After my previous posts in this thread regarding the morality of killing and more specifically killing via trapping I figured I'd stay away from this one. Well I failed. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> My wife is a vegetarian and I eat very little meat. I eat oily cold water fish once a week and any wild game that I may kill but that is about it. I refuse to buy processed meat other than the fish that my doctor (and family friend) insists that I eat. <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> That being said I am a hunter. I grew up as a very avid hunter in fact. These days I go on maybe one weekend hunt per year primarily because I get all the meat I need for the year from one deer and a couple wild turkeys so there is really no point in returning again in the same year. I usually make the trip on opening weekend of Texas whitetail season. I have unlimitted access to 5000 acres of SW Texas land where I am the only person around other than a single ranch hand whom I have known since I was 12 years old, so it is certainly a hard opportunity to not take advantage of at least once a year. This weekend is actually opening weekend for SW Texas and I am going on my annual trip to my leased land which is what got me thinking about things as I read these threads. I don't hunt for trophies, I only kill animals that benefit the environment with their death and I use everything... and I really mean everything. A lot of people say that they use "everything" but I am for real and I have picutres to prove it <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />. The area where I hunt is extremely over-populated with female whitetail so for a skilled stalker (no I dont use blinds) and marksman/archer, finding a large mature doe to take is far from an impossible task. I usually try to take her on the first morning if I can then spend the rest of the weekend processing the meat, skin, bone and even preparing sinew. I also dont take any food with me when I hunt and the nearest civilization is about 20 miles away so if I dont take her on the first morning then either I'm gonna be real hungry or I'm gonna be eating jack rabbit. Trust me... the jack rabbits in SW TX are the size of small dogs and dont tast nearly as good as the little bunnies some of you may have eaten in the past. <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> Ah but I digress (as usual).

Now I will get to the point (I know you're thinking "finally he gets to the point" <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />) In all my years of hunting I have never made a single kill that I did not have a guilty feeling about. Not once. I'm the kind of person that doesn't even squish insects in the house if I can cup them in my hand and take them outside. Every kill I have every made in my life (including mice, rats, a snake, fish, fox, deer, dove, quail, phesant, ducks, geese, mountain goat, rabbit squirrel and a whole lot more) has left me feeling bad "afterwards". I will not get in to the spirituality of it all since it is something I feel too strongly about to debate objectively but I will say simply that I am extremely spiritual about my killing.... extremely! So you ask yourself, "if he feels so bad after making a kill, how/why does he continue?" Well that takes us back to the spiritual aspects which I'm not getting in to (not today anyway <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />).

There is something my father told me as a small boy that I want to share with the rest of you. Unlike a lot of other stuff he told me growing up, these words have stuck very well in my mind over the years. One time after a kill when I was young and first started hunting I was standing over my deer about to split him/her open I asked my father if he ever felt bad after making a kil..l. if he got an ill feeling standing over his deer before inserting the knife to split him/her open. Much to my surprise he said "yes I do, every single time." This really surprised me to hear him say this. Then he said what really has stuck with me for all these years and always will. Something that I will pass on to future generations hopefully.

He said "I get that feeling every time I make a kill and I hope everyone does. I think the day that you make a kill and don't feel bad afterwards, then that is the day when you should give up hunting."

Maybe that's the difference between a hunter and a killer? Maybe not. I won't debate that but I did want to shared his words with you guys (and girls) because based on what I am reading, there are a lot of you that will understand those words and take them with you as I have.