Early on. Lots of trips to the outdoors, the baby, Mom and me. Day trips, picnics, fishing. I hunted with my friends. He stayed home. When he was a year old we were camping over night. Second child, now way an 18 month old and another baby, same routine. Lots and lots of outdoor activities, lots of sight seeing. Lots of wildlife toys, bows and arrows with suction cup tips, and toy guns. Toy horses. Everything in our lives, our friends lives was hunting fishing and the outdoors. Constant conversation. If we were not outside we were talking about the next trip outside.
I still hunted with friends the boys stayed home.
By the time they were in kindergarten we were shooting a Red Ryder BB gun in the back yard. I must have cocked that gun 10,000 times, setting on the back step shooting milk jugs. (Big targets = success. Success = confidence) I took them fishing. I took them a lot. When I took them fishing I learned I leave my fishing gear at home. I took their Mom so there was someone there to mother them when they fell or got dirty, or need supper, or got stung by hornets. We took the BB gun on fishing trips, they hunted deer, elk, squirrels, fogs. grasshoppers, sparrows and Big Foot. We let them run but always kept the distance within reach.
We sold the camp trailer and bought a 18" lodge and went to lots of Rendezvous. We bought them stuff to make out of beads and leather and metal so they could have a cache of stuff to trade. Mom made them leather clothes and bought them coon skinned caps. We taught them to stick a tomahawk in a stump and set a gopher trap.
I held off pulling the trigger on my deer hunts because I didn't want to end my hunt so even though I hunted with my friends, ever evening and every weekend I wasn't in the back country, from the time they were three I had them and their Mom in the Jimmy looking for deer or elk. By the time they were 5 or 6 they were spotting deer as often as the adults were. We put the binoculars on hundreds of rock and stump deer in those early years. I stopped for everyone, never scolded them for seeing something they thought was a deer that wasn't. Didn't want them to stop looking.
We always kept reminding them what a wonderful life we had enjoying wildlife and the outdoors. Tried very hard to teach them a balance of love and respect for all animals as well as the love for hunting and harvesting and conservation so they could have it for their children some day. On Sunday afternoons during the spring and summer we would drive over to the marshes and watch the song birds, the muskrats, the blue cranes, the baby skunks, the porcupines and the squirrels.
When they were 8 or 9 we bought them a pellet gun. I pumped it 10,000 time setting on the back step.
They had no less than three fiberglass bows and a hundred wooden arrows before they got their first compound bow.
They trapped squirrels and nailed there salted hides to the top of there bedroom dresser, they collected deer tails and hid them in their sock draw. They pissed their mother off.
Between 8 and 10 I started taking them deer hunting with my friends. They never shut up, they thought they were equal to anybody in camp. I explained to them they were not a million times but to no avail. My friends did the same. Some of those deer camps had twice as many 10 year olds as adults.
I taught them to catch and release fish. Keep enough for lunch, turn the rest back and keep fishing. Fishing's fun, do what ever it takes to stay on the stream as long as you can.
I taught them to shoot deer but i also taught them to let a lot of deer walk. Save your tag, the fun is in the hunt, not just the kill. We passed hundreds more than we killed. We killed a lot too.
When they turned 12 I started them elk hunting because they were now mature enough and strong enough (not mature but mature enough) to keep up. We slept on the ground, under the stars, elk screaming and trashing timber, antlers crashing and elk musk drifting over us, yards way, giggling at the wonder of it all.
Hunting, fishing and the outdoors was our life. Our children never knew anything else.
Did they do anything else. Yes, I coached them in baseball and basketball until they started high school. One won a State Championship in Baseball, One played tennis. One wrestled. One played the trumpet. They worked. One worked before it was legal and had enough cash to buy his own Bronco then he turned 16. Another saved enough to pay his way on a guided caribou hunt in the North West Territories in Canada when he was a junior, including airfare and a new .300 WnMg.
I never made them hunt or fish, we just lived it everyday. We put it in front of them every minute we could. We told them they could do anything they wanted, if they wanted to be in the school band, great. If they wanted to play the piano, great. If they wanted to wrestle, great. Whatever, great, do the best you can, we support you, now grab the shot gun and go get the dog, lets see if we can find a pheasant before the ball game.
They are teaching there kids the same way. Not all will take to it but some are coming along nicely.
I think your judging yourself way too soon and too critically. Besides, if some of your children choose a different path, enjoy it with them. life is full of amazing opportunities be it the outdoors or otherwise.
Just make sure you and your family enjoy the journey. Success to your adventure!
DC
