ORIGINAL: whitetaildreamer
You may take offence to the term harvest but that is how I look at it. Yes I have killed the animal but I am harvesting it from the wild. The entire experience of the hunt is important. I have never looked at it as going out for, "the kill". Venison is the primary red meat that my family eats. Besides getting out for the experience my main goal is to put meat in the freezer for the following year. As to the term, "city folk", that is a huge generalization. I spent much of my youth on the farm but have been living as "city folk", for the last 35 years. Is qualification of a hunter's skills based on where they live? Because I live and hunt in Canada where the average buck is 100 lbs. or more than the avg. buck in Texas, I'm a better hunter? I think not. (it's just the development of the species due to geographic location).
Dreamer- I do not take offense at the term "harvest", it just kind of strikes me as if the speaker is trying to disguise what he is doing. I agree that the experience is in the hunt. I don't think that I have ever had an unsuccessful deer hunt even though I have had many where I did not shoot (or GET or KILL) a deer. I might call it HARVEST in a high fence but my personal values would not allow high fence. I have been "city folk" for a bit longer than you, 49 years since leaving Manson, a small farming community. I too feel fortunate to live in an area where we have big deer. Look at Iowa in the record books. I am not particularly a trophy hunter as I shoot fawns and does, that being said, I have probably let deer pass that are larger than most Florida, Louisiana, and Mississippi hunters see in a life time. They may be much better hunters than I.
About the horns vs antlers question- If a hunter uses the term "horns" it does not bother me because I know that he is using the term intentionally knowing that it is incorrect. If a non-hunter uses "horns" it grates me wrong because I believe they are UNintentionally using the wrong term. Ya gotta be in the hunting fraternity to use "horns". Even novices should not use that term until after we show them the secret handshake.
Bob