New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) announced results of the second year of a pilot program allowing 12- and 13-year-old hunters to kill whitetail deer with a firearm or crossbow.
Last fall, more than 9,400 12-and 13-year-old hunters, were eligible to hunt deer with a firearm or crossbow and youth hunters submitted reports on more than 1,800 deer they killed while hunting.
DEC conducted a post-hunting survey that found 82 percent of youth hunters and 87 percent of their adult mentors were moderately or greatly satisfied with their youth big game hunting experience.
No hunting-related shooting incidents, violations, or license revocations involving 12- and 13-year-old hunters have occurred during the first two years of the pilot program.
In 2021, legislation authorized 12- and 13-year-olds to hunt deer with an experienced adult mentor in eligible areas of the state under a three-year pilot program.
The law required DEC to analyze results of the pilot program each year and report its findings back to the State Legislature.
DEC tracked participation, satisfaction, deer harvest, and safety compliance in the pilot program, and submitted a report to the New York State Legislature sharing its findings from the 2022/23 hunting season and recommendations for future actions.
Photo of youth hunter with whitetail deer courtesy DEC.
I’m sorry, but when you see 12 and 13 year old CHILDREN killing animals, please know that their father or other relative who is a hunter was very likely giving these kids guns at age 4 or 5 and taking them out to kill. Children view animals as their peers, so for that alone, this is perverse behavior that gratifies the ADULT, not the CHILD, but more than that, young brains are not developed to process advanced concepts like death and ethics until late teens/early twenties. A child won’t understand that he or she killed a living being – the child only know that he or she pleased his/her parent. Of course, the parent and the NRA/DEC/F&W just LOVES this. Money.
The parent believes he has the right to teach his kid anything at any time. However, this is nothing less than CHILD ABUSE and robbing children of their right to be children and not little murdering machines.
I can’t think of anything more repulsive.
You’re right.
One additional comment – one of the main reasons hunters give for why they teach and take their children hunting is “to enjoy the outdoors together.”
Frankly, there is something extremely warped and downright SICK with anyone who can’t find enjoyment in nature without destroying life and who further teaches this perversion to a young child. Why don’t you shoot with a CAMERA instead of a gun? Teach your child photography or birdwatching instead of slaughter.
Killing the natural inhabitants is not “enjoying the outdoors.”
I agree.
Not everyone chooses to be a vegetarian. Many Americans believe that the parent is and should be the primary teacher of their children; not leaving it to ‘experts.’ As with fishing, a camera will not provide game protein for the family freezer. Often the excess is shared with needy neighbors … or with total strangers through third volunteer parties. Our tax- and LICENSE-supported NY State Dept of Environmental Conservation prudently allows for the numerical annual culling of the herd … or risk over-population,/starvation with loss of habitat or increased spread of disease within the herd. Similarly, childless persons pay school tax … for the general good. There seems to be at least two sides to the questions here. Can we just talk civilly to each other?
You’re talking apples and sauerkraut. First, you are off-topic, trying to make a general argument in favor of hunting. I already answered this in another column, but I will re-post it here:
Deer populations are MISMANAGED by hunting. In nature, deer populations ebb and flow depending on the availability of food and some natural predators. The old, the sick and the injured are winnowed out naturally and never become excessive. Darted contraception would also take care of any occasional excess of deer without harming them.
However, hunters don’t go after the old, the sick or the injured; they go for the biggest bucks with the largest racks. Government gaming agencies and Fish & Wildlife artificially and quite deliberately manipulate deer populations in this way and that is the real reason why there are so many deer – so there is always an abundance to kill.
Likewise the USDA deliberately created an excessive Canada goose population as a BUSINESS MODEL specifically so they can make a fortune getting communities to kill them.
Nature always takes care of its own balancing act. It is only human interference that messes this up. And it’s usually about money.
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I have also been out to hunting areas on advocate issues and have seen hunters throw the deer (or ducks or geese) they’ve killed into the landfills and go off to the supermarket. Some people just like to kill. They are also hardly the generous saints you are trying to paint them to be. Frankly, I can’t help but notice, whenever there is a photo of the grinning hunter with his kill, how the dead animal has so much more dignity.
However, hunting in general, being vegetarian, etc. is not the issue or the point here. Sorry, but there is a fundamental difference here that you seem to be overlooking, deliberately ignoring or trying to deflect. This is about teaching CHILDREN to kill.
Whatever adults choose to do, whether or not I agree with it, is the result of a grown-up mind making a decision with a fully-developed thought process, and also not out of fear or love of a parent. I have to draw the line at teaching children to kill and there are no two sides about this. This is not the Wild West and these people aren’t Daniel Boone. This is the unmitigated warping of a still-developing mind and it is wrong on SO many levels and in a way that few things are wrong.
If you cannot vote, drive a car, run for office, drink alcohol, serve in the military or marry until a certain age, you shouldn’t be able to use a gun to hunt/kill until that age. And there is no argument that will EVER make that right.
Thanks for the feedback, Arlene. Always good to extend civil, well-informed conversations among inquiring minds.
Arlene is correct – those 12 and 13 year olds are taken out by dad, grandpa or Uncle Bob to start hunting when they are much younger. I know this for a fact because I was one of those kids. My father started taking me out with him to hunt when I was 6 years old.
I loved my father but I hated hunting. I had no desire to hurt any animal. I was fascinated by them and wanted to watch them and play with them. I certainly did not want to kill them. I didn’t even know what killing really meant – when I saw my cartoons, the same animal that was flattened by an anvil or blown up by a bomb was back to play the next day. Because this is how a child’s mind works. And this is exactly why a 6 year old should be watching cartoons and NOT taken out to hunt.
In my own family, my father was told in no uncertain terms by me and my wife that he was never to take his grandchildren out hunting and if he ever did so, that would be the end of any private time with them, and he has respected that. When I asked my dad why he made me go hunting with him, he told me his buddies and fish & wildlife urged all the parents to take their kids out to hunt as young as possible to get them into the sport – the younger they are when they start, the more likely they will keep doing it (i.e. brainwashing). That speaks volumes to me. It also tells me that any parent who does that loves hunting more than he loves his own child.
There is a brief period of innocence in a child’s life that no one has the right to take away. It is expecially abhorrant when PARENT takes away his child’s innocence.