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Amazing experience at mentored pheasant hunt

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ljsommer:
My wife and I attended https://www.register-ed.com/events/view/219947 last Saturday and had an amazing time.

I have been hunting for coming up on 8 years, and have struggled quite a bit. I have one deer (2019) and one turkey (2022). My wife started hunting around 2020 and had yet to secure any measurable success. When we saw this opportunity for a mentored pheasant hunt, we leapt on it immediately! We were both very excited for the day to come, and loaded up all our gear.

Unfortunately, when we arrived, my wife was observant enough to notice that I had left on our turkey chokes which did not allow steel shot (which we were using, as the site requires non-toxic shot) and if we put a shell through it then it may rip the choke out of the barrel. I had no other chokes with me. Moments after this realization, one of the mentors came over and introduced himself and offered that we use his shotgun, as well as one of the other available shotguns.

We spent the day hunting with and talking with our mentors, as well as the other hunters. Every single person there, without exception, was kind and friendly and knowledgeable. Lunch was provided for free by the event organizers, and I was repeatedly impressed by how gracious folks were with not only their time but their resources. We flushed many pheasants and missed many shots, but at the end of the day I had shot a beautiful rooster and my wife had shot a beautiful hen - her first ever hunting success! We were both ecstatic and so incredibly grateful for that opportunity.

I have already thanked (repeatedly) the folks who arranged the event, but I wanted to extend a thank you to anyone here on these forums that have ever mentored a new hunter, or in my case, a hunter that is not new at all but has just really struggled to figure things out. Your time and effort mean more to that person than you may realize!

We have upcoming hunts in November for turkey and deer and this event really energized us to think that "yeah this is possible!".

full choke:
Great post!  :tup:

Bob33:
Those are great photos and a nice story as well. Congratulations.

ASHQUACK:
Those mentored hunts are a blast. I am a fhf mentor in my area and was going to volunteer for that hunt however things just didn't align as my mom broke her hip and had replacement surgery. As well I'm currently training a new bird dog and she's just not ready. Every mentor I have met is, above everything else trying to get more folks involved in the outdoors. I believe it's one of the very few things WDFW is doing correctly. The mentors are passionate about safety, and making sure the participants learn and have fun at the same time. It's a great experience.

mboyle0828:
This is really awesome!

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