A little background on my daughter, she’s a 6th grader and just turned 12. This was her 5th deer season. Before she shot her first deer I showed her videos of youth hunts on YouTube. After watching a teenage girl shoot a doe, she decided does were all she was interested in, “I’m a girl and I want to shoot a girl deer” she told me. On her first hunt, she couldn’t have cared less that there was a 140 class 9 point in the field and she shot a doe over my pleas to shoot the buck. The next 2 years were more does. Last year she shot what I’ll call a medium sized 9pt for her first buck.
Last night was the first time I was able to take her this year, KS rifle season started last Wednesday. I’d been seeing 4 different bucks in the 130-140ish range, and my trail cam was giving me high hopes of seeing one of them last night. On our way to the field I reminded her to be patient, there are some nice bucks in the area and we’re not going to shoot the first dink we see. After sitting for almost 2 hours, 2 basket racks and 2 does came out. After a shot in the distance, the bigger basket rack and does went back in the brush. My daughter then asks if she can shoot the small buck that was left out there. At this point we still had 45 minutes of shooting time left.
I asked her if she really wanted to shoot that one and she said yes. I then asked if that was because she didn’t really want to go deer hunting and didn’t want to come back again. She said yes, and then said it’s just too boring. I can’t lie, that one hurt. I told her that as long as she was happy with that buck she could shoot it when a good shot presented itself.
The buck got behind the only tree in the clearing we were in and started walking away, blocking any shot opportunities. At about 125 yards he cleared the tree and presented a pretty steep quartering away shot. I told her to put the crosshairs between his front legs and follow that line up about 1/3 of the way up his body. She said she was ready and let the 243 rip. The buck ran straight away into the brush about 50 yards before I saw him stop and start shaking. Then we could both hear crashing and thrashing around. I gave her a big hug and a kiss and told her thanks for going hunting with me.
Unfortunately, like many young girls as they grow up, hunting, fishing, and farming with Dad seem to be getting less fun her. She’s a cheerleader, point guard on the basketball team, involved with 4H showing pigs at the fair and several other activities, but she may not be a hunter. The lesson learned was that I just need to support her in whatever activities she chooses and just be thankful she’s willing to spend a little time doing Dad stuff when she’s able to.
On our way walking out, she said the last few moments waiting for the buck to clear the tree were pretty exciting. I told her the boring part pays off because the exciting part comes last. She said “Yeah, it’s kind of like school on Fridays.” So maybe there a little hope yet.