Sunday, November 30, 2008

A FAMILY SHOOTOUT

What would a family pheasant shoot be without offending someone and their dog. Grandpa teaching the nephews the B$#@h word on accident, and the five year olds repeating it (we tried to explain that it means a female dog). Family anything wouldn't be complete without some wrestling. All in all it was a wild success.

It kind of goes against everything I believe in to shoot pen raised birds. But when your family is mostly city slickers and I have the responsibility to get all my nephews addicted to bird hunting I figured the best way to get them hooked is to get them on birds anyway I can. Well I think it worked i've got some brothers, brother-in-laws, and five or six nephews really loving this bird hunting stuff. I bought twenty birds and set them in the hills behind my brother-in-laws house. Then we released the dog.

These are my nephews Jed and Spencer, age 13 and 12, with their first pheasants. I didn't think they would shoot so straight but these guys are shooters. I think the first pheasant is pretty awesome and unforgettable.

The highlight of the the hunt didn't even include a gun. We had four boys that were too young to carry guns but they proved to be great bird dogs. Jake is nine with dark red hair, we don't really no where that came from since no one in his family on either side has red hair. The last pheasant that went down hit the ground running and Jake chased that bird a hundred yards or so before diving on top of it and wrestling it to death. Everyone was screaming "Get it Jake" "Dive on it!". I've never seen a kid smile so big in my life.

By the looks of the smiles in this picture I think a new family tradition was born.

1 comment:

Andrew M. Wayment said...

Eric,

Man, look at all those familiar faces. Glad to see you got all the family involved. From experience I can say that when you have a good dog, all the male members of your family are your best friend. So much for the solitude of bird hunting. Maybe it is better that we only have mediocre dogs. Just kidding! The more the merrier (as long as everyone hunts safely). Good post.

Your cousin,

Andy