Our middle daughter has been part of the recovery for all 7 of her older sister's deer, but she's never shown more than a mild interest in hunting herself. And as the biggest empath I know, I wasn't sure how she really felt about killing an animal. After I took Kaydence out on Monday, she asked when she could go and I told her whenever she was serious about going, I'd take her out. She's been shooting the crossbow for a couple years and after a refresher Monday afternoon, I was satisfied that she had the skills and mindset to get it done.
After a close call yesterday, she made it very clear she was on a mission to kill her first deer, but she didn't want to shoot any "mommy deer" because we needed them to make more deer "after the bad disease this summer" killed so many. Although I said we would not hunt behind our house, we had a nice 3-year-old buck daylight this morning, so with breeding largely done, I felt good about taking him down if we could.
With the wind change today, we got the wind we needed for our blind and within a half hour, we got to practice aiming on some mommy deer. Kenna (and I) were happy to see a couple healthy does after not seeing many all fall.
Right at sunset, we both heard the telltale cadence of a deer walking and our boy, which we are now calling Ocho, came in and stood facing us for 10 minutes. With light fading and him seeming comfortable with letting shooting light run out, I did what I could to get her a shot. If you notice in the video, his front leg stays curled. She said afterwards she was ready to "SQUEEZE" but wanted his leg to go down and man, am I proud of her! We've talked a lot about being patience, taking our time to aim, and squeezing only when we're confident in the shot. In the heat of the moment at 8 years old with her first buck/deer in her sights, she made the right judgement call without a word from dad (other than "no, no, no" as he started to walk off).
One thing that's cool about her is how she took this in stride like water off a ducks back. Kaydence is ultra-competitive and would cry out of frustration in these moments when she was younger, but Kenna says "ah, we'll get him another day." So we left the woods tonight with a new chess match underway and we're going to give it hell until the final bell!
After a close call yesterday, she made it very clear she was on a mission to kill her first deer, but she didn't want to shoot any "mommy deer" because we needed them to make more deer "after the bad disease this summer" killed so many. Although I said we would not hunt behind our house, we had a nice 3-year-old buck daylight this morning, so with breeding largely done, I felt good about taking him down if we could.
With the wind change today, we got the wind we needed for our blind and within a half hour, we got to practice aiming on some mommy deer. Kenna (and I) were happy to see a couple healthy does after not seeing many all fall.
Right at sunset, we both heard the telltale cadence of a deer walking and our boy, which we are now calling Ocho, came in and stood facing us for 10 minutes. With light fading and him seeming comfortable with letting shooting light run out, I did what I could to get her a shot. If you notice in the video, his front leg stays curled. She said afterwards she was ready to "SQUEEZE" but wanted his leg to go down and man, am I proud of her! We've talked a lot about being patience, taking our time to aim, and squeezing only when we're confident in the shot. In the heat of the moment at 8 years old with her first buck/deer in her sights, she made the right judgement call without a word from dad (other than "no, no, no" as he started to walk off).
One thing that's cool about her is how she took this in stride like water off a ducks back. Kaydence is ultra-competitive and would cry out of frustration in these moments when she was younger, but Kenna says "ah, we'll get him another day." So we left the woods tonight with a new chess match underway and we're going to give it hell until the final bell!
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