Our Next Generation of Shooters

I thought I'd add some more pictures to my daughter's timeline as I had to go find them. A little background here, she'd have started shooting sooner if I'd met her mother before she was five.

Age 6 learning to shoot with the rifle she picked out





Age 7 or 8 first hunting experience, ambushing dad when he gets home!


Age 9 prairie doggin with Uncle Ted and "Bruiser" the .223.




2 months later first deer with "Brusier"



Age 10



Age 11 moved up to the .300 Savage





Age 12



Age 13



Age 14 she got a little artsy.





Age 15 she got a Howa Alpine in .308 for her first serious mountain hunt.







Hopefully we'll add a ML bull elk this year at 16.

I have a number of things that go bang. But every time I go to my club for practice I take the 22 rifle my grandfather bought me when I was 16. Nothing makes me smile like that rifle. A lot of great memories shooting at tin cans in the north woods of Wisconsin.

My daughter was 2 days old and I had a pink laminated stainless cricket 22lr inbound. My wife just shook her head and laughed. She just turned 5 and we are going to go this summer. I also have a 20# Vodoo she will be able to run off the bench. She has been helping my with the reloading and is always asking to build Bullets. I just ordered a new Manners compact stock for a future build for her.
Now we have a 2 month old little boy. Can't wait!


Shooting buddies daughter graduated HS this year but been shooting with him/her for 10 years. I remember her running a 22-250 on a 1/2 size yote plate & 500yds. After about 10 hit we showed her the same plate to show the size and she was amazed. We had her running 1000yds at 14 and loving it.

Had/have more fun helping the little then I do pulling the trigger myself!!!!

Thanks fellows for sharing. I am so glad to see there are still normal people in this world! To many people raise their kids as guns are a bad thing! They raise them to be scared of them, which blows my mind. Guns aint dangerous at all when handled correctly and the person using them is educated on proper gun handling lol. I am more looking to start my boy a collection of guns that are unique with a variety of old and new you know and start from here on out so he has guns to hand down to his kids someday and hopefully keep going through the generations. I do know one HAS to be a 6.5 Creedmoor and of coarse a Hi-Point Yeti Cannon !

Joe Cool 5yo got his whistle pig earlier in the spring. 125 yds, prone. His big sis took care of spotting duty.She's no slouch either.

If you have lots of open space then go with 22. If not, go with a suppressed PCP air rifle and a Yong Heng compressor. That's what my 10yo uses here in the swamp; he was so happy with his first kills (white wings, a squirrel, and house sparrow) that he had me post it on a family chat, and my hunting group's chat.

He has had BB gun since he was like 4 and like I said he has a RPR rimfire now which is super adjustable.

I gotta get one of those RPR rimfires for my boys

My plan is to keep him on that suppressed rpr for a good while and then step up to a little bolt rig 223 or similar.

And reactive targets. Don't try to make a big game hunter out of him when he is 5.

Nice starter collection!

chickm1 said:

And reactive targets. Don't try to make a big game hunter out of him when he is 5.

Click to expand...

Concerning hunting, I don't consider age as a factor at all for this decision of when he is ready. All kids mature differently and at different times. My 13 year old is more mature than my 17 year old lol. IMHO the gun handling portion is my top priority of coarse prior to getting him after any game. Once his marksmanship and maturity level is where I deem it should be to responsibly take an animal that is when he will be in the woods to get us some supper, whether that is next year or in 5 years.