This is a hot topic for some so figured to get a healthy debate going.
I have let my kids take advantage of the early youth deer season with few people in the woods for a couple of years now. The time with the kids in the stand without the swarms of other so called hunters that show up during regular season is full of joy and learning for my family. I would like to hear what others think.

I think your right. I'm all for it

its a great opportunity for kids to learn without all the pressure that gets applied during normal season! [pro] [ con] is trigger happy dads that shoot big bucks and make kids tag them! Boy oh boy that's teaching your kid ethics! Thankfully theres been a lot of tickets wrote these past few years here for just that reason.

A con would be that people have to wear orange in the woods during the youth hunt, when in fact many people don't know there's a youth hunt going on.

A pro would be the warm weather.

Tony, I can see how the poachers could take advantage of the early season. IMO that same person would break the game laws regardless. I hope that the wardens can get hold of those folks and hopefully curb little John's picking up of a pour parents ways.

I take youth hunters every year. I think it is a great way to teach hunting ethics without all the other hunters in the field. I have not heard of any problems in my area with trigger happy dads shooting their kids deer for them. Slobs will be slobs given the opportunity. The rest of us should take advantage of the opportunity to take a young person hunting and show them the proper way to do things and respect the animals they are hunting.
This is a photo from last Thursday morning. One shot kill at 120 yards with a 22-250. It was the forth (and smallest) buck I put her on that morning. The others did not offer an ethical shot and she passed on them.

Im for it. I can't understand being against getting our youth out in the woods. I can't think of a outdoor sport that doesn't need a youth injection. Lord knows trapping does.

Amen to your post,100% for the youth hunt.Here's the buck Kam shot last night 4.5 year old,field dressed 222lbs and measured out at 128".The smile says everything.....

The future is always in the kids when it comes to consumptive use of wildlife resources. There could be a rub in some sectors with letting kids kill bucks instead of antlerless. Different states: different circumstances probably but we need to get and keep kids interested in consumptive use of renewable wildlife resources.

When they first started our youth hunt in Oklahoma it was doe only. Can you image sitting in a stand with a young hunter who has never killed a deer and having to watch a buck walk by only to tell them that we are saving the bucks for the black powder season that opens next weekend. Thankfully that rule was changed.

I think youth hunts are great. I started all my boys at the age of 8 on whitetail does. After 4 years of does I let them shoot a cull buck, after that game on. If a 180 comes in let him have it. We have big deer and I always worried about them not appreciating a great deer and a great hunt, so I made the rules as I went.

To me the one aspect of youth hunts that here in WI has not worked as some may have hoped is that the number of youth that participate from non hunting families is minimal and a small percentage of all youth involved. If we are hoping to maintain hunter numbers or increase we need better ways to reach those youth. One aspect that I would like to see is what is the retention of youth that participate in youth hunts? How many purchase licenses say for 1, 3, 5 or more years after participation.

We need to find ways to reach the growing part of our society that is growing away from hunting and outdoor activities,not just providing more opportunities for those who would be hunting with their hunting families any way.
One of the advantages of teaching younger youth about trapping is that traps are set and you harvest what you catch. There is not nearly the emphasis on size, sex etc. etc. that there is in some of the other sporting activities.

Bryce

I agree. I think it's a little humorous when someone whines about kids being able to shoot bucks during a youth hunt; as though the only people who should be able to shoot bucks are guys like them "who have paid their dues". The implication is that women and children aren't worthy to shoot bucks.

Youth hunts should not be a debate point any more than if teenagers in sports should be playing against college age adults. What I would like to suggest is the education of the youth instead to stop the "big doe" hunting which is what I see posted here at times too. In genetics, shooting big does in hunting season deprives the next season of better fawns. Older does produce more fawns, larger yearlings and in time larger antlered bucks.
For all of us, we should be teaching and commending our children that bigger is not better. If a large antlered buck is not available, the harvesting of small antlered deer to remove inferior bucks from the gene pool is beneficial, as much as harvesting a yearling doe is much better than shooting doe which will improve the herd.
I would like to see our youth praised for not the bigger is better, but for the husbandry of our herds.

I 100% support the youth hunts here in Wisconsin,that being said I think that most of the kids would end up hunting anyway because they come from hunting families. I think the biggest issue is finding a way to get the 20 somethings involved a lot of them have disposable income and in my opinion are a group we should be trying to recruit.

around here we need to kill "big does". its the only way to control the population.

Youth hunts are ridiculous.

I agree, youth hunts are ridiculous. There aren't enough participants to warrant setting aside a time slot that deprives anyone else in the field of the privilege of not having to wear orange that day.

In my state, season ought to be reduced to a week or less, and shoot anything.

The very idea of "horn" hunting, is unethical in itself, as that animal isn't the best eating of all specimens, as a rule.

I say, get that orange army in and out of the woods, that is, harvest the meat quickly, and free up the place for trapping.

Thanks for posting this Andrew.

How about we just give participation trophy's to all the youth that has parents who suck?

The idea that we teach them it's a "sport" and it's all about the "big rack" bothers me. That's not why my Grandad shot deer. Not that it's sporting.

Harvest is key.