown, Ohio area up to deer camp in Clearfield County Pa. Interstate 80 wasn't in yet, so it was a 5 hour plus ride on the Friday after Thanksgiving up through the mountains to get to camp. All the little towns on the way were buzzing with activity as the Orange Army headed for the hills. Little motels, bars and restaurants, and all the little gun shops were very busy. Monday morning found me behind camp on a windswept ridge, guarding a centuries old deer trail up the side of the mountain. Sure enough, here came a spiker working his way up the hill. My old .32 Special barked twice, and the deer kept right on running-up and over the top of the hill. Dad was up high in another hollow, but old Bud, one of the old timers from our camp came over to check on me. I told him I missed, and he's like "what do you mean you missed? You shot, where's the buck?" Bud was a curmudgeon in the first degree, and had no use for kids, especially ones that shot at deer and missed. I was respectful of the fact that he was a very good hunter, scared to death of his no BS attitude, and pizzed as all get out at him for being such a danged crab.

It would be ten years before I filled my first tag, on what was to be Dad's last hunt. Sadly, he died the following spring.

79 here, so definitely a kid still.

I remember bow hunting with my dad when I was 3 or 4. I got sleepy and almost fell out of the tree, so he lowered me down by the hood of my sweatshirt and had me walk bad to the truck, about 3/4 of a mile. I sat there til dark surrounded by deer that I was just sure knew why we were out there and were going to get their revenge at any second. dad walked up after dark and wondered why I had been crying, he laughed when I told him. when we got home my mom didn't laugh at him making me walk through the woods that far. his defense was he could see me for the most part half of the walk back, didn't fly with mama too well.
But I survived, and it must have made an impression because it's one of if not the earliest memory I have I can remember. Mom still gets flustered at dad when I bring it up, it's hilarious!

This kinda mirrors my experience. We started having a few deer and a season in the mid-sixties, but I knew no person that knew anything about deer hunting, so it was a long, slow learning curve until I killed one. We hunted off the ground and ran them with dogs, and not knowing much about deer trails and such, seldom saw a deer. I also knew nothing about how important keeping still was, at the time, but I slowly learned. miles

My first year deer hunting, I didn't go. Deer numbers were so low that the state of Minnesota closed the season in the half of the state where I lived. Again. It really didn't matter as there were no deer in most that part of the state and the season was frequently closed. The following year the season was closed state wide so did not go then either.

Finally, got out when in my mid-teens. I had a great year as I saw tracks two of the four days I hunted. Today I am pretty sure the second set of tracks were made when the first were made a week earlier but I was in a different stand so they were a different deer to me.

First buck was shot the following year. We were on a "bucks only" program to build up the deer herd. My stepfather's sister married into a family with a lot of land in southern MN. They invited us to hunt with them that year. It was a shotgun zone and hunts were done as drives.

We drove several areas that Saturday with only a couple of deer seen and one shot at. Sunday had us hitting the same areas as it was hoped deer pushed from other properties would end up on ours.

The second drive was a woody fenceline. 4 drove the woods and two posted the end. It was really no different than pheasant hunting and it was not uncommon for one to load a birdshot round first it was more likely to see a pheasant than a deer. I was a driver and was pushing through the thickest part as I was young and new.

As I stepped over a downed tree, I almost stepped on a deer. If it would have broke and ran right then I would never have shot as identification would have been impossible. Instead, the deer just hunkered down lower and expected me to walk by. That gave me time to see antlers and I shot it with my 20 ga 870 and Winchester Foster slugs before it could change its mind. It was "the Old Man" of the area with 8 pts. Looking back it was probably 3 years old but back then a deer did not live long and bucks even less.

I was pretty proud of that buck but it caused some hard feelings with others. Bucks were nearly as rare as unicorns and having a kid and a guest shoot the local monster did not sit well with some. We weren't invited back for a couple of years but that changed when we set up our own camp "Up North" and began inviting some of them up. Deer numbers took off up there faster than down south and we became the preferred destination.

First year deer hunting in the mid 50's . I was using a borrowed Remington pump,32-30. When actuating it the magazine was on a helix and the whole thing moved somewhat.

This was in the PA mountains in Clinton County. My father put me on a stand and told me do not move from there until he came back for me. There was a lot of snow and it was cold ,cold , cold. The stand was under a large pine tree,and after a bit , a clump of snow fell and landed on the action of the gun. I brushed it off as well as I could,but there was still snow down between the barrel and magazine.So I got close to blow it off.

Too close,my upper lip stuck frozen to the barrel.There I was with a gun stuck to my face and the longer it stayed the more it froze. I finally got enough guts to yank it off and a good part of my lip stayed with the gun. I was bleeding quite bit and I didn't care if I ever shot a deer. It was a couple hours before my father came back and if he said stay,you stayed.

My first recollection - I think the year was 1973. My father (Whelen Nut) shot a buck and he and my uncle (pictured) thought it would be pretty funny to get my brother and I to "help find" the already downed/located deer.

They covered the buck in marsh grass and kept insisting the deer had to be right in the general vicinity. It wasn't until I tripped over the deer that I "found him"... I recall being quite proud of myself to find dad's deer for him.

Scott -

I didn't know they had cameras back then! !








KOOL pic and great story!


Jerry

They closed Arkansas deer season state wide in 1944. All through the early '50s my grandad cruised the roads of the International Paper companies game preserve in Columbia County every Sunday afternoon looking for deer. It was big news when he saw tracks cross the road.

In 1959 they had an experimental season there. One day. Grandad took me that Saturday after granma filled my pockets with baked potatoes fresh out of the oven to keep me warm. I was placed under a large Oak tree and told not to move. Grandad eased on into the woods.

Around 9AM I saw grandad slowly walking back toward me when suddenly to my right there was a shaking of bushes about thirty yards way. First deer I had ever seen. I was so stunned I didn't even raise my gun. Pa wasn't happy.

It was twenty two years before I hunted deer again. Took my limit(whatever it was that year) for the next thirty two years.

Me either!

Stone cold killer, right there.

my 1st rifle season was in 1972 i was 14 hunted with a 12 gage with slugs, only saw does and no doe permits, I started going up with my dad the year before, helping in the deer drives, back than sometime there be 30-40 guys, and we drive mile squares! those days are long gone, well the next year, i got a any deer permit, my grandfather loaned me his 742 30-06 with iron sights, I shot at 3 does running by missed I dont think I had ever shot that rifle before, but it was on for my gramps! after i looked for blood, i went back to my spot on the oak ridge, was feeling down cuz I missed! looked up and a med sized doe was troting, by me at about 30 yards, boom knocked it over the edge, by the time i eased up to the spot I saw the deer go over a hill. there was blood but also guts, i followed the trail a ways and saw the deer standing about 40yrds looking at me, I started to shoot thru the shoulders but fig it would ruin them with the 06, so being a kid with great eyes I put the bead on her head, boom, she lost her mind! I dressed her out as my dad had me gut 3-4 deer for others the 2 seasons before, to learn. had a hard time draging her to camp as the rope kept slideing off what little was left of her head! i was a proud Kid tho! :DI have not missed a deer season since!

I remember hunting a few times with my dad when we were kids, would have been late 60's or early 70's. Everybody back then that I knew were road hunters up in rural Nebraska. They'd grown up as farm kids and knew all the folks who owned land and we'd just drive around with occasional stops to hit choice places or join up with a relatives to do drives along tree lines. Deer were scarce, to put it mildly. I think I only remember dad getting a deer a couple of times. Our job was to help spot the deer. Oddly I always swore as a kid that I'd never go deer hunting, though I had no problems eating it or helping hold a dead one down as dad field dressed it.

Probably went 5 years without hunting with my dad (to say my dad and I didn't get along starting in my teenage years was putting it mildly), and then I hit a doe on the road when I was 17. I ended up in the ditch, she ran away, and that fall was revenge. Dad and I went up with me using my brother's 7mm Mag. 20 yard shot at a fawn dead center in the chest and we didn't really have to field dress that poor thing. Just slice, turn over and let it flow out. But boy did that small deer taste good. I think I've missed one deer season since then. Dad got a nice 4x4 that year as well.

I was born late in '49 so in '59 I would turn 10. Sometime ?? in the early 60s Dad took me 'deer' hunting in Garland Co. and I carried a shotgun, don't remember what/which gun.

It was C O L D and we did NOT have warm clothes as we have today. I saw a whole lot of hunters and NOT ONE deer. That was the last time I went 'deer' hunting for some yrs.

We had bird dogs so we quail hunted, walking helped stay NOT so cold. We/I also squirrel hunted.

I didn't start deer hunting till 1972, so I was almost 23 Y O. From there it has been all full throttle down hill.


Jerry

Camp my father hunted out of in Vermont with some of his friends. I was about 13± . I did not wander to far out the door during the day . My job was to stay back and help the cook who once ran a bakery -- My main job was to help him prepare the evening meal of mashed taters, Veggies, venison steak, and of course the deep dish apple pies-- best ever.
Peel taters and apples, do dishes, but my main job was to make sure his glass was always full of draft beer.That alone kept me very busy. The men never hunted hard. Once meat was hanging to eat ,the poker chips ,beer and Whisky took up lots of their time. After opening morning the hunts would start around 10:00 am--- poker till 3:00 am

This place is where I learned bonding with the older males. Things that were said and done would or should never leave the interior walls of camp. Back at school on Mondays the classmates who never had chance of a hunting camp education would ask me all kinds of questions. I'd give them just enough info. and then leave them hanging on the cliff. --- I made sure my son got the same education at camp , but the only difference-- we at camp now are more serious hunters. --- Web

Gorgeous ! !

I forgot to mention this in my post per 'kid' stories.

I mentioned this in the 760/7600 Pump thread.

Seriously - My Dad and Grandpa (dad's dad) were serious when they talked about the RARITY of even seeing a deer track.

There were so few deer that most people never saw a deer's track.

TO DATE -

I see deer in my pasture frequently and have killed a few since moving here in 2012.

Last Spring I had Deer tracks in my FRONT yard. They were eating the buds on a Red Tip that's not more than 15 steps from my house.


Times certainly have changed.


Jerry

Our local newspaper has some articles from past issues, every week. A while back there was an article where in 1961 a local dairy farmer saw a doe and two fawns run across his pasture. Deer were so scarce that it was newsworthy. miles

When I was a kid the world was a better place.

When I was a kid, I use to.........

No Wait.... I still do that.....

Well, 1972...but I remember it like it was yesterday! Nov 23, too.
Mom's birthday!

I was 15 in 1967 and my dad, cousin, his buds Pete and Frank would head to Westminister Vermont which is up the road from Putney every weekend.
Pete and Frank had a camp there
.
One Satirday night we headed into town for ice cream and on the way back we spotted 6-8 deer and one big one stood out in the full moon.

The next morning my dad and I hunted across the street from the camp on a ridge line that was a short distance away.
my dad told me to walk in the woods and find a spot which I did.
I was using a Winchester Model 94 pre 64.

I wasn't there very long and here comes a doe ambling along and a 6 point buck with his nose up her ass., head down, very close to me.
The deer never caught wind and I put two shots from the 94 in the heart area. I remember those bullet holes were 2-3 inches apart,
That buck made one jump in place and dropped in a heap.
It was bittersweet since my father died two years later.
The Gus continued to take me hunting the next few years until they sold the camp.
Three years ago Frank and I took a road trip and found the camp.

It changed a bit I'm sure, an addition and I'm sure indoor plumbing and running water from a well.

I tell my son the best few years was going to a deer camp and he and his friends should do the same one day.

reading some of these stories it's amazing how far we've come in conservation in the last 50 years. which makes me scratch my head when I read about people bad mouthing biologists and how regs are set. ymmv

1977 and I want my pacifier.

Shot my first deer in 1970. I was on a hunting trip with my dad and several family friends. Up until that time I had hunted for a couple seasons with no opportunity to shoot a deer.
My uncle took me under his wing to try to get me a deer. We left camp before dawn and just after first light we hit a fresh track ( fresh snow the night before) and followed up for a couple of miles til we came to the edge of a big opening. My uncle spotted the buck and a couple does moving across the opening and said he'd better take the first shot as they were about 300 yards away. After the shot they start to head for the timber and he yells for me to shoot as he missed. I got off a couple shots and at the second shot the buck sagged noticeably and slowed to a walk/stumble. Uncle gives him one more shot to be sure and a couple minutes later we were standing next to a nice 5pt mule deer.
I hunted a couple more years with that uncle and he remains my favourite uncle. He helped me a lot through my teen years and I have never forgotten his patience and kindness with me.
Every year on the anniversary of that first deer I stop and remember those times and my uncle, without fail.
My favourite hunting is still hunting with my brother chasing mule deer in November in the snow, nothing has topped it for hunting, for me.

I was 14 in 1967 when I went deer hunting for the first time. I had small game hunted for a couple of years by then, and shot in a junior smallbore league. I coaxed my dad into buying me a deer rifle, as I had shot my wad on my .22 target rifle (pre-war Winchester 52). His idea was to fix me up with a Mauser- a greasy old Spanish M1916 7mm Mauser. It was pretty bad, but he rationalized that I could learn a thing or two by "sporterizing" it after the season was over. (Plus, the cheap guy that he was, he got off by only spending $15 for it out of the trunk of somebody's car.) This was on the day before Thanksgiving, with only two days to get familiar with it before deer season. Sheesh. A quick trip to Monkey Wards got me two boxes of 175gr. ammo, and off to the county dump we went to "sight it in". I could hit a gallon can at 50 yards pretty handily- after I learned to hold about a foot low. (Standard military sights- lowest setting was 3 or 400 yards as I recall.) It actually grouped fairly well considering there wasn't much useable rifling left in the bore.

Thankfully (for the deer) I didn't get to shoot it at anything. I remember how I shivered violently from the cold more than anything else that opening day- uninsulated rubber boots and a thin pair of cotton socks. OMG, a recipe for disaster.

After the season, I dutifully set about sporterizing it- cut down stock, hand polished, and a blue job follow up at the LGS,and an el-cheapo Bushnell 3-9x. One neat thing though- my grandfather chucked the barrel in his lathe and worked out a taper that cleaned the steps off that military barrel very sweetly. I learned a lot, and most importantly that gun started me down the road of gun building. Never mind the fact that it shot even worse when I was done with it. (First couple shots in a decent group and then started to walk as that thin barrel heated up. A lot- like a foot at 100 yards by the sixth shot.)

More and better rifles soon found their way into my grubby mitts (Krags, Springfields, and in '70 my first ever income tax refund went for a new 700BDL in .243.) Cars, beer, and women took their usual toll on gun buying for a while after that. What am I saying- they still do!

When I was a kid, my first deer hunt was up near Lake Tahoe, CA in the D3 & D4 zones. I was either 14 or 15, no one in my immediate family hunted (most thought it was a phase that would pass), so my first hunt was more of a camping trip with a gun.

We drove up to my uncle's house and loaded everything into his truck. Drove the truck out into an area we had scouted over the summer that seemed like nice deer habitat, then loaded up our backpacks and hiked in probably another 4 or 5 miles.

I remember I was super excited, very ambitious, and incredibly naive at how hard finding a deer in California is. My rifle weighed 9 pounds, my backpack weighed about 50 pounds, I weighed about 125 pounds and I got tired of carrying my gear quick. We ended up dumping my pack and my dad and uncle figured one of them could come collect it later.

Walked around the rest of the day with no success and no sign of anything. Ended up hiking back to where my gear was dumped and just camping there. I remember my dad was not so pleased to have carried his gear all day when he could have left it with mine. (My uncle, who had run a safari outfit in Africa for 20+ years, was far more experienced in packing light and told me about the extremes some guys go to save weight - like cutting their toothbrush handle off. Thought he was nuts at the time, totally understand it now).

We setup camp for the evening, ate some freeze dried beef stroganoff and settled into our tents for the night. I remember hearing a coyote as I was falling asleep. All three of us were deep in sleep when we awoke to the most unnatural racket. A herd of cattle had come clambering through and the owner of the cows had tied bells to some of their necks. That pretty much ended any peaceful sleep for the rest of the night.

We got up the next day, hunted, moved camp over lunch, then hunted some more. I never did see a deer that trip, but I can remember sitting on top of a big stone outcropping that overlook a huge meadow and beyond it was a great expanse of forest and way beyond that, just teeny-tiny in the binoculars, I could see the highway we used to drive in on. A truly spectacular view.

I know I probably had a poor attitude about it then as the quality of the hunt at that age was still judge by if I shot a deer or not, but looking back it is one of my most favorite hunts. I know if we went again I would probably still not get a deer, but my pack would be lighter, my rifle would be lighter, and I would focus on enjoying the time in nature, being away from the office, and the beauty of the mountains. I've actually talked to my dad about doing just that too over Christmas, he said "Sure, as long as there are no more cows."

Don't let junior kid you, that pic was taken 4 years ago.

Snort.

When I was aa kid there weren't any deer to hunt in Western Oklahoma, we never saw a track. Oh there were a few here and there on the public lands and along the rivers, but hunting them was tough, not many guys got one. That began to change in the late 80's and now there are many. Our Wildlife Dept has done an excellent job.

When I was a kid we had no deer where I lived! Seriously. We had wild pheasants, grouse and bunnies though and that's what I grew up hunting. Worked in a machine shop after school and walked the two miles back home through the woods carrying my 16 GA double. No eyebrows raised by anyone!
Would hunt decoyed pigeons on Saturday afternoons in a chopped corn field. Went through many boxes of shells, and I know some of the pellets hit adjoining houses, but the cops never were called!!!
Now both places are subdivisions! Progress?
My first deer hunt was with that 16 double. Saw no deer, but bagged a Snowshoe rabbit with the buckshot (held off like the old man taught me and had only one pellet in the head). My mother fried it up and I still can taste that faint turpentine!
Feel sorry for kids today that are interested in hunting. So many obstacles.

When I was about 12 years old, Dad turned me lose with the shotgun to hunt rabbits and put some much needed meat on the table. I'd get off the bus, quickly change clothes, grab the old Fox Model B or the 870 and grab the beagle and off we'd go. I could hit all my good spots before the 5:00 closing time if I hustled. Danny, our beagle knew the route by heart. If I'd have just turned him loose on his own, he'd have gone to the same spots. Saturdays were all day hunts. We'd both be pretty worn out by the end of the day. No Sunday hunting in Ohio, so we got to just gear down on Sunday. Usually needed a full day to get my accumulated chores caught up anyways. There was a convenience store across the street from the one chunk of strip mine land we used to hunt. Danny and I would go in there every Saturday. The owner was a hunter, and really liked me and Danny. He'd have a bowl of water and some food out for Danny when we got there. I'd buy a can of pop and a can of Vienna sausages, and that would hold me over till we were done. Walk in a store with an uncased shotgun today and the cops are coming for sure.

So many great stories to tell. One of my favorite hunting areas was the Banks lake area in eastern Washington. It was the winter of 72/73 and I was hunting pheasants and happened to catch movement on a rock slide at the base of a cliff so I walked back to the car and glassed the hill side and there was a herd of Mule Deer browsing on the slope. I drove over to the bottom of the slope where there was a bench and got my 264WM out and was about 60 yards from the deer and there was a buck in the bunch so I sat down at the bench got a good rest and bang dropped in his tracks, climbed the slope rolled the deer down to the car, dressed him out loaded and home I went so meat in the freezer and one of the easiest deer I ever got.

I was born in 52, I’ll be 64 this coming May. I don’t remember my first hunting trips because I was too young to remember. I think I was only maybe a year old when Dad started taking me duck hunting. He bought an old army back pack, cut some leg holes in and put me in it. Mom fixed my formula, gave him a set of dippers and off we went.
My mother liked to go squirrel hunting so that became a family affair. We would come up here to my dad’s families place and do our squirrel hunting. After the morning hunt my grandmother cook up squirrel and dumplings for lunch. Deer hunting didn’t come about the mid to late sixties. When deer season started I used my dad’s M1 carbine and he used a Savage 99EG in 300Sav that he bought in 50. My dad bought me a Winchester 30/30 model 94 centennial. It was a long barral sucker with a full length magazine. It held 10+1. I didn’t buy my first real deer rifle till I came out of the Navy in 75. I picked up a Marlin 444. Now I use a DPMS home built AR10A2 carbine clone.

Wolf

Born in 1975 here...I've got a few cool hunting stories about my dad.

A buddy of dad's used to come out from Verona and go hunting with us every year. Of course Dad would take him out behind the house to shoot their rifles before season. They would always set up a target(usually a couple beer cans) for his buddy to shoot to make sure his .243 was still on. After a couple shots Dad would have me take one of his .243 cases and stand it up on a wood fence post about 300 yards out. Dad would take his old M98(still with the original irons)...and shoot the post!!! His buddy never did catch on until the post fell over after several years...

I remember how at the end of season we used to pile all the deer in the back of a couple pickups and go to town to "register them" amazing how long that could take on a good year...thirsty work too. One year Dad had shot a NICE 10 point buck, but had also shot a dink nub buck(t-zone that year, had to shoot an antlerless deer to get a buck tag)...when we went to the tavern after we registered the deer, I slipped one of my cousin's baby bottles into the dink's mouth...everybody that came in asked who shot that "big" one out there, we just pointed to Dad...man was he pissed when we left and he saw that bottle...by the way this is the first time I've ever admitted it was me that done it, reall load off my chest LOL.

As a kid growing up on a WI dairy farm in the 50's, my hunting exploits were restricted until after morning chores. We didn't have any deer in our area yet, but we had lots rabbits, pheasants and grouse.

A couple of times each winter, Joe, a relative of my Mom and WWII veteran would show up early on a Saturday morning with his beagles to hunt our land. My Dad always liked Joe so it was hard for him not to let me tag along. Of course the chores were still waiting for me when we got back.

Joe and his three buddies all carried Remington 11-48's in 28ga and there was a case of Federal paper #6's in the back of the station wagon with the three beagles; Jerry, Bif, and Sally. There weren't too many times we didn't get our limit of bunnies along with some grouse and pheasants.

About the time I was 13, Sally (and Jerry) had a litter of pups and Joe let me have my pick of the litter. I took the one that looked most like Jerry and named him Jack. Jack and I roamed the fields and swamps every weekend during the season well into my college years.

Since this thread has broadened to 'other' hunting beside deer stories I have 1 I'd like to share.

I'm certain that some WILL NOT believe it but I swear on my Dad's grave that it is true.

In the mid 60s Dad and I were bird (quail) hunting with his Liver Pointer. Her name was Lou. She was a very good bird dog but this one thing was truly remarkable.

We were hunting on family farm land. Pasture and mixed woods and sage grass mixed around. We had already killed some birds, don't remember exactly, then we could NOT find Lou. We knew she was on point but couldn't find her.

Dad and I separated looking for her. After several minutes Dad and I met up w/o finding her. We kept walking and looking. Out of a small patch of timber Lou came to us almost crawling. When she saw us, she TURNED AROUND and 'slowly' went back where she had been.

Sure enough she took US to the covey of quail. I rememer that we killed 1-3 (?) but that was NOT important.

She came and found us and took us to the birds. That was before 1967 and I remember it as if it was yesterday.

TRUE STORY

Jerry

One of my first deer hunting memories is this picture, from 1950. I was five years old at the time. We didn't have any deer in our part of NE Wisconsin so my Dad and his buddies would head 'up north' near Star Lake for the season.

They built a 'camper' on the back of a cattle truck. It had a wood burner, kerosene lanterns, bunks, and table. During the off season they stored it in our hay barn. I remember playing in it with my buddies pretending we were going deer hunting!

My Dad is on the left with a Marlin 1893 in 38-55.

My memory is Rusty with Cobwebs--

Is that the rifle you "used" in Kansas this deer season?


You are only 5 (FIVE) years older than I am ? ?

That ain't good for either of us.



Jerry

Jerry

Well, yes, I used a 38-55 in Kansas last fall and also on the hog hunt in TN two years ago. But I can't swear to the fact that it is the rifle in the picture. Although I'm pretty sure it is.

The rifle in the picture was sold to a local barber when I was about twelve. Then about 10 years ago I bought it from the barber's son after his Dad passed away. I always had a hunch it was the same one and the main reason I wanted it back.

BTW--your memory is still pretty good!

Paul

When I started hunting as a kid, it was almost always "buck only". We would shoot any buck that dared to come by. Now you can kill 3 does per day.

Reading all of these stories makes me realize what different experiences we grew up with. We used to farm oats, barley and flax on the coast south of San Francisco. We were so over run with deer that we used to get depredation permits. We had a hunting club back then so used to have 20-30 guys show up for opening weekend. The season was buck only fork or more. One year we shot 16 the first day and 12 the second day. My grandfather stopped the hunt because we had more deer than we knew what to do with.
Today because of the increase in cougar population and they are protected you never see a deer.

Since we branched out from deer hunting, I'll throw another one out. Thanksgiving Day in Ohio always used to be a big rabbit and pheasant hunting day. Dad had a real good beagle, and an invite to join us for birds and bunnies was a highly coveted thing. Belle would literally run rabbits and birds till she dropped. Dad always issued the same advice to everyon hunting with us. Don't miss! Belle didn't take kindly to rabbits being missed. More than one man had that dog at his feet with her teeth bared, growling like she was ready to rip his leg off. The message was clear-"I'm doing my job-shoot the damned rabbit!"

When I was 12 and deer hunting with the family I had been making drives all day in the rain an was soaking wet. The men had been standing all day and were cold. The last drive of the day I got stuck out in a long north-south meadow and with the wind out of the north and the temps dropping like a stone.

After about 1/2 and hour my clothes were stiff as a board and I was in moderate hypothermia. About that time I hear something coming down a ridge that ran to the point where I was standing so I could see both sides. Out onto the meadow comes a big wolf and I was so fuzzy headed I didn't shoot even though it trotted by close enough I could have reached out with the gun and touched it. It no more than got past me and my uncle up on the hill put a 30-06 round into the meadow behind me. Scared the sh*t out of me and then I realized what I had done. I spun and did my best to hit it but I couldn't.

So, there I stand frozen, and just knowing for sure that my uncle was going to come down off that hill when the drive got done and gut me out. I also knew my dad wouldn't even make him shoot me first. About the time I was ready to take off across the creek that ran down the meadow, my uncle opened up on a doe. He managed to gut shoot her, but that's it and she's headed off the hill toward me at a very high speed. I managed to drop her about 70 yards north of me before she got to the creek.

Now, I felt better. At least I wouldn't get picked up by my hands and feet and heaved across the creek and then my gun tossed over to me with the admonition don't come back without her. I'd already been through that dance. now all I have to worry about is am I still going to get shot for the wolf. That was $50 worth of bounty and at least that much for the hide that I let get away, and that was a week's wages back then. I was usually tasked with making sets near the deer gut piles as that particular uncle had taught me, so I also knew how much work went into getting a wolf.

When the drive got done my uncle was the first one down to me and he chewed me unmerciful, but the knife never came out of the sheath. I grew up in a very German family and kids were just barely tolerated, and only then if they made decent slave labor in the summer on the farm. I was damn lucky I survived that mistake.