\n<\/p>\n
Among the many highly successful hunters I know, one thing they all have in common is great hunting instincts. Yes, they also have sharp skills and deep knowledge, but more importantly, they can recognize an opportunity and seize it without hesitation.<\/p>\n
They have an ability to anticipate what\u2019s going to happen, and they\u2019re able to react without over-analyzation. Often, this results in meat in their freezer when others would go home empty-handed.<\/p>\n
The good news here is that we can all sharpen our hunting instincts, however, this is no easy task.<\/p>\n
Hunting instincts play a role in a variety of different ways, but shooting scenarios are the most obvious.\u00a0Watching the development of my oldest son, who I\u2019ve taken grouse hunting since he was three years old, has taught me a lot about a hunter\u2019s instinct. I started him on a Savage Rascal .22<\/a>, and he first learned to shoot with a red dot scope<\/a>.<\/p>\n He\u2019s progressed to become proficient with iron sights and magnified optics, but his grouse gun is still that little .22. He often accompanies me to the shooting range and will constantly pepper my 100-yard targets with .22 holes. He thinks it\u2019s a gas. As staple of boyhood, he got his first Red Ryder this past spring, and we set up a backyard range for him, where he tears through bottles of BB\u2019s ventilating aluminum cans suspended by strings. But this is more than just fun and games, he\u2019s learning every time we shoot.<\/p>\n My son has always been a quick learner, and now he\u2019s becoming a crack shot before my eyes. He\u2019s been shooting red squirrels with his small hand-me-down compound bow since he was five. A few days ago, we followed a pair of grouse into a black spruce thicket, and when I could see a bird ducking and bobbing his way toward a tiny window through the tangled mess of dry, gray limbs and alder branches, I set the tripod we use and pointed his rifle toward the opening.<\/p>\n He quickly got behind the rifle and had only a couple seconds before the bird walked into the opening. Bang! <\/em>The grouse dropped. We continued, and he got another one in the same manner. It was our first grouse hunt in a while, and the first time I\u2019ve seen him shoot with such decisiveness. These weren\u2019t lucky shots made in haste; they were intentional and accurate. He prepared quickly and took his opportunities as soon as they appeared.<\/p>\n I\u2019d love to believe that the secret to being a great shot on wild game is simply flowing within the Freel family bloodline. And it\u2019s nice to think that we all have hunting instincts and skills hardcoded into our DNA from ancient ancestors who chased down wooly mammoths with bows and spears.<\/p>\n But, unfortunately, that\u2019s not how it works in the real world. Of course, some people have natural abilities (like keen vision or good hand-eye-coordination) that help them become better hunters, but a true hunter\u2019s instinct isn\u2019t something you\u2019re born with. Hunting instinct is cultured and learned.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve been crazy about hunting for as long as I can remember, but that didn\u2019t mean I was always good at it. When I was 12 years old, my dad and I started calling coyotes together. I loved it, but I don\u2019t remember killing a single coyote that first winter. Over several years, we got better, learning from each coyote we called in. We learned to predict what they were likely to do, we learned when to shoot and when to wait. As our experience and skills grew, so did our instinct for it.<\/p>\n We had to see a lot of hunts play out and we also mess up on a lot of coyotes before we really had the right instincts. All those experiences informed future hunts.<\/p>\n Shooting animals ethically, effectively, and decisively, is a learned skill. That skill can\u2019t be bought, and neither can good shooting instincts.<\/p>\n In the materialistic and hyper-marketed world, we live in, it\u2019s easy to fall for the notion that you can buy yourself better results with better gear. While accurate rifles, quality ammunition, and precise optics do provide tangible benefits, they don\u2019t mean shit if you don\u2019t know how to use them. Competency takes lots of practice, and yes, some failure, too.<\/p>\n Based on the nature of many posts and conversations I\u2019ve seen, I\u2019d say it\u2019s easy for many new hunters to be paralyzed by indecisiveness\u2014afraid to just go, try, and even fail on their own. Many want to be told everything from where to go to which type of bootlaces they need to be using. The best advice is to simply get out there and learn as you go. <\/p>\n Likewise, even many experienced hunters put too much emphasis on gear and not enough emphasis on time in the field. <\/p>\n The best route for developing a deadly and efficient hunting instinct is, quite simply, to spend a lot of time hunting. To get good at recognizing shot opportunities and to capitalize on them, you need to get many of animals in front of you. And to do that, you\u2019ve got to spend serious time in the woods.<\/p>\n But range time matters too. I started my son out with a red dot scope because it made for one less complication to the shooting process, and he could see success and improvement. It made shooting fun. With thousands of repetitions, he\u2019s become comfortable, quick, and decisive in his shooting. When starting with iron sights this summer on his BB gun, he was frustrated and shaky, shooting off a bench. Now he can make those tin cans dance shooting offhand better than Chuck Connors. That snappy decisiveness translates to hunting.<\/p>\n Experienced hunters can sharpen their instinct by practicing with a shot process. This means executing the exact same steps in the same order before every shot (this gets written about a lot in archery<\/a>, but it\u2019s important for any type of shooting). Drilling a shot process might seem counter intuitive at first, because the whole point of going on instinct is to not<\/em> think about it, right? That\u2019s true, but first you\u2019ve got to build solid fundamentals. By practicing with a shot process, you drill those fundamentals into your subconscious. Soon, you won\u2019t be thinking about the steps in the process, you\u2019ll do them automatically. When a shot opportunity presents itself on a hunt, you\u2019ll shoot the exact same way you do in practice.<\/p>\n It\u2019s amazing to watch son develop his skills and hunter\u2019s instinct. But it\u2019s important to remember that the focus of any hunt should never be only on killing something. After all, you\u2019ll learn more from missed opportunities than successful ones. I know I must be patient and have him only take good opportunities and ethical shots, but more and more he\u2019s recognizing those opportunities on his own.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\nWe Aren\u2019t Born with Hunter\u2019s Instincts<\/h2>\n
You Can\u2019t Buy Instinct<\/h2>\n
How to Develop a Hunter\u2019s Instinct<\/h2>\n