This is always the hardest thing for me to explain to someone about hunting so I'll ask how you guys explain it.

Do you ENJOY killing a deer?


People that know me find it very hard to compute that I hunt because my love of animals is so great that they can't imagine me hurting or killing one. The last thing in the world I want to see is an animal being hurt or mistreated.......but I LOVE to hunt.

On the flip side there are people who just don't understand hunting and they can't get past the fact that something gets killed on a successful hunt........they just harp on that fact and say "Why do you LIKE killing things?"

So how to respond??

I really don't know to tell you the truth........I just know how I feel inside. I don't ENJOY killing anything.....the fact that something loses it's life at my hands has absolutely no appeal to me and is not why I hunt...........I would NEVER kill anything I wasn't going to eat and think that anyone who takes pleasure in killing something is pretty sick.

Having said that I don't hesitate for even 1 second when I see a deer. I take my shot, trying for the quickest, cleanest, most humane kill I can provide........and that's that.

When I approach a deer I have killed I am fully aware that I just ended a life........and that is sad. I am also very aware that the deer will not be wasted and will provide many meals for my family and friends.........this knowledge rinses away the sadness quickly. I do not pretend that I don't feel anything inside when I kill one because I do.......I just understand that it is part of the deal and I treat it with as much respect as I possibly can and move on.

My father always said I would be "One and Done" once I killed a deer myself because he knows my love of animals. He figured when I saw one go down by MY own hands it would bother me too much. Obviously that didn't happen.........and he is still surprised to this day.

So as you can tell it is difficult for me to explain to some people.........they see me bending over backwards to make sure the deer in my backyard have food and taking pictures of them and talking about how beautiful they are............then they see me shooting my bow and bringing back deer in my truck and butchering them in my garage.


How do you guys explain it??...........or am I the only one who feels this way (I hope not)