The Cast and Blast Approach to Hunting Buddies
Finding hunting buddies can be tough. Here’s how to lure them in.
In a nutshell, to get more people out in the woods with you, and make your wife feel better about you trekking off into the unknown at least not alone, you should invite everyone with a pulse, arm them with all the information needed for the hunt, and then plan for them not to show up.
Step 1 - Cast a Wide Net.
Invite literally everyone that expresses the faintest interest. It’s not a sophisticated or complicated approach, but if you actually want to get out in the field with someone to back you up, it’s realistic. This approach makes the most sense if you’re an adult onset hunter like I am in California, where it seems like no one admits to hunting but there’s always a billion people out with rifles on public land.
My buddy Mike was one of the many I’ve invited out to hunt. His wife Kelly and mine are best friends from college when they ran on the track team together. From what I remember, Mike heard that I was a hunter when I dragged my wife to Arizona on her first bowhunt and she humble-bragged a photo of the sunset there to Kelly. Also like me, Mike has a couple rugrats running around and a very time-consuming, tough job. We would always talk about hunting and shooting when we got together for the wives and kids to play, so of course I started inviting him to come out with me.
When casting a wide net, keep in mind that everyone has outstanding obligations - birthday parties, softball games, happy hours and maybe other hunts - that are already calendared and that can surprisingly spring up out of the blue like a Texas thunderstorm. Similarly, if you have a buddy that says they’re planning on joining that hunt, just wait ten minutes, because those plans are probably going to change. People’s existing and changing plans are often easier than the mental, physical and even emotional toll that going on a hunt puts on you. Without knowing what success from this hard work brings, the outstanding obligations will win out when a new hunter is faced with the mountain of preparing for a hunt. Even experienced hunters, who have other hunts on the books, may decide at the last minute that the hunt is not worth missing their son’s game after an unexpected playoff run, worth missing work, or worth the money it takes to get out there.
I’ve invited dozens of my friends on hunts, but because of the fickle nature of life, only a few have jumped through the hoops needed to actually pull the trigger and leave their wives when that pre-dawn alarm goes off on departure day. Other reasons? Well, I might suck to hang out with or make people uncomfortable, but my brothers can tell you more about that some other time.
Step 2 - Blast ‘Em.
The fickle nature of first-time hunting buddies, whether they are first-time-ever hunters or experienced woodsmen, has led me to the next step. Take your information shotgun and give them both barrels. Especially if you’re fighting the uphill battle of getting your otherwise non-hunting friends to come along, they’re not going to figure out the draw system, they won’t know whether they need hunter’s safety, they won’t know the blaze orange requirements, they simply wont know what they don’t know. This can be a difficult balancing act if you’re going out for the first time with a more experienced hunter since you don’t want to insult them, but I’ve found that its better to have them think you’re a prick at first than to find out on the first morning of the hunt that they didn’t bring requisite non-lead ammo in California, failed to bring any blaze orange to a rifle hunt in Colorado, brought an electronic bow site to an archery hunt in Idaho, or rain gear to the Oregon coast.
When I invited my dad out of state for an elk hunt and my brothers and brother-in-law out to pig hunt, this shotgun approach prevented some manly tears and made sure we didn’t have to go home empty-handed.
Step 3 - Plan for Everything.
Once you’ve hit them with information, you have to plan for them to cancel last minute but prepare for them to come along. Get your travel, sleeping, tags etc. all in order while keeping them in the loop. Shoot your bow, sight in your rifle and start rucking while challenging them to do the same.
Most people won’t make it. The preparation, the act of hunting, and the post-shot cutting trekking and processing all require mental, physical and emotional toil. For many, there are a lot of other easier things that they could be doing, and they will fall off the wagon to pursue those things. If you want your buddies to experience the joy of harvest, the months of looking back at how much that hunt sucked and how fun it was, you have to make their preparation as easy as possible.
With hunting season quickly approaching, try the cast and blast method this year so you don’t have to pack that elk out alone!
