Women Should Not Be Hunters (title not opinion)

 

DO NOT WORRY! THAT IS JUST THE TITLE NOT MY THOUGHTS! Now sit back and enjoy.

“I’ll never apologize for being a hunter.” “Don’t confuse me for being anything other than proud.” These are some of the things we hear today when it comes to hunters. A phenomenon is happening in the hunting industry. The amount of women entering the field of hunting is growing at a rapid rate! Every year more and more young girls take their hunter education course and enter the great world of hunting. But it seems as the sport of hunting grows every year with women, so does the discontent with women being in the sport.

You all have seen exactly what I’m talking about. An absolutely horrendous response to women hunting. Even more so than outrage received by male hunters. Why? What is the difference? What difference does it make if it is me putting an arrow into a deer, or one of my female friends? The main trend that I have been seeing from people who protest this, is that it is not “lady like”. Now I know some of the women reading this right now probably just thought “excuse me?!” but when you break it down, that has been more than 50% of the reasoning behind the extra outrage brought onto female hunters all over the world.

A great example I like to use is my friend Matt Guedes (founder and owner of Journey Hunts) and his daughter Baylee. Matt has been involved with hunting for most of his life, it is all he thinks about, and it is a passion he has passed onto his children. All of his kids hunt. When possible Matt likes to take them with him whether it may be individually or together on a hunt. Baylee joined her father on his most recent trip to South Africa at Sediba Nkwe Hunting Safari. The pictures of how much enjoyment they both had together can be seen on their website. Journeyhunts webpage

On this hunt, Baylee had the opportunity to take one of her dream plains game animals, a giraffe. Now just so people are aware, giraffe in this area of the Limpopo province are not endangered at all. This species is not hurt by hunters and are thriving quite well. If this was any different the government and the outfitter would not allow them to be hunted. But Baylee was successful, you can see it in her mile wide smile and her father could not be prouder! Later that day Matt also had the chance to take a giraffe of his own with his bow. Both Matt and Baylee shared their wonderful experience with everyone through their social media accounts.

Matt Guedes & daughter Baylee. Giraffe pics. Sediba Nkwe Hunting Safari

The reaction for the most part was as I expected. People who are uninformed or ignorant to the facts of what goes on there were up in arms about an “extinct” animal being hunted. Yes, I used the word extinct because that was the word I saw quite often used by angry animal rights activists. When I started looking at the comments on Matt and Baylee’s page separately, I was appalled by how more people were attacking her page because she is a hunter. Many whom deleted their comments after I confronted the remarks made.

From the year 2006 to 2011 the growth of women in the hunting industry is up 25%. Although out of the near 14 million hunters that are in the United States, females make up 11% of them that still is greater than the 9% that made up the total in 2006. But to say that for women to do this is not “lady like” or that hunting “is a mans sport” is absurd. The greatest amusement I had was seeing feminists say such things. “So women should be able to do things men do, just not hunting?” That didn’t bode well with the ones I was debating with, but my point got across. This direct attack is the victimization of female hunters.

During my time on social media I have made some great friends. Many of whom are female hunters. Chelsea Cheff @sosgearmt, Lindsay Persico @HuntFiber and Candace @CamoCandace are some of the few highly ethical and intelligent women in the hunting industry that I have met who represent a great class of female hunters.

Chelsea Cheff founder/ owner of SOS GEAR MT
Montana buck from 2015 season @sosgearmt

Lindsay Persico @HuntFiber  with her American Pronghorn Antelope

Candace @CamoCandace with her 2015 Colorado Cow Elk

We have to look at what women entering the hunting  industry have done for hunting as a whole. Not only has it brought more money to conservation efforts in the country, but it has resulted in the growth of women hunting apparel lines such as She Outdoor Apparel and Girls With Guns Clothing. It is great to see this growth but to fight it or be against it is ridiculous. The growth of women in this industry is inevitable. Having role models in the industry such as Melissa Bachman,  Jana Waller, Eva Shockey, Jen O’Hara, are just many examples of great women who are inspiring the youth of today to get into such an amazing sport.

Journey Hunts Hunting Consultant – Baylee Guedes Promoting the Girls With Guns clothing line

Special Thanks to Chelsea Cheff, Lindsay Persico, Candace, Baylee Guedes, Matt Guedes & Journey Hunts for the pictures.
Listed below are their social media accounts.

Baylee:  Twitter/IG –     @bayleeguedes1
Instagram-      @bayleeguedesgwg

Matt:     Instagram-      @mattguedes1

JourneyHunts: Twitter/IG- @journeyhunts1

Lindsay: IG/ Twitter-    @huntfiber

Chelsea: IG/Twitter-     @sosgearmt

Candace: IG/ Twitter-   @CamoCandace