Why don't people like youth hunts?

[wvdeer4u]

First off, I'm 25 and have no kids or younger relatives who hunt but I do take a kid whose dad I work with hunting each year. I think they are great. In WV we have a 1 day gun hunt in october and 2-3 days after christmas. The only reason that i can see an adult hunter not liking youth hunt is because he has to wear orange if he is trying to bowhunt or because a dad is jealous of his kid shooting a deer before he gets one.
In the october hunt we get 10 guys and do drives. The kid sits with an unarmed hunter who renders advice. Everyone else has a bow for deer or a shotgun for turkies and we have a good time and at the end of the day that kid should have a deer and a turkey and maybe everyone else but the emphasis is on the kid. There are a lot more deer in october than the first saturday of gun season also.
The first year I took him hunting he shot a doe on a drive(youth season) then in regular season he shot a doe and a buck with me.
It's just a couple extra days a year to try and give the kids something special. What's the problem with that?

[Hacimsaalk]

i like them , just b/c im am a jr. lots of adults like them too though, they r a good way to get kids involved in hunting. here in PA they even have mentored jr phesant hunts.

[ELKINMTCWB]

In montana they give the kids free tags there 1st year. and there is many spots to hunt speshaly for youth. I help kids a lot and think this is a very good deal.

[Sniper151]

wvdeer, I help instruct the Bowhunter Safety Course in Pa. Since the future of bowhunting is the youth shooter I often get into a conversation during the break on this subject. The responses I hear most ofter: I don't want my son/daugher exposed to what goes on at camp, I don't want my son/daugher to get hurt, they make to much noise and want to leave to soon and the most common, I don't have the time. Youth are the future of hunting no matter what kind of hunting you do. They need to experience the hunt with a safe, ethical hunting companion. Someone that will take the time to share their experiences and knowledge of the outdoors. Harvesting an animal is just a small part of the hunting experience. The trees, the smells and other game that occupy the forest while hunting are also part of the package. Quite often that companion doesn't offer that opportunity and the young hunters are turned off by the sport. Take a kid hunting, the experience will be one neither of you will ever forget

[JerseyJim]

I love reading these posts about how the youth hunts should be the same rules as adults or removed completly. One thing we as hunters need to do if we want our favorite pass time to survive is get more young people involved! Letting them take doe's or small bucks is going to benefit this sport in the long run! If they are forced to pass on doe's and smaller bucks they may get bored and discouraged and end up giving it up before they ever get a chance to discover how awesome hunting really is! How hungry of a hunter are you when you want youths to play by the same rules so you have a better chance at getting a big buck! Just plain sad some people are! Don't force AR on youths and take a chance at losing them to a different pass time! We need as many new hunters as we can get to keep up with the growing numbers of anti's! Lose the young people and you will eventually lose hunting all together!

[cardeer]

Jersey, I wonder if those fathers that dont want there youth to shoot a small deer would give them a 500 HP car for their first ride instead of a smaller less powered car they wont kill themselves with ???? Same thought process.

[Allseasonhunter7]

mayb the "headhunters" dont want roookies to shoot that big buck theyve been scouting

[BTBowhunter]

I cant even begin to understand the mentality of begrudging kids just a little extra opportunity.
I'm a scoutmaster and its totall amazes me how little time some parents put into their kids at anything anymore. I've got parents who barely slow the car down enough to let the kid out for a meeting and worse yet I've sen parents discourage their kids from staying in the organization simply because it was too much bother "always running em around for scouts"

As pointed out here, the youth days allow for a day that is only about the kid's hunt. It helps interested parents concentrate on just the kid for that day. It also gets more kids out who wouldnt have gotten out cause some selfish dads dont want to mess up their opening day or their "camp experience". What kind of "camp experience" are they ashamed to have their kid see?


As for relaxed antler standards, it is statistically insignificant due to the low percentage of hunters in the age group that can take advantage of it. It has a negligible effect, less than car mortality, on the buck kill so the objection cant really be about helping AR if someone understands the real numbers.

I've heard more than once from guys that passed a decent buck that was sub AR legal to them and then really be agitated when some 12 year old takes that deer as his first buck. That to me is truly pitiful.

As for the arguement that we should teach kids that the hunt is not just about killing, we all know that every new hunter, young or old learns that very quickly. Interestingly, some of the folks who attempt to make this point are very vocal when they complain there are no deer and worry that hunters will soon lose interest and our numbers will drop. Just as adults can lose interest, so can our youth. Their attention pan is much shorter, its a fact of life. Whats the problem with trying a little harder to keep their enthusiasm level up with slightly easier requirements?

I have a 15 and a 12 year old. They both had a ball at the youth pheasant hunt. The youth doe season was a great chance for them to get out in reasonably mild weather and hunt with their rifles without the opening day madness to detract from the experience. Neither killed a deer that season but we had a great hunt.

Lets work to keep the special younth hunts in place and even look for more ways to expand youth opportunities

[fastfire]

Their not good hunters to start with & their afraid some kid will out do them.

[wingbar]

I read posts here from jr hunters and I read posts here from family or friends of jr hunters....odd that they should all be in support of youth days.
I haven't a problem with youth days for fishing or hunting as I have raised 3 kids myself during the youth day era and we enjoyed all of them as a family.
My problem arises from seeing some parents trying to expand on the youth deer days to include bucks and bucks that are not AR legal to boot.
Which lesson is better to give our beloved kids to tell them it is better to kill a small buck than a doe, or that killing a doe prior the main rut is better for the herds health????
Those kids can go out in early ML season can they not? they can go out in archery season can they not? and during archery season they have 6 wks to try an kill a buck do they not?
My 3 kids each killed a doe in archery season their first few years. 1 even killed a nice 9 pt on HER 14th B'day in archery season one year.
The idea behind youth days is to get kids to try the sport it is not about getting kids to kill a buck

Keep youth days but forget the idea of youth buck too!