I grew up near San Angelo on the Concho river and we had a very small place that very rarely had deer passing thru so we never hunted them. My dad was always working but I had a uncle who owned 300 or so acres just outside of Mason,Texas.

Uncle Howard Leifeste was a great man who overlooked all my stupid ideas and questions and I was truly blessed to have him as an uncle and a teacher. He used to tell my dad every deer I ever saw was a buck He instilled a love of hunting in me that still burns bright today. He would pick up my brother, myself and my cousin after school and take us to Mason for the weekend during deer season. I was able as a yong adult to take him to a lease I was on near Garden City only one time before he passed away and I still wish I could have spent more time with him.

I've stayed employed my entire adult life although I never manage to buy my own place. Due to a lifelong buddy from San Angelo I was able to introduce both my kids to deer hunting. Neither has the love for it that I do so I guess I failed to instill the love for it that I felt at a very young age.

Christmas time always makes me reflect on my life and uncle Howard was a gift that God blessed me with. Merry Christmas to all my Campfire friends. Some of you I've met FTF and many others I really hope to someday over a campfire and a beer!!!

My Uncle Rick.

My Father!!!

My Dad.

Great Uncle Donald. RIP.

My dad.

My Dad, one of the few things he got right. I'll always be thankful for it.

My Dad and Grandpa. They used us kids as drivers. They dropped us off and had us walk through the woods when we were like 5-8. Today they would get arrested but it was great fun. Little kids wandering around in a 1000 acre forest while drunk men shoot at deer at the far end. What could go wrong?

At the time my girlfriends father and woould be father-in-law..............

Dad.

Me, Myself & I.

My father used to take me goose hunting, which got me interested. Then I got into squirrel and rabbit hunting. While squirrel hunting, I used to see deer all of the time, so I figured I'd try this deer hunting thing.

I was 17 and totally clueless. I headed for the woods and walked around like I would do while squirrel hunting. No knife and no rope. The second day out, it had snowed a couple of inches, so when I walked, I was quiet. Luckily, my neighbor and his father were there and I told them I didn't have a knife. The father said, with a smile on his face, "if you happen to shoot one, just whistle and I'll let you use mine". Later that evening, one of them shot a deer. I probably pushed them to him. After the shot, here comes a doe 10 yards from me. BANG!!! She goes down. So I start to whistle frantically and out they come from the woods. Sonny's father hands me the knife, so I took it and looked at the deer. Didn't know what to do. He said, "here, I'll show you once and then you're on your own." He gutted it for me and then he said that I had to drink the blood and started laughing. NOT!!

After that, they went to find his deer and left me to drag it out about 1/2 mile. Luckily it had snowed, because I dragged it backwards with the hind legs. I had a 1970 Camaro and because of the snow, I had to park out on the road. In the mean time, someone locked the gate, so I had to lift it up over the gate. I looked liked a monkey f^cking a football. I had blood all over me. I put it in the trunk of my car, so my trunk was full of it also.

It was a great memory.

My Dad

I was lucky enough to grow up in a family with a very long, rich, and deep hunting tradition. My Dad's uncle was a professional trick shooter for Savage Arms. He did shooting exhibitions all over the Ohio and Pennsylvania area, bestowing the virtues of Savage Arms. Dad said he was an amazing shot.

My earliest childhood memories are of climbing over the mountain of gear that accumulated in the dining room before deer season. Dad took an old Army backpack and cut holes in the bottom for my stubby legs to dangle through, and pretty much from the time I could drink from a cup, I went hunting with dad. When I was about 8 I started small game hunting. Dad ran beagles for rabbits and pheasants, and his dogs were very good. An invite to join Dad for a small game hunt was not to be taken lightly. The dogs did all the heavy lifting, we just had to make the shots.

By the time I was 11, I was fully expected to put food on the table in the fall. We hunted squirrels and between me and my older brother, put a lot of meals on the table. The tails were kept and sold to Mepps. A year's haul of tails usually bought us enough .22 ammo to get us through the next year. My first deer rifle was a Model 94 chambered for .32 Special. It would be a full 10 years before I killed my first deer, a spike buck that walked in front of me up at camp in Pennsylvania. Sadly, Dad died the following spring.

I realize how lucky I was to grow up in a hunting family. It's too bad more kids don't get the opportunity. So many great memories. Squirrel hunts in the huge beech trees of Ohio, the whistle of a wood duck sideslipping down through the branches of a tree in a beaver pond, so many deer hunts with and without my father. As I often say, I'm a very lucky man.

My uncles took me. Dad went a few times later on just so he could take me , but fishing was always his thing.

My friend's uncles. My people were city folks and none of them hunted.

I went by myself the first time. Dad had to work and I wasn't waiting. Had a spike horn hanging in the barn by 9 AM.

My buddy Charles Bridges. We didn't kill anything and almost got arrested for unintentional trespassing, but we had a great camping trip with guns. My first steady girl friend's father (who eventually became my father-in-law) was the one that really taught me how to hunt, and he taught me how to organize a hunting trip and a hunting camp. He's been gone for a while but I still miss him.

My Father & grandfather.

My sister's future husband. My father gave up hunting after spending a year or so in Europe hunting truly dangerous game in 1944 and 1945.

I had to teach myself the finer points of hunting because my BIL was KIA in 1968.

My Dad, with all three of us boys and I always looked forward to it. He used to put oil of anise on his hat every year. When I smelled that in the house, I knew it was deer season!

Me

Dad

Dad....in 1950! Made many hunts together! Miss he and Mom every day!!

Strictly speaking, my grandmother. I guess I was 4 or so, Dad and Papa were hunting and Grandma took me with her when she went hunting in the woods below the pasture for a while.

Once I was old enough to have a license and carry a gun, then it was Dad.

Dale

Same guy that took me on my most recent hunting trip - my father.

Me and Qtip, God rest his soul.

My father didn't hunt, neither did his father. Qtips Dad would drive us all the way up Greenwood Lake Turnpike to where it met East Shore Road from Hawthorne NJ, for small game or deer and we were on our own. He'd pick us up later at dusk.

We would hunt the state land that is now underwater as Monksville Reservoir as of 1987.

It was always a good time, and while we had no one to teach us we learned, first together, then separate when he moved permanently up New York State.

I have a photo of my mom with her first deer, a 4x4 blacktail. Dad and grandpa had taken her and the punk 3 year old kid and she tagged out.

I took myself, which was illegal of'course because you had to be 16 to hunt without an adult in PA. I had a 70's wingmaster and hunted rabbits by myself since I was 12 or 13 or so. By the time I was about 15, I figured I could do this deer thing alone. My dad didnt hunt and my grandfather had stopped due to health reasons. My 870 had a bead sight, no rib but practiced shooting "sluggers" before hand.

The 3 day doe season rolled around and I was out prowling the last day, when i jumped up about 3 deer. One stopped to look back at about 80 yards, I held a little high and see dashed at the shot. Thought I missed and was almost beside myself worrying about recovery when I found hair. I slowly tracked her but she only went about 60 yards. I gutted her like I did a rabbit and started the drag. After a few hundred yards, I went home and called a buddy who was old enough to drive to help me drag her out. Still the biggest doe I think Ive ever shot!

I was a self-taught, self-motivated hunter from the start. I did not start until I was in my early twenties. I had decided that caving was getting too dangerous and hiking and camping wasn't enough. I had support from some of my older friends, but this was a DIY thing all the way.

My first deer hunts were all bow. This was back in the early 80's, and bowhunting did not have the glitz and hype it does now. It also did not have the kit. I spent the first few seasons letting doe walk, trying to burn my one tag on a buck. I was also driving 3 hours one-way to hunt, and there was no Sunday hunting. That meant getting of work on Fridays, driving until 11 PM, pitching a tent, grabbing few hours sleep and then hunting all day Saturday and going home Sunday, because Ohio did not allow hunting on the sabbath. I went for years like that.

I learned on my own…started on the 120 acres that our family cabin was on in the Spooner area of WI. I enjoyed the bow hunting there. My first time out I climbed an oak (no portable tree stands back there) at the corner of our field right over a deer trail and had a fork horn buck walk right under me for a spine shot. Well that got me hooked! Then came the WI rifle season. The woods which were devoid of other hunters all grouse and bow season sprouted orange blobs overnight. There were hunters literally everywhere. Our neighbor invited me on some deer drives one day. I also didn't care for that at all.

I bow hunted around there for a few more years before my father sold the place. I gave up deer hunting for awhile until my wife and I moved to far northern MN, near the Canadian border. I found myself back in deer hunting heaven and I bought a rifle. I found that I could walk out my backdoor and ramble all day during rifle season without seeing another hunter or as much as a boot track. I ended up shooting one deer up there during that time with my bow, but rifle hunting proved to far more effective for the still hunting I really enjoy more than other forms of whitetail hunting.

We moved, but I kept some adjoining land and built a cabin, which is my deer camp now.

My Daddy always took me. I sure appreciate all he taught me through the years. Hope to instill some of this in my daughter and nephew and nieces

Not always about the kill, they had a ball.

brother was 14,me at 13.dad would take us squirrel hunting on my grandads farm.we all carried 410 shotguns but dad never shot anything.same with fishing ,he would take us but never fished.my brother soon decided he wasn't and hunter or fisherman.

Great stories folks, thanks for sharing.

My dad, but he didn't teach me to hunt and was more concerned with killing his own deer than sitting with me. He would just drop me in the woods on the way to where he was going and tell me to stay put. I still managed to kill a deer the second year I went deer hunting and a favorite uncle heard me shoot and came and helped me field dress and drag it out.

Perry

My dad and his brother. I killed my first deer with my uncle taking me down to the property. Dad was traveling back then. I have a lot of fond memories with my family hunting.

My best friend and myself.. Dad got re-bit by the hunting bug that same year and hunted with me for the rest of his life.. Good times and great memories..

Friend of the Family taught me how to hunt Small Game and Deer. I in turn took my younger brother hunting.

"My dad." And both my 13 and 11 year old daughters can give you the same answer.

My now ex BIL. He took me on my first deer hunt and I've been hooked ever since.

My Dad was a hunter back in the 50's and 60's but upland only. I taught myself how to deer hunt after my BIL introduced me to it.

My uncle...

Nobody...wanted to hunt,took hunter safety course at 18 yrs old and taught myself

My dad helped me plant a food plot and put up a stand when I was 14. Started with his old 870 with buckshot. Next year I carried the old 94 30-30. Hunted with his 742 30-06 until I was 18. I bought a 700 270win when I got a job off the farm. Killed a pile of deer with the 700.

Learned deer hunting on my own.

Dad

Me

My dad was never really a deer hunter and only shot two deer that I remember.

But when I was old enough he'd let me bring a rifle along when we went to check cows. Sort of an opportunistic way of hunting and of course I didn't complain. It's been pretty much self taught ever since.

He did like to shoot the occasional rooster. Guessing this was over 30 years ago.



That must be my stone cold killer look.....grin

Funny I don't remember my first hunt but it was probably just my long time friend and I staring on our own back then there weren't a lot of deer in Eastern KY and our idea of scouting was I met a guy that knows a guy that thinks his friend saw some deer tracks down by the river. Oooh sounds like a hotspot lets try there. Needless to say for the first few years we were half way convinced they were like unicorns. It was either that or we would go to a place that would turn out to be so crowded it looked like the county fair. I remember once going to some hotspot someone had told us about so we get there in the dark and I'm tramping around and finally decide you have no idea where you are and your going to walk off a cliff here in the dark so I just sat down next to a tree to wait for some light. When it got light enough to see there were 3-4 other guys all sitting within 30 yards . Everybody just looked at each other got up and walked off never saying a word . It's been a trip over the past 35 years

my dad,but he was more a rabbit hunter and I went with him since I was 5, learned more about deer hunting on my own, the first deer I killed was with my uncle Eldon, he could hunt, wish, I had the chance to hunt with him again, me and my younger brothers would go with him and drink his coffee and smoke his cigarette's, He'd bitch about it, but never meant it, I hope he is hunting on the other side!

Me

Dad. He got me into small game hunting (dove, rabbit and quail). He started me walking with him at age 5 and this progressed over time to not being able to keep me out of the woods. At 13, I wanted to go deer hunting and he knew nothing about it but he agreed to it. I shot my first doe at 15. We both looked at it and Dad handed me a knife and said, "this is all you."

I have never seen a guy dry heave as much as that morning. I didn't know what I was doing and Dad was downwind of a cut open paunch. I remember it like it was yesterday and it was over 25 years ago.

I wouldn't trade those early memories for anything.

My dad, but he was an a-hole to hunt with. Once I got old enough I refused to hunt with him.

My Uncle, Hank. When I was 18 years old I was headed in the wrong direction. The rest of the world just thought I needed my a$$ kicked. Uncle Hank took me deer hunting instead. That was 41 years ago and Uncle Hank & I still hunt at that same camp every fall. I can never thank him enough.

My grandfather.. We only hunted one season and he passed on far too soon... I have often wondered what life would have been like if he would have lived..

My Father Hunted or Fished about every weekend...Until us Kids got old enough to go and then he quit hunting and fishing...I guess he did it to get away from us.. So when it was time to take us he wanted no part of it and started chasing two legged deer....I started Hunting on my own in my early 30...and took my Kids when they were ready...

Likely not much different, sans the good memories. We are what we are, regardless of those around us.

Having it nurtured is of course always a good thing, but not necessary.

My Dad.

He first patiently taught me how to track at about age 8. I loved tracking for Dad and he seemed to greatly enjoy teaching me. IIRC the first deer I saw shot was when I was about 11 yrs old. (1949)

I was tracking and Dad was following. We were walking as quietly as we could when Dad tapped my shoulder and stepped up beside me. When he lifted the old 99 I saw the buck. The 300 spoke and I tracked that deer another 40 yds. I had gutted a few rabbits by then but he explained every stroke of his knife as he gutted it. I wasn't shooting but I sure was hunting! I was hooked.

Guess I was pretty fortunate, given the locale I grew up, and having a phuquing awesome old man.... he always found the time to run the trap line with me when I was 8-9 years old, hunted the hell outta bear with dogs, and in the winter time hunted coon with dogs. Fondest memories are huntin blacktails here in western Washington..... ol man never hunted hunted elk so I had to learn to hunt em with buddies in high school. Elk are stupid easy compared to western wa Columbia blacktails, they do fill the freezer up with good table fare though. Anyhow, thanks to the ol man, lotsa great memories...

Me.

Jim

Self taught here.

My father. But from 6-8 years old till I was 16 and had my own hunting license, all I was was his "dog". Whether bare ground or snow covered he would find a track and put me on it. This is NO BS. Compass in my hand, North=1 bark, E=2 barks, W=3 barks, S=4 barks. He would make an attempt at intercepting the deer. I don't ever remember it working. As far as I can remember, my WIFE killed the first animal ever with his rifle. She killed a bull moose with it in 1992. This past year I killed a nice buck with it on Anticosti Island. On the way home, I gave the rifle to MY son and I really don't care if I ever see it again. Hunting really wasn't much fun for me. Probably why I LOVE it so much at my age.

That's worse than my Dad. Mine was just miserable and b*tched a lot.

My Dad and he was the greatest deer hunter I ever knew or was around. He could walk through the Texas brush quieter and with more stealth than anyone I ever saw. He was a great shot and had great intuition when it came to deer hunting. At least 3 times in his life, while hunting on marginal leases, he was the only man to kill a buck. One of those leases had 8 other hunters on it. He introduced me to hunting in 1957 when I was 6-7 years old. We hunted a beautiful place he had between Mason and Fredricksburg at a little place called Doss. We parked the old jeep one evening and walked up a long fence line that paralled a county road. I thought we went a half mile but it was probably only a couple of hundred yards. We climbed into a large oak tree and it began to mist ever so lightly...just enough to get your eyebrows wet. Close to dark he turned and motioned for me to be quiet. I realized he was fixing to shoot so I began to watch. He placed his old sporterized Enfield 30-06 on a limb that stretched out in front of him. As he fired, fire shot out of his barrel at least a foot. It was almost dark when we climbed down and we began to walk till we came across a beautiful young, fat spike buck. In later years, Dad would say, that was the longest shot he ever made. He died 5 years ago on the opening day of deer season. So, because of him I've been hunting now 60 years. Thank you Dad. powdr

Nobody, I started on My own and learned from anybody I could.......Hb