how things have changed

[golden acres]

My son was asking me about rabbit hunting when I was his age. I told him of a story of around 10 or 11 I can remember walking down a gravel road next to papermill shooting rabbits of the train tracks over my beagle major spot. Chief Goswick pulls over and asked how we were doing and when he pulled away he said something along the line of shoot straight and shoot em dead. Things that have changed over the last 25 years.
1 Hunting rabbits on paper mill property.
2 Sheriff not questioning a couple 11 year olds about rabbit hunting alone
3 living in a world that was not so scared of kids and guns.
4 kid wanting to hunt more than play video games
5 hoping no one reports me for letting my 9 year shoot a rabbit
6 sub divisions need to say no more

tell your stories about the changes in your area

[big mike 50]

James I won't be 30 until next year and I have to agree with everything you said. It hasn't even been that long but there is a sub-division at the end of the pipeline we used to hunt during snow days and after school. My friends and I used to leave the house in the morning with a can of soup a box of matches and a pocket full of .22 shells, and mom never woried and dad showed me over and over again how to clean rabbits when we got home. Come to think about it I don't even know who owned the property we were on most of the time and we never had any problems. My wife and I are expecting our first child (son) in September and I am wondering how he is going to learn the things I was able to around here. I guess it may be across the bridge for me and mine.

[da ridgetop]

I just turned 35 and it's changed bigtime around here,can remember growing up my dad never locked the doors at night or when we left hell summertime he left entry door open only closing screen door and all the windows in the house were open just screens didn't have ac all we had were fans but never worried about getting robbed.Now i make sure all is locked before turnin in for the night and keep a loaded gun handy. I used squirrel and rabbit hunt all over all you had to do is find a place to cross a fence or catch some body out in the yard and ask if it was ok never got turned down most times end up with an extra hunter or 2.All this before i could drive after gettin my license all you had to have was a place to park,turn loose and let the good times roll. Housing market started booming around here now most of the good spots are subdivisions. Big thing is boys hunted and new how to handle firearms,if your neighbors saw you they would wave and go about there own buisness or ask you if you had any luck.Around here tobacco was it before it became worst drug on the planet you could find all kinds of grown up fence rows or grown up fields as long as folks could get to the baccer patch now cattle all over and you can't find a briar in a 1000 acres, but the biggest problem is most landowners have got there fingers burnt by some asshole with no respect and gettin permission is like tryin to pull hens teeth.
Donald

[rabbitsmoker]

Just turned 44 and i remember a train track cross the road and the train picked up coal and came by the house at 4 pm every day me and my half walker and half beagle would sit and wait on the train to go by before we could go huntin we would leave and run rabbits till dark and and then ole birdie would tree coons and possums that night i never got off them tracks and would walk miles one way till about dark then start home with my single shot 410 I sure miss them days if you was caught walkin down street in town today carryin a gun you would have the FBI called in on you

[Schag]

I am now 34 years old, and many things have changed. I can remember when I was 10 years old turning dogs loose to run in the thirty acre field behind the house. No one really knew who owned the property, but not once was I stopped by anyone. I would be out by myself at 10 years old and my parents were not afraid to allow me to do so. The neighbors would come out of the house to listen to the dogs chase a rabbit. Permission to hunt was easily given as long as you abided by the farmer's instructions on where to park, etc. I use to hunt by myself at 16 years old when I had a driver's license.

Now, I wouldn't let my own son or daughter out of the house by themselves in fear of someone lurking behind a tree. Permission to hunt is getting harder to come by because big pieces of land are being leased by deer hunters searching for the money ticket buck. They don't want anyone running beagles in their deer grounds. Subdivisions are taking over, and briars are looked down upon by the Jones'. Neighbors have no idea that a beagle chasing a rabbit is not going to come attack them! Really, they have no idea what a beagle is really suppose to be used for nor do they care because they are running through their precious 1-5 acres lot. I had a woman once come out of her house and say, "What is going on out here? What are those dogs doing chasing that rabbit? Are they going to come after me?" What do you say to that? Well, I said no M'am, they are just chasing a rabbit that figured he could get away by coming to your yard. He was right, I am sorry, I will get my dogs. Times have certainly changed, not for the better, but we have to adapt somehow while trying to keep our insanity.

Jason Schag

[Bobby Vest]

When I was a kid we hunted the world, now we have to hunt the world to find a place to run dogs.

[Ron Conroe]

you got it bobby, between the deer hunters and the city slickers, its getting hard to find places to hunt. when i was a kid living in town, i could turn loose inside city limits and not get bothered.

[bluerunner43]

my dad told me once about when he was a kid that the school bus drivers would let the kids bring their shotguns on the bus in the morning and if they saw a pheasant or a rabbit or anything else while on the way to school the bus driver would pull over and let them out to go after it. they would leave their guns on the bus during the day and do the same thing on the way home. when they got home they took their guns with them, then the next day they did it all over again. can you image what would happen if somebody tried to do that nowadays?

[Bobby Vest]

Schag, you should have told her no mam these are hog dogs and if you don't get back in the house they'll probably eat you alive for sure.

[paducahky1]

i remember people in kentucky would ask you to hunt their property to thin out the rabbits, they would encourage you to bring a child , it was something special that has been lost , i say greed and the loss of love for your fellow man has a lot to do with it, just the opinion of a 54 year old rabbit hunter !

[Schag]

Mr. Vest,

That was a good one.

[Bradh]

I live on a corner of the same farm I grew up on in flood zone river valley when I was a kid not more then 10-15 years ago I could hunt from my front porch to the end of our road for anything that walked I think at one point I figured it around 5 miles or so in any direction I could hunt back then only a handful of farmers owned all this land and I knew them all our closest neighbor growing up was about 1 1/2 miles away. Back then you could get permission to hunt anywhere for the price of a few back straps or the occasional rabbit or squirrel. I remember once asking a guy if I could turkey hunt he said I could but just this once the next morning I called in a nice bird and gave him the breast from it till this day it's one of the last farms around I can hunt on. This entire valley is now leased by outfitters who will call the law on an 80 year old women picking berries on the side of the road.

I can't blame the old farmers for leasing out the land times are hard and with the money some of these outfitters are paying it would be pretty hard to turn down. I guess I just don't see how my dogs running a rabbit from Feb-August would bother there deer population since we own 12 acres and in the last 3 years have taken 3 bucks over 150 inchs with a bow one pushing close to 200 inchs less then 200 yards from my running pen.

[Kevin Dowell]

Nice deer bradh!

[Ron Conroe]

nice deer brad, yeai don't understand these deer hunters, the dogs don't bother them.if they do run them they come right back.

[hogbody]

I'm 53 and I remember just driving around the country side looking for good looking hunting spots. We never asked permission and no one cared if you were hunting their land. We used to keep our groundhog rifles in the gun rack in the back window of our pick up trucks all summer. Never took them down. There was a little store down the road from where I grew up. Before I was old enough to drive I would walk to my hunting spots. I would stop at the store for a snack and take my gun inside with me, just set it in the corner by the cash register.