Though it was a little wet, we had a good hunt for the kids. All but one of them harvested the animal of their choice. This poor young man couldn't hit the targets with any of the guns we tried; .223, .22-250, 6.5x55, .7mm-08 and a .243. After getting the young man away from his mother and talking to him, my range master finally determined that his mother had installed a severe case of gun fear in him and we weren't going to be able to reverse it in the 3 days we had for the hunt. He even had trouble with the .22 rifles we had. I felt sorry for him because he just could not hit the targets so I couldn't let him try for an animal. It would not have been fair to the animal or ethical. Fortunately, he lives in Austin near one of my shooting instructors and they have agreed to get together for some shooting sessions. I told him that if he worked at it and improved to the point that we felt it would be safe for him to trying harvesting an animal I would get him on another of my youth hunts scheduled for later this year. Hopefully that will be enough incentive for him. Well gotta go to work.
