ORIGINAL: SBGobblers
IMO a guide doesn't do a whole lot except provide a place for you to hunt, help with game care if necessary, provide lodging, sometimes help with calling such as elk or moose. It is up to the hunters' skill to do it all.
Now HCH.....really......
YOU go to an outfitter......the guide has already scouted your area.....hung you a stand.....and told you which way the deer are going to be coming from. He then stays there and helps you glass deer......then you shoot one. He helps (or does it all) the tracking......loads your deer......and then they process it for you.
Forgive me if this scenario takes about 90% of the "hunt" out of "hunting" for me.
I don't begrudge anyone using guides. I'm just saying....let's call a spade a spade. What part of my scenario isn't the truth?
I'm so sore today....my 42 yr old bones are cussing me. Why?.....besides the fact that I scouted my buck all year......set up in an area "I" thought I might get the best shot at him......I drug my buck out of the sh%t on Saturday....I loaded him in my truck, alone.....I unloaded him to field dress him.....I loaded him on the 4 wheeler to take into the woods to field dress. I loaded him back up......I hung him on the gambrel.....I caped him out and I processed him. THAT ENTIRE LITTANY OF STEPS contributes to the overall experience of "THE HUNT". It wouldn't mean NEARLY the same to me if it didn't go down, that way.
Again....I don't begrudge anyone using a guide. "I" am rewarded by the entire experience, though....and the part I'd be paying for.....is what I love the most. the killing is easy.
Just my .02......and I mean no disrespect.
jeff
I have never seen Tred in a treestand and his buddy just walks around with him and they use their brains to try to get an animal on their hunts I have seen. Using a guide is not a give me and I never use them for financial reasons and I like doing things the "hard way." I use an outfitter in Canada as it is required. I still hang my own stands when I get there. I personally think 4 wheelers are not hunting either, so there. Hunting is about going into the woods on your own, hanging your own stands after scouting, or stalking and calling game on your ownand getting in and your game out with nothing but your own power. Horses are OK for elk and a must at times if you have the luxuryof having one. To put a man down for using a guide to help him get around and his knowledge of the land and to say that it isn't real hunting and then talk about loading a deer on a 4 wheeler to field dress it is rediculous!!! BTW; why load it in a pickup just to load itback on a sissy city slicker ATV when you could have field dressed it in the woods to begin with? BTW; you have been bowhunting a year and Tred has forgot more about bowhunting than you will probably ever know. Just my .02 and I mean no disrespect.