How many of you folks remember your first real hunt?
I remember mine quite well.
I remember it so well because I will never be allowed to forget....and therein lies the story....or lack of!
I was born and raised on a 6000 acre cattle ranch in Central Texas.
The nearest neighbor was about 1/3 of a mile away and the next closest neighbor was over 3 miles - we were in the middle of nowhere and I didn't know how good I had it!
It was a different time as I clearly remember the local guys always had a gun belt and pistol when they were out and about, even down town but times were better then and my, have they changed.
My ancestors were pioneers and we were gun people but safety was always up front.
There were nice guns everywhere that I could get to at any time as I was growing up.
But my parents raised me right and I knew that if I touched one without permission, I was gonna get a spanking.
It's a shame a lot of folks don't actually enforce right and wrong with something more than a time-out as a good spanking would do a lot of these brats today good.
I as given my first Daisy pump BB gun when I was at the ripe old age of 5.
My parents bought me the pump because they figured I couldn't shoot my self trying to pump a gun that was longer than I was tall.
They told me when I could cock it, I could shoot it.
It took a long time and a few pinched fingers but I figured it out.
If I sat the butt stock on the ground and I put all my skinny scrawny weight into it by basically hanging on the pump while precariously balanced on the buttstock, I could actually pump it - OH HAPPY DAYS!
My Mom worked part time at the local General Store and kept me supplied with boxes of little black and yellow tubes full of Daisy Golden Bullseye BBs.
I also learned a few valuable and somewhat painful lessons about ricochets and what's behind your target while shooting cans by the chicken pen.
I pumped that thing to the point where the stock had a curve in it and eventually broke where the stock meets the action.
A few years later, I graduated to a genuine Remington bolt action single shot 22 with an adjustable Williams peep sight and a brick of .22 shorts.
That gun taught me how to shoot and shoot accurately.
Lots of cans, squirrels, bunnies and stuff, some which got me in trouble, became lunch or just perforated by that little gun.
Being from a hunting family ment I was gonna be a hunter whether I wanted to or not...
At the ripe old age of 9, after much prodding from my Dad and older Brother, my first Whitetail hunt was set.
My Brother spent quite a few hours with me teaching me how to safely use and shoot his M1 Carbine.
To this day, I wear a small scar in my right eye brow from that little 4X scope.....and got to see my Brother get in trouble for not being more careful with me!
After M1-101, we set up a tree stand in a particularly vension productive area about 200 yards from my Brother's stand.
When THE morning came, I was rudely awaken, told to get dressed and grab my gun - man, I was on autopilot.
Off into the darkness in a WWII surplus M38A Jeep and deep into the back 2000 acre section of dark pineywoods along Big Sandy Creek we went.
Those woods were a cool playground during the day but kinda scarrey in the dark.
We got to my stand and I went up there, pulled up the gun, loaded it and got comfortable.
I watched my brother disappear into the darkness towards his stand.
Then reality sat in.....I was a 9 year old kid up in a tree in deep woods AND IT WAS DARK...NO, REALLY, REALLY DARK and quiet....OH MY GOD!
Everything was OK for about 10 minutes, then the wild life settled back into their routine after we had disturbed their morning.
The owls started hooting.....cool!
The deer were snorting, stomping around in the darkness and carrying on.
Then the coyotes started howling and they sounded like they were right under the tree I was in.
That was the final straw!
I started hollering for my Brother - I swear I heard him laughing a few times.
The hollering turned into screaming, then bawling and he eventually came and rescued me from the unknown beasts that were out to get me, but I know he took his time getting there.
I got to relive this hunting trip at every birthday, family get together and party for many years there after but that's one of the things that make a family a family. It hasn't been brought up in a few years as my Mom, Dad, Brother and Sister have all passed away. As mad as it used to make me to hear it again and again, it brings a smile to my face and a tear to my eyes to pass on a little part of me to you.
Hope you enjoy reading this and add your own, either an utter failure like mine or a success story!
I remember mine quite well.
I remember it so well because I will never be allowed to forget....and therein lies the story....or lack of!
I was born and raised on a 6000 acre cattle ranch in Central Texas.
The nearest neighbor was about 1/3 of a mile away and the next closest neighbor was over 3 miles - we were in the middle of nowhere and I didn't know how good I had it!
It was a different time as I clearly remember the local guys always had a gun belt and pistol when they were out and about, even down town but times were better then and my, have they changed.
My ancestors were pioneers and we were gun people but safety was always up front.
There were nice guns everywhere that I could get to at any time as I was growing up.
But my parents raised me right and I knew that if I touched one without permission, I was gonna get a spanking.
It's a shame a lot of folks don't actually enforce right and wrong with something more than a time-out as a good spanking would do a lot of these brats today good.
I as given my first Daisy pump BB gun when I was at the ripe old age of 5.
My parents bought me the pump because they figured I couldn't shoot my self trying to pump a gun that was longer than I was tall.
They told me when I could cock it, I could shoot it.
It took a long time and a few pinched fingers but I figured it out.
If I sat the butt stock on the ground and I put all my skinny scrawny weight into it by basically hanging on the pump while precariously balanced on the buttstock, I could actually pump it - OH HAPPY DAYS!
My Mom worked part time at the local General Store and kept me supplied with boxes of little black and yellow tubes full of Daisy Golden Bullseye BBs.
I also learned a few valuable and somewhat painful lessons about ricochets and what's behind your target while shooting cans by the chicken pen.
I pumped that thing to the point where the stock had a curve in it and eventually broke where the stock meets the action.
A few years later, I graduated to a genuine Remington bolt action single shot 22 with an adjustable Williams peep sight and a brick of .22 shorts.
That gun taught me how to shoot and shoot accurately.
Lots of cans, squirrels, bunnies and stuff, some which got me in trouble, became lunch or just perforated by that little gun.
Being from a hunting family ment I was gonna be a hunter whether I wanted to or not...
At the ripe old age of 9, after much prodding from my Dad and older Brother, my first Whitetail hunt was set.
My Brother spent quite a few hours with me teaching me how to safely use and shoot his M1 Carbine.
To this day, I wear a small scar in my right eye brow from that little 4X scope.....and got to see my Brother get in trouble for not being more careful with me!
After M1-101, we set up a tree stand in a particularly vension productive area about 200 yards from my Brother's stand.
When THE morning came, I was rudely awaken, told to get dressed and grab my gun - man, I was on autopilot.
Off into the darkness in a WWII surplus M38A Jeep and deep into the back 2000 acre section of dark pineywoods along Big Sandy Creek we went.
Those woods were a cool playground during the day but kinda scarrey in the dark.
We got to my stand and I went up there, pulled up the gun, loaded it and got comfortable.
I watched my brother disappear into the darkness towards his stand.
Then reality sat in.....I was a 9 year old kid up in a tree in deep woods AND IT WAS DARK...NO, REALLY, REALLY DARK and quiet....OH MY GOD!
Everything was OK for about 10 minutes, then the wild life settled back into their routine after we had disturbed their morning.
The owls started hooting.....cool!
The deer were snorting, stomping around in the darkness and carrying on.
Then the coyotes started howling and they sounded like they were right under the tree I was in.
That was the final straw!
I started hollering for my Brother - I swear I heard him laughing a few times.
The hollering turned into screaming, then bawling and he eventually came and rescued me from the unknown beasts that were out to get me, but I know he took his time getting there.
I got to relive this hunting trip at every birthday, family get together and party for many years there after but that's one of the things that make a family a family. It hasn't been brought up in a few years as my Mom, Dad, Brother and Sister have all passed away. As mad as it used to make me to hear it again and again, it brings a smile to my face and a tear to my eyes to pass on a little part of me to you.
Hope you enjoy reading this and add your own, either an utter failure like mine or a success story!
