Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

Heard on the news this morning that males over the age of 16 that hunt and fish is down to an all time low of 25% and continues to decline. It' s sad but if you think about it, how true it is - video games, computers, satellite tv, more after school stuff to do, less land to grow up on.......

My son is 10 and has been shooting a bow for three years now. He' s looking forward to hunting with Dad in a couple more years, but doesn' t seem to have the fire I had when I was his age. I try my best to keep him interested, but I' m not going to push him either.

I guess it' s all part of the brain-washing and dumbing down of America - to get our weapons they first need to convince us that we don' t need them. Take your young' n hunting. Pass it down. Heck, grab the neighbor kid and his dad and take them hunting. I don' t know, what to do.

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

I' m 23 and I' ll tell you what - it' s hard to find anyone my age who fishes, let alone hunts anymore. Out of 10 close friends I went to high school with only one hunts and fishes with me. The rest are content to go to do other things. A few have expressed interest in maybe trying to learn how to shoot a bow and hunt but the problem is I don' t have the time, money, or resources to really help them. I have a hard enough time finding spots of my own to hunt let along places big enough to bring friends with. It sucks cuz I would love to have more hunting buddies.

I just found out 3 days ago that my girlfriend is pregnant and you can bet your bottom dollar that my kid is gonna be a hunter. :D

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

bob I really feel it is the migration to the cities and suburbs that have brought this about, I like many others was raised with the outdoors as my playground, I saw wildlife all the time I was growing up, I started fishing when I was old enough to hold a rod and started hunting squirrel at about age 7. I really feel that many of our youth have lost the connection with the outdoors, not due to video games or TV, but due to being isolated from the outdoors due to where they live.

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

21 years old here, my partners consist of dad, uncles, older guys, my little brother and my girlfriend' s sixteen year old brother. I don' t know many people at my school that hunt or shoot much either. Sad fact, means we have to all pick up the slack.

[Deleted]
 

[Deleted by Admins]

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

This type of statistic becomes shockingly evident whenever I head out to the local gamelands to hunt. I would guess that somewhere around 80% of the hunters or more are at least 30 years of age...if not older.

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

Jeeze, I can' t believe I' m going to say this but NJ does a good thing by children. They get free licences until age 16. They only have to pay for permits for special seasons but at a reduced rate. ($10 to my $28) They also have youth days where only kids can hunt. An adult must accompany them but only the kids hunt. They do this for ducks, pheasants, deer, and turkey. That is all well and good but getting non-hunting families to let their kids hunt is tough. We sponsor a kids night at my archery club. Local kids who know a club member can come to our club once a month to shoot a bow. We get between 15 and 20 kids every month. Few will hunt though I' ll bet.

I agree it is a scary statistic. My son is ten also and he started hunting this year. He is not obsessed like I am now and he is less intense than I was at his age. Still he loves it. I really cherish our time together. I try to remember that friends are very important at his age and if he wants to sleep over a friend' s house and miss the hunt tomorrow so be it. I miss him though.

Keep getting him out all the time.

Greg

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

Taz, I' d have to agree with that. Now that you mention it, that' s exactly where I' m at in life. Grew up out in the sticks on 10 acres. My playground was about 6 square miles. My son' s playground is a 60 x 30 piece of lawn and the streets. (It' s expensive to live in the outlying areas of Detroit)

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

Tazman and Navy both nailed it right on the head.

I' m no kid by all means, but I mean, I' m 42 yrs old and this is my 3rd year hunting. I never hunted as a kid, because I was way too young at the time my dad and uncle hunted (50' s, 60' s). But now I am finally trying to get my start and be successful.

As far as other adults, I must be hanging out with the wrong crowd, because out of all my good friends (either at work, or the high school marching band " boosters" ), I am the only hunter. Nobody else hunts nor wants to get interested in it, to come along with me. One of the band parents is a real good friend and used to go hunting years ago when he lived up near Tazman' s area, near Massaponax, VA. But the rising suburban developement, and lack of public land and issues with trying to obtain private land permission, made him decide to pack it all in and give it up. [:' (]

It' s getting tougher and tougher each season, IMHO.... :(

Butch

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

20 years old here, and I too hunt with my dad, and uncles. Luckily one of my roommates decided to start bowhunting with me this year and plans on shotgun hunting next year. He and I are the only people that I know of at school that hunt. I have tried to talk some of my other friends into hunting, but none of them ever showed any interest. I can only hope that statistic will improve.

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

It sounds like we' re doing a poor job promoting our sport to the youth. I' ve been an avid fisherman and hunter since I was big enough to walk. I tried my darndest to influence my 3 kids but they could care less about hunting. I took my son hunting for 3 years before I figured out he had no desire to kill anything for any reason. There not anti' s, I did do that right, but there certainly not woodsmen either. I love em though, there great kids.
Anyone got any ideas on how to reverse this trend?

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

That' s too bad. Honestly most people that are my age(21) don' t have the time to hunt dedicatedly. I think that is the main reason for the decline. Kids who once hunted and went to school in rural areas are now on Urban areas and don' t have to time it take to go back and hunt.

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

My two sons are 9 & 11. They like the outdoors but don' t seem to have a strong desire to hunt. I think most kids today want instant gratification. If it takes more than an hour to accomplish, they just don' t want to do it.

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

OK here is my 28 year old take on everything.

I started pheasant hunting with my dad at the age of 15. To be honest I didn' t like it too much then. Waking up early, walking all over creation, hunting with no dogs was not a lot of fun. We would go out a few times over the next few years.

My interest actually picked up again when I entered college. We decided to stop fooling around and get a springer spaniel. Also being away at school and not seeing my family made coming home to hunt even more fun.

Pheasant hunting has become a passion of mine now and I love the time spent with my father and our now 2 springers and a lab.

As for Deer hunting, my old man never did it. I didn' t know the first thing about it. I few years ago I went out at the end of shotgun season with my dad and a co-worker, we were ALL newbies. Needless to say we didn' t see anything!

My wife then introduced me to a co-workers husband who is a big bow hunter and he took me under his wing. He taught me about bows, hunting, deer, the woods, treestands, everything. Bow hunting is VERY intimidating and shall I say almost impossible to just " pick-up" . You need someone to teach you.

I have now managed to get my wifes father, my sister inlaws boyfriend, and 2 close friends into pheasant hunting. Two of them have taken up deer hunting but aren' t serious about it.

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

Geoff - you made a great point I' ve never thought about - kid' s being impatient wanting instant gratification. I don' t know about your neck of the woods, but here in MI public schools, the trend is to not teach failure to kids. For example, they' ve taken away 1st - 3rd place ribbons in field day and give each kid a " participation ribbon" so there' s no hard feelings. Big deal, why compete. This must some how translate into hunting - everyone and everything are equal, so don' t hurt it. I don' t know, just a guess. (Or is it called " brain-washing" ?)

When I first passed hunter' s safety, my dad let me take the day off school for opening day pheasant. I was hot about hunting back then, but that was the coolest thing - to tell my friends my dad let me skip school to hunt.

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

All of the above are good points, and its only going to get worse, here in Pa, the reduction of game, plus the posted ground, hell most kids dont have a chance, when i was 12 yrs old i could hunt anywhere in my area, it was really great, now all of the land i used to hunt was bought up and posted. What are the kids gonna do, i hunt with a group of guys and we have 3 kids with us, they are all getting disgusted because we are hardly seeing any deer, and where there are deer its posted, i wouldnt be afraid to bet within the next 5 yrs 2 out of the 3 kids that hunt with us wont be hunting anymore...ITs sad and it will get worse, so all of these people that post there ground better understand when there isnt many new hunters buying up license and the anti' s gain all of the power they to will loose there hunting priviledges!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I really hope this doesnt happen but it dont look good. Im 43 yrs and lived for hunting, but you hardly see that anymore with the younger generation!!!!

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

I wonder if that statistic includes us older guys? It sounds like it does. I wonder what percentage of males between 16 and 25 hunt? I' ll bet it is much lower then 25%. The problem is, very few non-hunters raise kids that end up hunting. Add to that the fact that many hunters raise kids that do not hunt, and you can see why this percentage gets worse all the time. To change it around, we have to find kids from non-hunting families and somehow get them interested. Getting them into target archery or 3D is a great place to start. The local shop I cater to, allows kids to shoot free. They' ll even loan them a bow, so they can learn.

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

20 years old here. Been bowhunting for two years deer hunting since i can remember. Good luck on a 16 year old kid getting permission to hunt private land around here. I lost a hunting spot this year b/c the farmer let a 17 year old hunt his land and the kid wound up taking all his friends out there and drinking at the quarry causing all kinds of hell. Ruined it for all of us. Although i now have gotten permission through the farmer once again this week. Proplem: too many bad apples for the farmers to weed through the good ones.

When bow season comes around every bone in my body aches to be in a deer stand. I absolutely live and breath it. Out of the three friends i have that bow hunt. Only one has been out more than twice all year. Him and I both have the itch. We have seen our fair share of deer and actually took two does 10 minutes apart and 100 yds away from one another this year. We are still waiting on the big boy to show. IT TAKES COMMITMENT!!!!

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

I' m 22 and I started hunting three years ago. And I honestly only know one guy my age who hunts. I am involved heavily in Bass fishing and am the President of my club. In my club there is one guy who is 20, everyone else is 35 or older. I have tried recruiting my peers, but they arent interested. To combat this my club is inthe process of starting a youth fishing club, but its still tought to get kids into it.

I think the biggest problem hunting faces is availability. When I wanted to start bowhunting I went down the street and introduced myself to my neighbor that had a deer target in his backyard. Fortunately he was as excited to teach me to hunt, as I was to learn ( he has only daughters who arent interested). But many kids my age and younger dont have those oportunities. If you are part of a hunt club, why dont you look into starting a youth club. Make them real members of a youth organization, give them a hat and a membership card and you would be very surprised at how much more excited they are about it.

Scott

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

I agree with the instant gratification theory. I also think land access is a huge problem. Not many young people can pony up the money for a lease. I hunt less than a mile from a subdivision where $1 million homes are being built. I hunt 160 acres for free. It doesn' t take a rocket scientist to figure out that in a few years the landowner will get a lucrative offer for his land so more million dollar homes can be built. I don' t blame him, it will set him and his kids for life but there goes another area full of deer that won' t be there for the future.

TJ

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

I am 22, and have been hunting ever since I can remember, although I live in a small, relatively rural community. I take it for granted but had thousands of acres of national forest land at my fingertips, along with my dads land, and MOST everyone in our school hunted and fished! Here are a couple problems I can see or have encountered, maybe some will agree, maybe some wont.
1. Land access. I am a senior in college at UW-Stevens Point, and I couldnt beleive how many kids here hunt and fish, which was totally the opposite of UW-Madison where I transferred from. Ironically the amount of public land around SP is extremely small, you have to travel 1/2 hour to find any meaningful land.
Not only that, but young kids USED to be able to ride four whellers to go hunting, now the DNR is SO strict about where you can ride, age, rider, registration it deters TONS of kids from going hunting and fishing. Unfortunately access to land, to hunt is dwindling all of the time.
2. Sports, and how much coaches demand from training, practicing, and playing. I played 3 sports in high school, and it was VERY difficult to get out to hunt. COmbined with the practices, mandatory lifting weihts, etc. it was tough to get in the woods or on the lakes.
3. The Price to play along with the number of hours parents and kids are working. The licenses are high, the fines are high, the gear is high, it cost a lot of $$$$$ to hunt or fish. Couple this with the MAJORITY of young kids working part time jobs makes it hard for kids to get out in the outdoors. Also, add the increasing hours working adults must work, and the time both parent and kid have to get out in the outdoors is getting smaller than in the past. WE work longer, harder, and more days.
Just a few thoughts anyway....

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

I took my 3 and 1/2 year old out with me to sit for a couple hours and I ended up spooking a doe away when I got up to stamp down some grass to make more room to sit. He had a blast and I let him bring his unloaded Red Rider along. Fun to see him so enthused at an early age.

RE: Heard a sad statistic on young hunters
 

When i lived in michigan everyone of my close friends hunts and fishes, no in indy none of my friends hunt and fish, and i am left to drive 300 miles every other weekend to go do what i love with the friends i love. Even though it is well worth it, i wish i could have some one to hunt with down here.