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  1. #1
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    Default Newcomers Versus Rite of Passagers

    Lotta y'all do some really cool stuff outdoors, and I'm curious to know how you were introduced to them. Is it something you've always done because it was passed on to you, or did you pick it up on your own along the way? And is it important that your kids carry on the lifestyle? Appreciate your feedback.
    - "My dad used to tell me that nothing good happens when you take your AR to an out of town riot. Or maybe it was that nothing good happens after 1:00 in the morning. I can't remember any more." - Wob

    - "Any thought of romance went out the window when I saw the Ohio plates" - Squirrel Master

  2. #2
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    I had a seed planted in me at a young age by my father and my dad's brothers. That started it all. I passed my dad in all levels of skill and passion for hunting pretty early on; 16-17. What that showed me was he liked to hunt but he didn't love it. He took me because I wouldn't shut up about it. Everything from there was self taught/learned or I sought out resources and people who would teach me etc. For my kids, I just want them exposed to it all. I won't force them. I want them to have success but not have success handed to them either. They may love it as much as I do or they won't. But I know they won't ever care about things if they aren't exposed to and don't know about those things. God, Jesus, conservation, hunting etc. So early exposure and an appreciation of what a life lived to serve Christ and what an outdoors lifestyle gives us sets a good baseline for them in my opinion. I can buy them and give them ingredients. It's up to them what they make with those ingredients or whether they use them at all.

  3. #3
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    Quote Originally Posted by Glenn View Post
    I had a seed planted in me at a young age by my father and my dad's brothers. That started it all. I passed my dad in all levels of skill and passion for hunting pretty early on; 16-17. What that showed me was he liked to hunt but he didn't love it. He took me because I wouldn't shut up about it. Everything from there was self taught/learned or I sought out resources and people who would teach me etc. For my kids, I just want them exposed to it all. I won't force them. I want them to have success but not have success handed to them either. They may love it as much as I do or they won't. But I know they won't ever care about things if they aren't exposed to and don't know about those things. God, Jesus, conservation, hunting etc. So early exposure and an appreciation of what a life lived to serve Christ and what an outdoors lifestyle gives us sets a good baseline for them in my opinion. I can buy them and give them ingredients. It's up to them what they make with those ingredients or whether they use them at all.
    I could have typed this exact post. Identical background other than lack of uncles and same philosophy for children. As a kid, I read about every hunting magazine I could get my hands on and learned by trial and error. Lots of error. As a young adult, I was fortunate enough to befriend a world class turkey hunter named Tony Valentine who took me under his wing for a few seasons and dramatically improved upon my self-taught turkey hunting skills.
    Carolina Counsel

  4. #4
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    My short answer: nature and nurture
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  5. #5
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    My father hunted out of necessity. It put food on our table at a very affordable price. I remember it being $25 to process the deer when I was a kid. He would shoot 2-3 a year, only does. Once I came of age, he taught me what he knew, handed me a family heirloom 30/30, and he didn't sit in a deer stand again until I left for college. I took to it like a pig in mud. I was obsessed with "Monster Bucks" and anything outdoors on TV as a teenager. I got into duck hunting with a friend in high school who noticed we had a beaver swamp on our property and suggested that we duck hunt it. I was hooked from the first morning.

    As far as fishing goes, It was mostly self taught. My dad didn't eat fish, but he enjoyed being on the water. We would put our jon boat in at Saluda River Resort and back up towards lake greenwood to a sandbar. My sister and I would swim and fish with crickets all day. Once I started to drive, he gifted me the jon boat and I began to really start bass fishing and got really into that as well.

    As much as I enjoy it, I would hope my Daughter finds some joy in it as well. I know sometimes as a teenager I wondered why my dad didn't want to go do those things with me, but now that I am grown and look back I realize that he was making ends meet and a little bit extra for me to have boat gas money to enjoy the outdoors. I will be forever grateful for that, but I have also had discussions with my wife on how I plan to be there with our kids and spend that quality outdoors time with them. As my father ages, I realize its a ton of time I could have had with him that I will never get back.

  6. #6
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    Totally learned. Every bit of it.

    I was given the tools and opportunity as a kid, not much guidance. My dad didnt go a whole bunch and worked a lot. I was left to my own devices. Got in a lot of trouble. Once threatened a cop with the knife I was using to cut the jaws out of the dead sand tiger that had washed up on the beach. Begged for a job at 13 with Gus Spero to work on one of his boats. I got to take out the trash and he'd let me go fishing once in a while. I graduated to cutting fish then to deck hand. Had free use of a boat tied up to a channel house in Cherry Grove that I rode my bike to go hunt ducks in before school.
    "Rivers and the inhabitants of the watery elements are for wise men to contemplate and for fools to pass by without consideration" -Izaak Walton

  7. #7
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    Quote Originally Posted by BigBrother View Post
    Totally learned. Every bit of it.

    I was given the tools and opportunity as a kid, not much guidance. My dad didnt go a whole bunch and worked a lot. I was left to my own devices. Got in a lot of trouble. Once threatened a cop with the knife I was using to cut the jaws out of the dead sand tiger that had washed up on the beach. Begged for a job at 13 with Gus Spero to work on one of his boats. I got to take out the trash and he'd let me go fishing once in a while. I graduated to cutting fish then to deck hand. Had free use of a boat tied up to a channel house in Cherry Grove that I rode my bike to go hunt ducks in before school.
    Knowing what I know of you, I can't say I'm surprised. Good stuff.
    - "My dad used to tell me that nothing good happens when you take your AR to an out of town riot. Or maybe it was that nothing good happens after 1:00 in the morning. I can't remember any more." - Wob

    - "Any thought of romance went out the window when I saw the Ohio plates" - Squirrel Master

  8. #8
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    I got the "Bug" as a youngster. I remember daddy bringing home fish and me "Helping" him clean them on our table in the backyard or him stopping at the house before dropping a deer off at the processor. I loved every second of being out in the woods or the water with my Dad. I used to follow him around like a lost puppy dog so it was only natural I started going when he did. I will credit him for this, I was very young when he started me out but he never told me no. If he didn't have an invite for the both of us he wouldn't go. He has taught me everything I know about duck hunting but he will try to tell you that I'm better at it than he ever was. As far as fishing he taught me everything very early on but I will say I still cant keep up with him on one thing. He and my grandfather have spent hundreds if not thousand of hours watching a wooden cork wash through the jetty rocks in the Charleston harbor id probably put him up against the best this site has to offer. I used to be infatuated with his stories from the 80's mashing ducks on the cooper river and the lower lake which most certainly has made me as crazy about chasing waterfowl as I am today. He's getting older and needless to say he doesn't get out and do much hunting or fishing anymore but every now and again I can convince him to go shoot a few birds with me. Every time I drag him out of the house and get him out in the marsh I can see a subtle smirk on his face Ill look over and say "You got the bug again huh" he normally laughs and just says not quite but I know its not about the birds anymore. He's been there and done that. He jokes the only reason why he didn't quit 20 years ago was because of me. I will forever be grateful for my dad and cherish every moment we have spent outdoors. I will be excited to pass on this tradition when I have a few kids of my own one day.

  9. #9
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    Quote Originally Posted by CreekBoy View Post
    I got the "Bug" as a youngster. I remember daddy bringing home fish and me "Helping" him clean them on our table in the backyard or him stopping at the house before dropping a deer off at the processor. I loved every second of being out in the woods or the water with my Dad. I used to follow him around like a lost puppy dog so it was only natural I started going when he did. I will credit him for this, I was very young when he started me out but he never told me no. If he didn't have an invite for the both of us he wouldn't go. He has taught me everything I know about duck hunting but he will try to tell you that I'm better at it than he ever was. As far as fishing he taught me everything very early on but I will say I still cant keep up with him on one thing. He and my grandfather have spent hundreds if not thousand of hours watching a wooden cork wash through the jetty rocks in the Charleston harbor id probably put him up against the best this site has to offer. I used to be infatuated with his stories from the 80's mashing ducks on the cooper river and the lower lake which most certainly has made me as crazy about chasing waterfowl as I am today. He's getting older and needless to say he doesn't get out and do much hunting or fishing anymore but every now and again I can convince him to go shoot a few birds with me. Every time I drag him out of the house and get him out in the marsh I can see a subtle smirk on his face Ill look over and say "You got the bug again huh" he normally laughs and just says not quite but I know its not about the birds anymore. He's been there and done that. He jokes the only reason why he didn't quit 20 years ago was because of me. I will forever be grateful for my dad and cherish every moment we have spent outdoors. I will be excited to pass on this tradition when I have a few kids of my own one day.
    Smiled the whole time reading this. Thank you.
    - "My dad used to tell me that nothing good happens when you take your AR to an out of town riot. Or maybe it was that nothing good happens after 1:00 in the morning. I can't remember any more." - Wob

    - "Any thought of romance went out the window when I saw the Ohio plates" - Squirrel Master

  10. #10
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    My dad is to blame for my obsession with hunting and fishing. I can remember him picking me up early from pre-school to go hunting and I went everywhere with him from a very early age. If the fish were biting or it was during the rut he would regularly check me out of school around lunchtime to go. Or drop me off late to school after duck hunting. Wether it was hunting or fishing he never told me we couldn’t go, if I asked to go we were going. I’m not sure how my mom tolerated it.

    My grandad didn’t hunt or fish so everything my dad knew he had to learn on his own. All of his deer hunting revolved around bowhunting WMAs or the FMNF and he was a straight killer back in the day. He taught me everything he knew and got me into bowhunting at 11 years old. The only thing he didn’t do was turkey hunt so I had to figure that out on my own.

  11. #11
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    I was nurtured early then I took it all to much higher levels.

    As a child of 6, I waited on my father to get home from the farm in the afternoons. I would have the cane poles out and tackle box organized in hopes that we might go. Sometime yes, but many times no. I was just as happy throwing sticks and rocks as fishing. He took me on dove shoots. I loved being around all the REAL hunters and soaked in every bit of it. Loved it so much that I used to beg my dad, Bobby Batten and Dr Bland to let me clean their quail when he got home.

    I got older, I was the apprentice/paddler for my grandfather... he got to fish and I paddled. .

    When I got to be about 11, my cousin Pebble was the major influence. He took me duck hunting, hog hunting and on deer drives every Saturday. He was my hero.. bad assed Vietnam Vet that never spoke about the unspeakable things he was exposed to that I never knew until the last 15 years.

    Then there was my orthodontist in college. He schooled me about quail hunting (he supplied the dogs and I provided the dirt) for 15 years. He CORRUPTED me after learning that I had an interest in Wild turkeys. I would stop by his office once a week for a beer and to practice turkey calls...

    These gentlemen gave me an introduction to much of what South Carolina has to offer. Little did they know that the tiny spark that each one of them lit in me as a child/young man, would grow into a passion that would dominate every aspect of my life. I never tired of all the stories that each one of them gave me. I owe them all a debt that can never be repaid.
    Last edited by Sasha and Abby; 03-27-2023 at 09:27 AM.
    "If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die, I want to go where they went."
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  12. #12
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    The basics were provided to me early on. My dad lived on a boat the majority of my childhood so I spent every other weekend there, bream fishing from the dock or trolling for flounder off the little Jon boat we had. I learned to kneeboard behind a 36’ Chris Craft. He definitely instilled my love for the water and had me Junior open water certified at a pretty young age. When we weren’t on the boat, we were on our property in Winnsboro, where he’d set me loose with cargo pockets full of 22s and my Henry to wreak hell on some squirrels.

    Beyond that it’s all been self taught and would be obvious if you knew me.

    We have a neighborhood pond behind the house and I refuse to tell my 4 year old no to goin fishing just about every day as long as his behavior has been good. He’s on the boat weekly with me when it’s warm and I try to let him handle all the different types of live bait. He’s been running down fiddlers for me since he was two. I hope he gets into it like I am, but if he doesn’t always tell people I’ll just get into what he’s into.
    Last edited by Cwaysvt; 03-27-2023 at 10:01 AM.

  13. #13
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    Well, this might get long, but here goes...
    My biological father was a POS and he and my Mom divorced when I was 4 yrs old. So, it was Mom, my brother, and me. My Dad is actually my stepfather, but, from day one, nobody would ever have known that. When they got married, she had 2 boys and he had 3 boys from previous lives. Then my youngest brother came 2 years after they got married. So, for those keeping track, that's 6 boys, all within a year or so of each other ranging from newborn to about 8 or 9.
    We hunted for food and entertainment. Lots of weekends during deer season, we would load up and camp at whichever land we had to hunt and spend all weekend hunting. It was a blast. We all started pretty early sitting stands alone. My Dad had already scouted and placed stands in good locations (baiting was illegal and we couldn't afford those tickets). Once my Dad thought we could be safe enough, we hunted stands on our own. Most of the hunting instruction was, "be still, pay attention, bucks only today, stay till I get back, and if you shoot I'll come get you." The actual woods knowledge came later, but he was good at that too. I killed my first deer at 7yrs old with a Browning BAR 30-06 (my Dad's gun) sitting a stand by myself.
    When deer season was over, we'd load up in the boat and try till fill all of our coolers with crappie. I remember the disassembly line in the back yard cleaning all those fish. Great times. Dad also loved to quail hunt and from time-to-time, he'd take a couple of us along, but I always felt like that was more his thing and I understand that. I'm sure he needed a break.
    When I was 14, we moved way out into the country and the rest is history. All of my younger childhood had prepared me for all those woods and I was thrilled.
    My brothers and I, somewhat, returned the favor by getting him into turkey hunting later on. He enjoyed that alot too.

    I am extremely grateful for my Dad and how he treated me and what he taught me. I could not have had a better Dad. He didn't have to do any of it, but he did.
    Crops are harvested, animals are killed.

  14. #14
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    My papa, who raised me from birth to 5, introduced me to crappie fishing, dog hunting, turkey hunting, and then still hunting in the upstate. He was a rabbit hunter that turned to a deer hunter with hounds in the 70s in Mt Pleasant and Allendale. He took a break in the 80s when my grandmother was suffering from rheumatoid arthritis. He got back into dog hunting after she passed in 87 and introduced me to the sport 94. His idea of turkey hunting was building a blind in creek bottoms and calling every 20-30 min. His idea of still hunting was sitting in a stand for the first hour of daylight then walking a cutover. While he loved hunting deer turkey and rabbits with me catching crappie was his passion and he was good at it. He passed in 2019 and I've missed my HERO everyday since.

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    good thread Bart... great memories flooding back from all these shared stories
    "If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die, I want to go where they went."
    Will Rogers

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    Figured it out on my own. Mistakes are good teachers.

  17. #17
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    I'm in the same camp with Glenn, Sasha and Abby and many others here. My dad got me started, mostly fishing at a very young age. I got a 20ga for my 10th birthday and we were invited on an opening day dove shoot a few weeks later. It was like throwing a match to a drum of gasoline.

    My dad worked a lot, but he realized how much I loved it and made a conscious effort to make sure we always had a dove club to hunt with and we fished and camped as much as he could. Dad hunted ducks before I was born and has some pretty good Sparkleberry stories, but we only duck hunted occasionally as I was coming along. I remember hunting wild quail with him a couple times, and we would go up to hunt squirrels with my uncle after Christmas most years. The one time we got invited to go on a rabbit hunt, I ended up not being able to go because I had done poorly on a test at school. It probably says a lot that I remember that nearly 40 years later!

    Dad didn't deer or turkey hunt. Deer hunting was a huge struggle for me, but the more "bad luck" I had, the more resolved I was to figure it out. Turkey hunting came a little easier, largely in part to a highschool friend who's family had a couple thousand acres in the Wateree River swamp that was loaded with turkeys. His dad was a heck of a turkey hunter and enjoyed teaching his kids and others what he knew.

    There were others that had an influence on me as well. Some of my dad's friends that took me deer hunting come to mind. I was pretty involved in Boy Scouts back then and I had a fantastic troop with a Scoutmaster that really enjoyed the outdoors. We did some great trips around the state and I had an excellent experience with Scouting. I also really enjoyed reading about the outdoors and I would read a lot of Gene Hill, Robert Rourke, Havilah Babcock, Archibald Rutledge and many others. I think reading a lot of those guys helped me form an genuine appreciation for wildlife and wild places and a desire to pursue game in a respectful way.

    As far as my two boys, I have tried to expose them to everything I know and support them in whatever they are interested in. It is up to them to decide what they want to pursue. I do enjoy showing them the outdoors and teaching them things that I'm still in awe of. This past weekend I got to sit on a tree with my youngest son and listen to him hyperventilate as a longbeard strutted the whole way in. All the while his older brother sat on a tree behind us running my old slate call. Memories I'll treasure the rest of my days that I hope will mean something to them one day too.

  18. #18
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    Dad introduced me to deer and dove hunting as far back as I can remember and anything else I was interested in hunting he would help facilitate and would go along with me .He set me up with Gene Hayes for my first Turkey hunt when I was a kid, Robert Lollis when I thought I wanted beagles and wanted to be a rabbit hunter and he introduced me to Bobby Maffett for squirrel hunting with dogs and the rest is history.

    Dad doesnt hunt a whole lot these days, he still likes to plant and shoot a dove field but rarely does he deer hunt anymore but he will go squirrel hunting with Jake and I a couple times each year. Now a days he’s a glitter boat bass fisherman
    Houndsmen are born, not made

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    I STAND WITH DUCK CUTTER!
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  19. #19
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    Quote Originally Posted by Duck cutter View Post
    Dad introduced me to deer and dove hunting as far back as I can remember and anything else I was interested in hunting he would help facilitate and would go along with me .He set me up with Gene Hayes for my first Turkey hunt when I was a kid, Robert Lollis when I thought I wanted beagles and wanted to be a rabbit hunter and he introduced me to Bobby Maffett for squirrel hunting with dogs and the rest is history.

    Dad doesnt hunt a whole lot these days, he still likes to plant and shoot a dove field but rarely does he deer hunt anymore but he will go squirrel hunting with Jake and I a couple times each year. Now a days he’s a glitter boat bass fisherman
    Son you named a couple of Greenwood/ Ninety Six legends in this post!
    I am a nobody, that met somebody, that can save anybody.

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    Quote Originally Posted by quack head 11 View Post
    Son you named a couple of Greenwood/ Ninety Six legends in this post!
    I’d love to load up that old jeep and hit the woods with Mr.Bobby one more time and maybe sit down to a plate of Mrs. Myrna’s cooking. I was the last person to ever hunt with him before he died, I’ve got tons of memories with that old man
    Houndsmen are born, not made

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    I STAND WITH DUCK CUTTER!
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    I knew it wasn't real because no dogbox...

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