Elmo

Currently reading a book called "The Mindful Carnivore" by Tovar Cerulli. Interesting read. Basically the author grew up with some exposure to fishing and hunting but became a vegatarian and eventually a full blown vegan. But he didn't want to just be a vegan, he wanted to grow his own vegatables and that's when he discovered that vegans indirectly cause more destruction to animals than hunters. Then his health started failing him and his doctor told hiim he needed to eat more meat. He then started eating meat again and naturally, became a hunter. The book isn't great. He often gets side tracked and he goes on and on about some stuff that can be left out because it adds nothing to his story or argument. He does, however, raises a lot of very interesting points and he has seen both sides of the coin.

Note: This is written as my own reflection and in no means am I questioning other people's reasoning behind why they hunt. For me, there isn't one reason why I hunt because I honestly have not found a single reason to why I hunt. There are a few possible reasons but let's be realistic, if you were trying to explain yourself with any single one of these reasons, they can counter your reason easily. 1. I WANT TO BE OUT THERE IN THE WOODS. Okay...but I can get that from hiking and camping. 2. I WANT TO EXPERIENCE NATURE. I can shoot nature with a camera more easily than I can with a rifle or bow. 3. I HUNT FOR FOOD. Let's get serious. It's not like if I don't come home with enough game, me and my family won't make it through the winter. Heck, with my novice skills, game meat makes such a insignificant part of my diet. 4. I WANT TO GET CLOSER TO MY FOOD SOURCE AND GET MY HANDS DIRTY. SO why don't you grow your own vegatables or raise your own livestock? Don't have the room or the means? Instead of going to the supermarket, you can go to a livestock market and purchase your chicken there. 5. I LIKE THE CHALLENGE OF SHOOTING A TARGET. I could do that at a warm and dry shooting range. Why take a life if all I want to do is hit a target? 6. I WANT TO BE A SURVIVALIST/OUTDOORSMAN. But yet, I'm not sitting around trying to weave baskets out of vines or trying to start a fire with two sticks. 7. I WANT TO SPEND TIME WITH FRIENDS AND FAMILY. Oddly, I go hunting to get away from friends and family and destress. Sure, every once in a while I go out into the woods with friends and family and enjoy their company but it if I really want to spend time with friends and family, I organize a trip of some sort or I drive over to their place and have dinner. Besides, the only other person in my family who hunts is my brother and when we go together, we never talk. Our entire communication consists of eye contact, nods, and hand signals. So why do I hunt? While the seven reasons I just gave are not enough of a valid reasons individually but when combined, it gives me all the reasons I need. I go hunting because of all those reasons and I can't think of a better activity that I can do that will give me the joy, the relaxation, the feeling of appreciation, and the feeling of accomplishment as I do when I go hunting. PS: Note that I do not list trophy hunting as any of the reasons why I go hunting. PPS: Survivalist/Outdoorsman. I have a friend who is an investment banker. He once told me that if he had one regret is that he picked a career that offers no real skill of value. If all hell breaks loose and SHTF, a mechanic can fix cars. Doctors can heal people. Since all he can do is manage money and in a post-apocalyptic world money has no value, he would essentially be useless.

For this question, you should be able to pick multiple answers.

I took up hunting 2 years ago. From mid-November till March, I went out every weekend. I might have missed 3 or 4 weekends but made up for it by going twice in one week on several occasions. Though I never hunted for big game during that year, I never actually saw a deer anyway. This past year, I took up big game hunting. Again, went pretty much every weekend from start of bow to end of muzzleloader. Saw deer twice. First was a yearling during archery when I was heading back to my car with my tree stand on back. Had the trunk open when he walked by maybe 15-20 yards from me. Stopped, looked a me for a second, and kept on walking. A lot of people said I should have dropped the tree stand and try to get a quick shot in. Believe me, it did cross my mind. But I figured by my sudden movement, he would have started running and I would be shooting a bow at a running deer so instead, I just watched him walk away. Second time during rifle season, saw two does I think I might have called in but spooked. Eventhough they were slowly zipzagging broadside up the side of a mountain, it would still have been a 200+ yard shot at a moving target so I decided to pass. During the season, a lot of non-hunters would make fun of me because they always know some one (like a cousin of an uncle or a friend of a co-worker, etc.) who hunts and brings home several deer every year so that means I'm just a horrible hunter who doesn't know what he's doing. They picture me fumbling around in the woods like an idiot. When you read nothing but success threads, you start to doubt yourself. I know I only have one real season to go by but still, for people like me who came from absolutely zero exposure, hearing the failures of true, established, experienced hunters encourages me to keep going at it.

Congratz! That's an awesome prize!

I actually don't recognize the original song.

The bear must have scared the sh*t out of him.

Here's the article about the woman who got hit by an arrow in my neighborhood a few years back. They eventually caught the guy. http://articles.nydailynews.com/2009-03-15/news/17919124_1_arrow-nursing-fletching

In an episode of The Wild Within with Steve Rinella, he went to Hawaii to hunt deer but I guess not on the big island. I spent a summer on the big island many many years ago. Didn't see any deer of course but everyone spoke about the feral hog problem (this was back in the early 90's) and told me that if I bumped into one, I should run because they can charge. I never did see a hog but did come across a few droppings.

There's no sign that states you can't put children into the washing machines. How were they suppose to know?

We had a lady who was shot in the back a couple of years ago 4 blocks from my home. The section of the Bronx I live maybe very suburban but it's still the city so that means no one has a yard that's bigger than 10 by 10 yards, max. I think the guy tried to draw back a bow that was way too heavy and did one of those point up in the air to draw back before coming down on his target. We'll never know. He stated he was shooting in his back yard and it went off "by accident". The arrow travelled several city blocks and came down on this ladies buttocks. Police calculated arc,angle, and trajectory to find the culprit.

Did I read that correctly? 12 years from when you first bought a rifle till when you got your first deer? I'm still waiting for my first.

Sorry to hear about your loss.

Nice huntin'. Nice gun too.

Thanks for the tip. Will definitely have to check it out this fall for yotes and turkey.

Hey erminthunt. 1. First and foremost, welcome to the forum. You've come to the right place if you want to learn about hunting. There are hundreds of years of experience on this forum. 2. "carabine de chasse" translates to "hunting rifle" which is like saying I hunted with a weapon. Doesn't tell us much. Unless of course google translate did a piss poor job of translating the phrase. 3. Which type of hunting is like asking which is the best flavor ice cream. It's all personal preference. 4. Where did you go hunting? 2 weeks ago, rabbit season was closed. What region are you located and what region do you hunt? 5. Do you like romantic strolls through the beach during sunsets? This isn't a Playboy centerfold or a dating forum. More importantly, you should also have think skin and some sense of humor because there are some pranksters on this forum and I'm one of them. Welcome aboard.

Good to know Bass. Thanks! That's gives me another option. Would you happen to know if the turkey is also bow only?

Someone told me that Fahnstock will only allow bow on deer. I guess I was mislead. When I camped there last Spring, I had gobblers walk less than 10 yards from me like there wasn't a care in the world. Do they allow any other types of hunting on Fahnstock?

Ah, yes. Forgot. The city slicker in me still only focus for areas around NYC. My fault.

Rangers passing was horrible. They seem like they could never clear the zone or control the puck.

http://www.mrctv.org/videos/how-about-liberall-whoopi-goldberg-admits-shes-member-nra-0

Right after high school, I spent a year working at the Bronx Zoo in the herpatology (reptiles and amphibians) department before going to college. Snake are the most misunderstood animals out there. They get a bad rap for the poisonous species when in fact, in NY state, the only poisonous snake is the Copperhead and the their venom only causes intense pain. It isn't lethal. Most snake are docile. We use to have to kill the mice before we fed them to the snakes because if the snake isn't hungry, it would leave the mice along and the mice in turn, would bite the snakes and wouldn't fight back. These were wild caught snakes, not snake raised in captivity. A side note since many of us hunters are also conservationist. A zoo has thousands of animals but the public sees less than 10% of them. For example. When I was there, we were breeding Chinese Alligators. We had 2 on display. In the back, we had 190 of them that we had bred. Those 190 had minimal human contact because the goal was to release them back into their natural habitat. Sadly, not many people know about this and all people think about zoos is that they just lock animals up for human entertainment. Our big breeding projects during my time there were the Chinese Alligators as I mentioned, Cuban Crocodiles, Spitting Cobras, and the Mata Mata.

IMHO, the perfect shot would have the bullet expand 99% of all it's energy within the deer and exit with the remaining 1%. This assures maximum trauma within the deer and leave two open wounds for blood lost for good measure. Picking between a clean pass through or full expendature of energy within the target, I would go with complete expendature of energy within the target.

That's great news!