Luke Haynes, 13 (Detroit News photo by Dale Young)

If the future of hunting is in the hands of the Haynes family of Vicksburg, Mich., it’s all good.

They’re the ones who produced Luke Haynes, one of the three lucky winners of the first Pure Michigan Hunt. Luke is 13 years old, and winning means he’ll go to the front of the line for Michigan elk, bear, antlerless deer, turkey and waterfowl drawings this year. You can read more about Luke’s prize in today’s Detroit News.

Plans are in place for the News — and yours truly — to tag along on all of Luke’s Pure Michigan hunts beginning in April with the spring turkey season. We’ll chronicle Luke’s challenges and successes as he and his dad work their way through Michigan’s game species.

I met Luke on Thursday, along with parents Scott and Kelly and sisters Katelyn and Linsey, and it’s hard for me to imagine a better ambassador for hunting and outdoor sports. Luke is bright, friendly and funny, not at all averse to looking adults in the eye and answering their questions — even folks he’s just met. I have a 13-year-old of my own, and I can tell you many members of that species would rather stab themselves in the neck than carry on a conversation with an adult.

Above all Luke is passionate, and he comes by that honestly. Everyone in his family — mom, sisters, dad — hunts. Luke just turned 13 on January 6, and already he has killed a double-bearded gobbler and an 8-point buck. He hunts rabbits and squirrels behind his home in Kalamazoo County every chance he gets. He started tagging along with Scott on hunts as a toddler strapped in a backpack.

It may seem to Luke like he’s just going hunting. But in a lot of ways he’s sending a very important message to a society that is increasingly concentrated on pavement and learns about nature through electronic devices sealed inside the weatherproof boxes we call home.

There’s another generation coming up that knows how to do it the other way. And its face will look a lot like Luke Haynes.