News
ENLARGE
Rhonda Hunter killed this lion in Africa with a bow and arrow. The mount is
now in her tattoo shop, Inkology, in south Rifle.
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Rhonda Hunter opened her tattoo shop, Inkology in south Rifle about two
months ago. She jumped into the tattoo industry about four years ago.
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Rhonda Hunter was as cool as leftover turkey. Her heart rate was nice and calm. The adrenaline rush would come in a minute.
A lion in the African desert was 10 yards away. Ten yards from one of the deadliest beasts on the planet.
Hunter pulled the bow string back, took aim and released.
A perfect strike and the thrill of a lifetime.
The king of the jungle killed with an arrow.
“I was always a very calm bow hunter until the shot goes off, then the adrenaline goes off,” she said.
“It was a life-changing experience,” Hunter says of her trips to Africa in the 1990s.
Hunter, 50, says that she was the first women to ever take a maned lion with a bow. She also killed a caped buffalo on an African hunt.
It was the buffalo that created one of her scariest hunts.
“I got charged, she said, smiling at the memory. “He put his horns through the tailgate.”
It took four trips to Africa to kill a caped buffalo. As for the lion, she was “lucky,” bagging the animal on her first trip.
The lion is now mounted and displayed on a perch in her tattoo shop, Inkology in south Rifle.
She's killed 19 different animals in Africa, has hunted in Canada and Mexico, and says that there is no thrill like the kill. From bears to elk to deer to mountain lions, she was a very good hunter.
An accident that damaged nerves in her neck ended her archery hunting days a number of years back, and she confessed that she still misses the sport.
“Going to a third-world country gives you a new-found respect for what we have here,” she said.
All the meat from those kills go to the natives, which Hunter says is tremendously satisfying.
Hunter says not much compares to taking an animal in the high country of Colorado, knowing that the meat is yours.
‘There's nothing like shooting something and bringing it home and preparing it for dinner,” she said.
Hunter the hunter didn't get into hunting the traditional way. One might think that growing up in the hunting hotbed of Rifle, Colorado, would be a perfect place to take up hunting. But not for her.
She started out as 3D hunting game competitor, which she got into to spend more time with her now ex-husband.
She went on to compete at the professional level for several years.
Competitors on the 3D circuit shoot targets with the highest score winning.
She helped design bows for women hunters and even spent some time on ESPN as a commentator in the 1990s.
At the peak of her professional level, Hunter was hit hard by an illness that derailed her 3D target shooting career.
It was a trip to Georgia to hone her broadcasting skills for ESPN that lead to her contracting Lymes Disease in the early 1990s. After that she admitted that she lost her competitive edge.
“I just wasn't always 100 percent, so I decided to stop competing,” she said.
That's when she got into hunting.
As an accomplished archer, Hunter has only shot a rifle twice in her life — during a hunt in Alberta, British Columbia.
“The first time was to see if I could actually shoot the rifle, then the second time I shot an 8-point whitetail buck,” she said.
Her favorite meat for the dinner table?
“Mountain lion,” she said without hesitating. “I call it the other, other white meat.”
Her hunting days are now over and so is the skyrocketing adrenaline rush that came with the kill.
Today, she has a stuffed lion looking over her shoulder every time she goes to work to remind her of those memorable days.
A lion in the African desert was 10 yards away. Ten yards from one of the deadliest beasts on the planet.
Hunter pulled the bow string back, took aim and released.
A perfect strike and the thrill of a lifetime.
The king of the jungle killed with an arrow.
“I was always a very calm bow hunter until the shot goes off, then the adrenaline goes off,” she said.
“It was a life-changing experience,” Hunter says of her trips to Africa in the 1990s.
Hunter, 50, says that she was the first women to ever take a maned lion with a bow. She also killed a caped buffalo on an African hunt.
It was the buffalo that created one of her scariest hunts.
“I got charged, she said, smiling at the memory. “He put his horns through the tailgate.”
It took four trips to Africa to kill a caped buffalo. As for the lion, she was “lucky,” bagging the animal on her first trip.
The lion is now mounted and displayed on a perch in her tattoo shop, Inkology in south Rifle.
She's killed 19 different animals in Africa, has hunted in Canada and Mexico, and says that there is no thrill like the kill. From bears to elk to deer to mountain lions, she was a very good hunter.
An accident that damaged nerves in her neck ended her archery hunting days a number of years back, and she confessed that she still misses the sport.
“Going to a third-world country gives you a new-found respect for what we have here,” she said.
All the meat from those kills go to the natives, which Hunter says is tremendously satisfying.
Hunter says not much compares to taking an animal in the high country of Colorado, knowing that the meat is yours.
‘There's nothing like shooting something and bringing it home and preparing it for dinner,” she said.
Hunter the hunter didn't get into hunting the traditional way. One might think that growing up in the hunting hotbed of Rifle, Colorado, would be a perfect place to take up hunting. But not for her.
She started out as 3D hunting game competitor, which she got into to spend more time with her now ex-husband.
She went on to compete at the professional level for several years.
Competitors on the 3D circuit shoot targets with the highest score winning.
She helped design bows for women hunters and even spent some time on ESPN as a commentator in the 1990s.
At the peak of her professional level, Hunter was hit hard by an illness that derailed her 3D target shooting career.
It was a trip to Georgia to hone her broadcasting skills for ESPN that lead to her contracting Lymes Disease in the early 1990s. After that she admitted that she lost her competitive edge.
“I just wasn't always 100 percent, so I decided to stop competing,” she said.
That's when she got into hunting.
As an accomplished archer, Hunter has only shot a rifle twice in her life — during a hunt in Alberta, British Columbia.
“The first time was to see if I could actually shoot the rifle, then the second time I shot an 8-point whitetail buck,” she said.
Her favorite meat for the dinner table?
“Mountain lion,” she said without hesitating. “I call it the other, other white meat.”
Her hunting days are now over and so is the skyrocketing adrenaline rush that came with the kill.
Today, she has a stuffed lion looking over her shoulder every time she goes to work to remind her of those memorable days.
