Gun-toting sorority

SANDWICH -- First there was movement, brown fur gliding through brown forest, and then the doe crept into view. One blast from the hunter's shotgun, and the doe fell, laying still against the dead leaves.

Kara Peterson had bagged her first deer. After she had tied up the 125-pound animal and dragged its carcass out of the woods, the other women on her hunting trip burst into cheers. And then another woman, a veteran hunter, raised the question that Peterson said had been dancing around her mind: How do you feel?

"You feel like you've made an accomplishment," Peterson, 35, said recently recalling her successful deer hunt at the former Fort Devens earlier this month. But, she added, "I think if you're just going to go out and blast something away without putting much thought into it, it would be kind of difficult."

Peterson, interim principal of a charter school in Barnstable, is a member of a growing, gun-lugging sorority: women who have taken up hunting in recent years. While the number of male hunters is slowly declining, women are heading into the woods in greater numbers.

Some people who study hunting speculate that the increasing numbers of women might be changing the sport. While men often come to hunting as boys or adolescents, the women hunters are often choosing the sport as adults and often take classes to learn the ropes, said Jan Dizard, an Amherst College professor and author of a book on hunters.

"Women, particularly adult women, are much more thoughtful and considerate, and come into hunting with a much clearer ethical sensibility," Dizard said. "I think that's one of the reasons why one sees a decline in the number of accidents."

The women Dizard interviewed his studies of hunting appeared less competitive about hunting than their male counterparts.

"They report they're not as disappointed if they come home empty-handed," Dizard said. "In a sense, there's not as much ego on the line as there appears to be with at least some men."

Some hunting and gun-owners' groups say that enticing more women to hunt could revive the sport's flagging numbers. The National Rifle Association has begun publishing Woman's Outlook, a magazine its leadership believes will appeal to its female members. The magazine has fewer pictures of guns than the group's other publications; one recent issue features a recipe for antelope fondue.

Women make up only about 9 percent of the nation's hunters, according to some surveys, but the numbers have expanded in recent years. In the early 1960s, only about 2 percent of hunters were women, Dizard said.

The Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife does not track the number of women who apply for hunting licenses each year. But between 1991 and 2001 -- the latest year the US Fish and Wildlife Service has collected data for its five-year studies -- the number of women hunters increased by about 11 percent, to an estimated 1.2 million female hunters.

"Women are the fastest growing demographic of both shooting and hunting," said James Wallace, executive director of the Gun Owners' Action League in Northborough. "In our shooting classes, the participation of women has gone through the roof."

Women hunters say they have noticed the change. When Nancy Begin of Topsfield began hunting more than four decades ago, she was often the only woman trekking through the woods with a gun. "Most women would have no part of it," Begin, 79, said.

Ellie Horwitz, who coordinates a state program called Becoming an Outdoors-Woman, began hunting about 15 years ago. Back then, she had trouble finding clothes warm enough for hours in the woods. The warmest shirts were made for men, she said, and the sleeves were too long. Now, clothing manufacturers have begun marketing hunting clothes and gear for women.

These days, many states' wildlife departments offer hunting classes for women. Becoming an Outdoors-Woman holds regular hunting workshops for women, part of a state effort to attract women to the sport; the workshops are often sold out.

This month, the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries & Wildlife held its annual Hunt Day for women. The hunt at the Devens Reserve Forces Training Area drew 16 women, who headed into the woods in groups of two, each pair guided by an instructor. Peterson shot the only deer.

"You cannot understand it fully until you've done it," Horwitz said. "The connection with what's going on in the woods is very different [than] if you're just taking a walk."

Many women still find guns too long for their arms. While some resort to smaller guns designed for adolescents, others buy full-sized guns and find someone to shorten the shotgun's butt, the wide end of the weapon that rests against the shoulder.

Deborah Stein, a real estate agent from Weston, was first introduced to hunting by a man she was dating who hunted game birds. When the relationship ended, Stein was still intrigued by the sport. She began practicing at a local shooting range and this fall, took to the woods. "I just started this past year, but I'm totally bitten by the thing," she said.

She said some of her friends and acquaintances are supportive of her new hobby; others are not.

"With some people you get the classic, 'You kill Bambi' kind of thing," she said. "I think there's a lack of understanding about how beneficial hunting is for the wildlife."

Wildlife officials say hunting helps cull oversized deer herds, keeping some from starving over the winter when food is scarce.

In West Barnstable, Peterson's basement freezer is packed with 55 pounds of venison -- roasts, steaks, stew meat and sausages -- from the deer she shot earlier this month, during shotgun hunting season. But she wanted to try again. For the second year in a row, she obtained a permit to hunt deer during the much longer season for muzzleloaders -- guns that must be reloaded before each shot.

On Dec. 18, Peterson took to the woods on the Cape. In the morning, she had spotted several deer, including an antlered buck, bounding through a strip of scrub pine and hardwood forest a 10-minute walk from the Sandwich Industrial Park.

In the afternoon, as the sky threatened rain, she returned to the woods with a friend, hoping the deer were still nearby. The two women, both wearing fluorescent orange caps, did not speak as they loaded their guns and entered the woods.

Peterson's friend, Sarah Dowling, circled around, hoping to roust out the animals. Peterson walked slowly along a flat path, gun at her side, sidestepping twigs that would crackle and startle the animals. But by the time the sun was starting to set, they had not seen a single deer.

"I think people think to go out and hunt, the big thrill is the kill," Peterson said. "I think the big thrill is to go out and see the patterns and see why [the animals] do what they do."

Kathleen Burge can be reached at kburge@globe.com.