# Too Young To Learn about Hunting?



## redbirddog (Apr 23, 2010)

http://redbirddog.blogspot.com/2014/03/bailey-and-little-hunter.html

This little girl came out for the last 1/2 hour of our hunt with her mom. Her dad is a friend of mine and an excellent hunter and fisherman. The mom worked in the meat department at Safeway for many years.

The daughter (almost 5-years-old) understands that this is will be food on the table one day soon. She held this hen for 15 minutes like a doll and placed it in the ice chest with the other eight birds we harvested yesterday morning.

I will let you each decide if this is a good life lesson or not.


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## CatK (May 29, 2013)

I this is an excellent lesson, children have to understand the link between animals and food so as to make their own decisions about what they will eat and where they will source it from.


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## texasred (Jan 29, 2012)

For her Yes. The big smile looks like she enjoyed herself.
When we take kids hunting, we make sure its a easy/fun hunt for them.
What I have seen from personal experience. If you introduce them while they are still young to the hunting world, they are not grossed out by it. If its left unknown to them they stand a far better chance of thinking its evil. They look at meat as it comes from the grocery store, not as it started out when still alive. My kids raised animals for 4H and then FFA in school. They had a clear understanding of what it means to raise animals for market.
Now if you had taken her to a animal packing plant, I would have said she was to young.


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## mlwindc (Feb 8, 2013)

This is excellent. My son is nearing five and I have wondered when he will be old enough to go into the field. Soon!


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## redbirddog (Apr 23, 2010)

I think the key was to make it a short time so they do not get tired. We had hunted for two hours before she got there and she only spent 1/2 hour in the field.


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## mlwindc (Feb 8, 2013)

redbirddog said:


> I think the key was to make it a short time so they do not get tired. We had hunted for two hours before she got there and she only spent 1/2 hour in the field.


Good advice, I will plan on doing this sometime in the fall when the season picks up again. My husband grew up raising sheep for 4H and his family has chickens still to this day; even though we live in the city, I am hoping that by visiting grandparents in the country and hunting, my son learns where food comes from and how to eat/grow/live responsibly.


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## tknafox2 (Apr 2, 2013)

My husband was raised in MN on a farm, I in the city, where we believed Chocolate milk came from brown cows. It is amazing, that there truly are children that don't know where the hamburger, or the drumstick they are eating comes from. If you were to ask most kids in the 5 yr age bracket, they would tell you " The Grocery Store". I believe it is a wonderful, and very important lesson for this child. She is a lucky little girl to be part of something so basic to life, all life, the hunt has been the center of human civilization, social interaction and survival since the caveman. It is not just a sport, it is a natural instinct. Who knows how this experience will benefit her as she progresses through her life...


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## mlwindc (Feb 8, 2013)

tknafox2 said:


> My husband was raised in MN on a farm, I in the city, where we believed Chocolate milk came from brown cows. It is amazing, that there truly are children that don't know where the hamburger, or the drumstick they are eating comes from. If you were to ask most kids in the 5 yr age bracket, they would tell you " The Grocery Store". I believe it is a wonderful, and very important lesson for this child. She is a lucky little girl to be part of something so basic to life, all life, the hunt has been the center of human civilization, social interaction and survival since the caveman. It is not just a sport, it is a natural instinct. Who knows how this experience will benefit her as she progresses through her life...


tknafox - I know GROWN UPS who don't know where food comes from (or at least they try to pretend where it comes from).


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## Watson (Sep 17, 2012)

A great life lesson! 
Fishing and hunting have been a part of my family as long as I can remember, and we as kids always understood and respected that it was done for food. I grew up in Toronto, and have come across many people who are against hunting - see it as cruelty, but have no qualms about eating processed meat bought from grocery stores. 

Here's a recent pic of my nieces and nephews after a hunt with my Dad and brother. They all help clean/cook what's been caught. Better than sitting in front of a TV playing video games!


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## einspänner (Sep 8, 2012)

Watson, their expressions are priceless!

This might have more to do with parenting styles, but I'll also say that I am sooo impressed with the behavior of kids I've met at various hunting events. They seem to be more independent and good at self-entertaining.


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## R E McCraith (Nov 24, 2011)

Just like with your new pup you hope to hunt over - the same is for your new young hunting partner - INTRODUCTION done correctly is the key to SUCCESS !!!!!!


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## harrigab (Aug 21, 2011)

never too young to learn I say  Harrison doesn't look too happy about the salmon, but he loves to come fishing were Gabriel isn't bothered



He does look happy with pheasants though


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## v-john (Jan 27, 2013)

It's great to get them started early! Cool deal.

Another lesson that I feel should be taught is that even though they are food, and animals, it is still our responsibility to kill them quickly and humanely. Each animal, deserves that. It is a life after all, and should be treated with respect.


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## redbirddog (Apr 23, 2010)

Something my oldest daughter posted recently. She is a early childhood parenting coach and she tells me this is the basis of her creed. I think it works in the two-legged and four-legged world well.
Happy trails. RBD

_"Any kind of propaganda, or telling people what to do, is to be deplored. It is an insult to indoctrinate people, even for their own good…

If mothers are told to do this or that or the other, they lose touch with their own ability to act without knowing exactly what is right and what is wrong. Only too easily they feel incompetent. If they must look up everything in a book…they are always too late even when they do the right things, because the right things have to be done immediately. It is only possible to act at exactly the right point when the action is intuitive or by instinct, as we say.

The mind can be brought to bear on the problem afterward, and when people think things out our problem is to help them. We may discuss with them the sorts of problems they are faced with, and the sorts of things they do, and the sort of effect that they may expect from their actions. This need not be the same as telling them what to do"_. (Talking to Parents, 1957)

This is such a strong and quality piece of advice, it has stood the test of time. 57 years later the words still ring true to a new generation of parents. Read this short statement three of four times and see how it applies to your dog and human lives.

Spring is in the air.


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