highground34
New member
It was cold and dark that morning in hunting camp. I was twelve years old but this first morning of hunting season I found myself feeling like a newborn elk calf just hitting the sage brush covered ground.
My eyes were pried open by the cold of a wall tent zipper opening with the smell of bacon and coffee from the campfire just outside the tent. Everyone was quite but smiling while they gathered gear for the morning horseback hunt in Hannan Gulch. It was odd to see how calm and yet focused my father and my uncle were to leave camp with four young boys.
It only took me a few minutes of watching their every move before it hit me like a magnum lead, this is what my family was born to do. Now almost three decades later that day still drives me into the hunt of another time.
We loaded up and rode for what seemed to be forever, as I became more and more cold. My feet stinging from not moving in the cold wind blown stirrups of my saddle. My rifle was as cold as the trees we road by one after another.
Later we found ourselves making a fire on a ridge just outside the tree line in a rocky area that my father and his brother called home many times before. After a while of glassing and a few short walks to different vantage points we saddled up to head for camp. Nothing was stirring around and the wind continued.
To my complete shock, less than half way back to camp, the moment to shoot just came crashing in. Several mulie deer bounced their way up the hill and across the trail we were on. My father had a look of excitement and determination as he said "this is it boy, now is your time."
I froze for a second and then my body just took over. I just wish at first my brain would have engaged as well. I was about 4' 10" and on horseback standing in the center of a thin frozen trail. "Let’s go boy, now, come on," said my eager father. I tried to pull my open sight lever action 30-30 from a cold leather scabbard and nothing. I jump from the horse with my heart pounding and fell in the snow. Jumping right up covered in snow I run to the right side of the horse to grab my gun.
As stated earlier I was 4' 10" on a slippery hill side trying to get a rifle off of a 15 hand high horse. Not a good situation at the time but I learned a lot quick. My taller brother climbed the left side of my horse drew my rifle and handed it to me, "go brother go," I am now clawing my way into position where my father is perched. A four by four spindly mulie is staring me down at 80 yards at the most. At this time that mulie very well could have been a 400 class bull elk by the way my brain and heart were racing.
I see a head and antlers peeking straight back over a large rear-end. My father whispers, "put a bullet in the tube son and get ready, when he turns you bust him." A 12 year old feeling like an equal next to the man he admires, this is what hunting feels like. Now at that young age when my father said those words I only remembered, "Bust him." So I let one fly. Not a muscle moved, not a hair split and I am readying shell number two. I swallow hard one time put the gun on hair and you guessed it, Texas Heart Shot. Now the buck humps up takes two steps forward and away from me then turned right and broadside to follow the does. My father telling me to focus and put it in the boiler maker I somehow gathered my thoughts and placed a great shot.
Now when the emotional dust settled in my mind and my breathing started to become more normal I realized that I had just harvested my first game animal. And much later I realized I was a part of something much large, family tradition and memory. Bless those who remember tradition and thank you to all of my fellow outdoorsman whom protect these privileges we enjoy in the wild.
My eyes were pried open by the cold of a wall tent zipper opening with the smell of bacon and coffee from the campfire just outside the tent. Everyone was quite but smiling while they gathered gear for the morning horseback hunt in Hannan Gulch. It was odd to see how calm and yet focused my father and my uncle were to leave camp with four young boys.
It only took me a few minutes of watching their every move before it hit me like a magnum lead, this is what my family was born to do. Now almost three decades later that day still drives me into the hunt of another time.
We loaded up and rode for what seemed to be forever, as I became more and more cold. My feet stinging from not moving in the cold wind blown stirrups of my saddle. My rifle was as cold as the trees we road by one after another.
Later we found ourselves making a fire on a ridge just outside the tree line in a rocky area that my father and his brother called home many times before. After a while of glassing and a few short walks to different vantage points we saddled up to head for camp. Nothing was stirring around and the wind continued.
To my complete shock, less than half way back to camp, the moment to shoot just came crashing in. Several mulie deer bounced their way up the hill and across the trail we were on. My father had a look of excitement and determination as he said "this is it boy, now is your time."
I froze for a second and then my body just took over. I just wish at first my brain would have engaged as well. I was about 4' 10" and on horseback standing in the center of a thin frozen trail. "Let’s go boy, now, come on," said my eager father. I tried to pull my open sight lever action 30-30 from a cold leather scabbard and nothing. I jump from the horse with my heart pounding and fell in the snow. Jumping right up covered in snow I run to the right side of the horse to grab my gun.
As stated earlier I was 4' 10" on a slippery hill side trying to get a rifle off of a 15 hand high horse. Not a good situation at the time but I learned a lot quick. My taller brother climbed the left side of my horse drew my rifle and handed it to me, "go brother go," I am now clawing my way into position where my father is perched. A four by four spindly mulie is staring me down at 80 yards at the most. At this time that mulie very well could have been a 400 class bull elk by the way my brain and heart were racing.
I see a head and antlers peeking straight back over a large rear-end. My father whispers, "put a bullet in the tube son and get ready, when he turns you bust him." A 12 year old feeling like an equal next to the man he admires, this is what hunting feels like. Now at that young age when my father said those words I only remembered, "Bust him." So I let one fly. Not a muscle moved, not a hair split and I am readying shell number two. I swallow hard one time put the gun on hair and you guessed it, Texas Heart Shot. Now the buck humps up takes two steps forward and away from me then turned right and broadside to follow the does. My father telling me to focus and put it in the boiler maker I somehow gathered my thoughts and placed a great shot.
Now when the emotional dust settled in my mind and my breathing started to become more normal I realized that I had just harvested my first game animal. And much later I realized I was a part of something much large, family tradition and memory. Bless those who remember tradition and thank you to all of my fellow outdoorsman whom protect these privileges we enjoy in the wild.
