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My dad taught me to shoot a rifle, follow a blood trail, and gut a deer. And that\u2019s simply the way it was for many kids who grew up in hunting families. It was up to Dad to teach the kids to hunt. While that\u2019s certainly changing\u2014just see our story on #huntingmamas<\/a>\u2014dads still tend to get most of the focus when we talk about raising kids to be hunters.<\/p>\n But when I look back closely at my own childhood, it\u2019s clear that I never would have been the hunter I am today without my mom. She was the one who took me to hunter safety classes (Mom actually took the course, even though she had no intention of ever hunting), she packed all of our food for deer camp, and she was there when I killed my first animal.<\/p>\n