Groups aim to get youths interested in hunting

SMITHFIELD — It's hard to miss the romance in Bruce Schoniger's description of his first time in the wilderness — the warm crackle of the campfire, the smells of frying bacon and meat roasting and, of course, the excitement of the kill.

But a combination of urbanization and cultural change is conspiring against efforts by Schoniger and other longtime hunters to share that experience with a generation of youths, whose only exposure to hunting may be in video games.

"Today, hunting is in danger," said Schoniger, 44, a Smithfield deer enthusiast who helps run an informal hunting club in northern Utah.

The number of young hunters has dropped nationally. According to the Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association, youth participation declined by 26 percent between 1990 and 2000.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which compiles outdoor recreation statistics, says youth hunting participation has stabilized in recent years. But the National Wild Turkey Federation found only 25 percent of children from hunting households actively participate in hunting today.

"When I was young, we'd go out and there'd be 20 of us," said Dave Bunce, who co-founded the northern Utah hunting club with Schoniger. "A lot of that tradition is disappearing."

Some, like Bob St.Pierre of Pheasants Forever, a Minnesota-based conservation group, believe urbanization and modernization have drastically changed the way youths think about the environment and thus, hunting.

"Kids believe that food comes from the grocery store," St.Pierre said. "They don't go to the store and connect the steak they see to a cow. There's a disconnect between the grocery store and the outdoors."

His organization's Leopold Education Project — a partnership with other conservation groups named after famed conservationist Aldo Leopold — is trying to change that. The group teaches youths to think about the human impact on the natural world through a series of outdoor workshops that also serve to pass on the methods of wilderness survival.

"We teach kids how to use a compass, learn about conservation, and then through our Youth Mentor Hunt, they go out in the field with a mentor," St.Pierre said.