Not going to help us any but I got my 3 year old daughter out for her first hunt on Saturday. She did better than expected. My son coughing every two mins (he's 6) made me want to drop kick him into the stream lol. We went down into a bottom that hasn't been touched this year between two corn fields that the deer love to funnel through. Right as we got to the edge of the woods we had a deer walk in front of us at about 20 yards. It was too thick and I didn't have a primer loaded or the kids ear pro on so we just watched until he got downwind of us and turned around and spooked. Looked like a little buck but couldn't be sure. Made it into our blind and got the kids set up. They snacked all night and played and made too much noise lol but we had 20-30 mph winds that I thought would help our cause. When it got to go time and I was frustrated from all the coughing I figured I needed to chill out and let the kids have fun so I just started hitting the bleat can or a grunt every time my son had to cough. Let them do a couple. Got out of the blind and did one of those obnoxious grunting and scraping the ground sequences with a little tree rubbing mixed in that had them laughing. We were having fun and I had text my wife saying that if we saw a deer it would be because some greater being really wanted these kids to be hunters. Wouldn't you know a few minutes later I heard footsteps and in walked a doe already about 50 yards away. It was a scramble to get the kids hearing protection on, make sure they were in safe spots of the blind, and get my smokepole out a window. Every time I got on the deer she'd start to move. I'd make a noise to stop her and she'd stop behind stuff so I had no shot. She'd move again and I'd stop her behind stuff again. Played that game 3 or 4 times and the last time she got curious. Started to walk quartering at me and that was a big mistake. Put it on the point of her shoulder and pulled the trigger. Bang. Smoke everywhere. Saw her run to our right, looked out the back of the blind and didn't see her any more, checked on the kids. My daughter was not happy with how loud it was even with the hearing protection lol. My son was ready to run out the blind. Got her calmed down and everything packed up as quickly as we could to try and go find blood. Set the expectation that I wasn't sure if we got the deer (even though I'm thinking there's 0 way I missed) and walk to where she was standing. 0 blood anywhere and light fading and I'm worrying about keeping the kids up and trying to find a deer with no blood in the dark so I suggest we walk up the deer trail towards the corn field (which I thought was how she ran). We walked 20 yards and I looked up to see a butt. Doe down. Heart shot her and completely split that thing in half. She crashed before my ears stopped ringing but luckily made it up most of the hill towards the corn field. Man, did my kids celebrate. Parts of the hunt can be frustrating but I've just got to remind myself how young they are and know going in it's most likely not going to happen. It's all the stuff during the hunt that's really memorable, but being able to get deer with both my kids this year sure is the icing on the cake. Sorry for the book, but man this was a fun hunt.
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