Like others have posted, I grew up outside the house !!!! Santa Claus brought me a Mossberg, bolt action , 3 shot .410 with a "poly-choke" the Christmas of my 3rd. grade. I had turned 8 on Nov. 11 of that year. Looking back I know that this was a heck of a sacrifice purchase for my parents. For years this was my squirrel - swamp rabbit - wood duck - dove - nutria gun. My No.1 childhood buddy had a single shot Winchester .410. We'd cruise the rural roads around our community, gathering soft drink bottles, and trade them at $.03 each at a local "jot 'em-down" dry goods and grocery store. We would get one 2 3/4", .410 shell for every 3 bottles. We'd try to get enough bottles for 3-5 shells, and you better know that we'd not waste them. I do not recall us ever having more than about 10 shells each. It was nothing unusual for us to leave at daylight on a Saturday, and chase critters almost all day long. Bologna/cheese sandwiches, a few candy bars and a Boy Scout canteen of water. Usually we'd come in around 4:00 p.m. with a couple of rabbits we had jumped or found on the nest, a couple of fox squirrels if we were lucky, and almost always a nutria or two. There was not even a thought of us missing a day's hunt. There was plenty of private land to hunt by permission back then and tons of small game. As we got older, we both started suffering from "fumes" ... perfumes and car fumes. Then came Viet Nam.
It was about 10 years later that I could bring myself to kill anything, and I got back into my first love .... archery. Now I hunt a ton and have a ball. And it is now never much about the bagging of game. It is almost 100% about the camp experience.
Where are the kids ???? I have no clue. Both of my daughters hunt. I hunt with 14 other men. Most nave sons and grand sons. Very few of their youngsters hunt at all. I figure that the way this activity is going, in 3-4 generations, a "hunter" will be a fairly rare critter.
As for the gadgets ??? We all know that nothing replaces solid woodsman-ship. GPS units, SPOTs, FRS radios, I-Phones and such all can serve as excellent hunting and especially safety related items. But every one of these needs a battery. Obviously batteries are life limited. So I will have a good compass, an accurate map with me , let some one else know where I intend to head ... and I'm gone !!
Last edited by Mojotex; 12-24-2011 at 07:58 AM.