Kate Snipes: Practice pays off in the turkey woods
- peter19892
- 5 days ago
- 7 min read
By Ford Walpole
Although Kate Snipes is only six years old, she is already a successful outdoorswoman, and the young girl has been anxiously awaiting this year’s wild turkey season with focused anticipation. Fortunately for Kate, her father David “Bunny” Snipes has worked hard to instill a love of the outdoors in Kate and her younger sister Olivia.
Snipes cut his teeth outdoors, learning to hunt ducks and deer while growing up in Anderson, where grandparents and aunt and uncle owned adjoining farms in nearby Townville. He spent afternoons at the farm after Sunday dinner shooting guns and exploring the woods and fields.
By age six, Bunny was squirrel hunting with his father. “I was deer hunting by myself before I could drive,” he recalls. He tried turkey hunting and found success in the challenging sport as a student at Clemson. He took his turkey hunting to the next level after being introduced to Broomstraw, a family farm outside of Bishopville owned by Al Dawson and his brother George. “My father-in-law, “Big George” Dawson didn’t really get into turkey hunting until he was 65.” he says. “I started calling in birds for him and he killed a bird on opening day for five consecutive seasons. Big George really loved turkey hunting even though he got a late start.” Snipes has since called in his niece Anna Dawson’s first turkey, and this year, he hopes to help his nephew George Dawson V bag his first bird.
“As a girl-dad, I have raised girls who love to be outdoors,” Snipes says. “They love to hunt doves and deer. I hope to take them offshore fishing with me this summer.” He sets up a blind in the dove field where “they have a party and play music. They like to pick cobs of corn, and they really love that you don’t have to be quiet when you’re dove hunting.”
Although Snipes loves to hunt, he is quick to emphasize that for him, the harvest of the hunt is only one aspect of his outdoors lifestyle. “We actively manage our farm for quail and turkeys year-round,” he says. “We burn and plant food plots and brood patches for quail and turkey poults. During the season, we practice predator management. It is important to me for my girls to realize everything that is involved.”
Because much of this management consists of practices that benefit turkeys also help wild quail, Snipes became involved with Quail Forever and currently serves as president of the Lowcountry Chapter. He also helps friends manage their properties. “Kate has volunteered to help with brood habitat for young turkeys and quail at Santee Coastal Reserve,” he says. The objective of these efforts is to give the poults a habitat that fosters a source of protein such as bugs, which are required to thrive.
In addition to managing the farm, “scouting is one of the biggest parts of turkey hunting,” Bunny explains. “I am not an expert caller, so I have to put in more time scouting than others might. Especially when you are hunting with a kid,” he says. “You have got to pick your poison and decide where you are going to hunt. The girls love scouting. They get to ride in the truck listening to 90s country music, and they think it is the coolest thing in the world to be able to ride on dirt roads in the truck with no seat belt and sit in the front seat with binoculars.”
Snipes explains his philosophy for keeping children engaged outdoors thusly: “I always try to keep them interested in hunting without pushing them too hard. You just want to get them exposed and be sure to keep everything fun. Kate has been going outdoors with me since she was little enough to walk. It doesn’t have to be a long, grinding day; it might just be 20 minutes in the afternoon to look for deer,” he says. “Some children just want to sit around the campfire and roast marshmallows. Everybody doesn’t have to be a killer — we just want you to get outdoors!”
Since Bunny Snipes is a professional dog trainer, his patience and role as a teacher helped prepare Kate for her first turkey hunt. To get her comfortable with a gun, he began with a Red Ryder BB gun. “First, I stacked cans of Chek Cola in a square so she was sure to hit something and feel success — and so that she could get to see the cans of cola go boom!” Kate then moved to a single-shot .22 before graduating to a .410 shotgun.
“From there, we started dialing in on her BOG Tripod,” the stand that holds her gun in place. Snipes affixed a red-dot scope to Kate’s .410. “We sat in the basement without shells. I took an adhesive door stop and kept moving it around to get her used to the scope. I moved it in circles, and she turned the gun in her BOG pod. We practiced getting on the bird, and I reminded her not to put her hand on the trigger until I take the safety off. She practiced a lot and let me tell you: she was diabolical in getting the scope on the target!” he says.
“After getting Kate comfortable with the red-dot scope on the .410, she started shooting small targets,” Snipes continues. “Turkeys strut and spin, and that’s what I wanted her to understand. So, I took a remote-control car with a balloon attached to it, and I drove the car in circles to simulate turkeys strutting and to get her used to shooting a moving target. Once she got that down, I had her shoot an old, discarded jake decoy so she would know what it was like to shoot a turkey.”
Kate’s first turkey hunt took place on last year’s youth day when she was only five years old. “I had been scouting, so I knew where the turkeys were,” Snipes says. “Two birds started gobbling on the roost, but they went into the swamp in the opposite direction. After 45 minutes, I could still hear the turkeys in the distance, but I knew the hunt was over. We just couldn’t make it happen. With a five-year-old, you are restricted to the blind — you aren’t doing a run-and-gun type of hunt.
“It was St. Patrick’s Day, and it was really hot, so we set up a sprinkler in the yard of the cabin. Kate was content to play in the sprinkler, so we didn’t hunt that afternoon. That evening we saw a bird on camera at another blind. I knew that if I saw him go across the field, he would be where he was supposed to be the next morning. We watched him on camera, and he went to bed at 6:30 p.m. Kate was fired up!” he says.
“The second morning, we got in the blind at about 6:20 a.m.,” Snipes continues. “At 6:55, he gobbled twice from the tree. After his second gobble, I purred two or three times. I never even yelped, and he came right in on a string.
“I couldn’t see him from where I was sitting, but Kate watched him fly down off the roost and got to see him in that running strut when they’re coming right to you. I was a little nervous when she shot, but all I felt was relief when the bird hit the ground. Kate shot him at 20 yards at 7:15. She hit him hammer-dead right where she was supposed to and he dropped right where he stood. It was awesome!” he says.
After the shot, “Kate was super-pumped up, but I was even more excited than she was!” the proud father exclaims. “I was so excited that instead of unzipping the blind, I just picked it up over our heads. We high-fived and hugged, but I don’t think it really sank in for her until we walked up to the bird — that’s when she really got excited,” he says. The successful young hunter was eager to return to the cabin and tell her sister and mother.
When asked about the most memorable part of harvesting her first turkey, Kate insightfully replies emphatically: “Being with my dad!”
“To start children off hunting, I want to provide them with every legal tool I can for them to be successful. And I want them to be comfortable,” Snipes says. “On her first hunt, Kate had Skittles, Snickers and Sprite — treats she normally doesn’t get, so she remembers that.” Of course, she will learn to hunt by more primitive means, “but on the first hunt, it doesn’t take anything away from having her set up in a ground blind in an office chair. You have to make it so they want to come back and keep hunting,” Snipes says.
Kate’s passion for the outdoors is proof that her father’s approach to youth hunter education is effective and wise: “Kate is now hooked on turkey hunting!” Snipes says proudly. “She is already talking about tagging out this year, and if so, she wants us to go on a trip out of state to hunt more turkeys,” Snipes says.
The young girl’s plans are hardly limited to wild turkeys. “I really want to shoot a deer,” she says. “And when I get a little bigger, I want to start shooting doves with my dad, too!” And thanks to the efforts and dedication of her father, we have no doubt that she will achieve these outdoor goals — and many more.
Ford Walpole lives and writes on John’s Island and is the author of many articles on the outdoors. He teaches English at James Island Charter High School and the College of Charleston and may be reached at fordwalpole@gmail.com.
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