Bowhunting Bias

[Walksalot]

just a quick note before this gets out of hand. Express all the opinions you guys want to, but keep it civil. I can see some hard feeling developing here. If this gets ignorant or into any serious personal attacks I will lock it up. Nobody has crossed that line yet....lets keep it that way.

Carry on

Chris

No fear Willyqbc, I totally respect their opinion howerver wrong it might be.

[Mooseman]

Compounds and crossbows are umbeatable for accuracy.
No really. No matter of your weapon there are people that are rude and there are respectful hunters. The choice of weapon is not the determining factor.
After 29 years of guiding hunters from all walks of life I have a statistic that will show you that most wounded animals I have to find with my dogs have come from 300 win mag. shots. Does that mean that all 300 win mag. shooters are wounding all animals???? NO. It means that some of the not very well trained shooters have used that caliber because marketing had made them believe that it is a magic bullet and it will kill everything you look at. Well not quite so I guess.

As a matter of fact, traditional shooters have a very close range on average (under 20 yards) and less then average wound game. That is just my experience and means nothing special.

Onesock is actually a good shot! I would have a hard time to keep up to him.

Compounds and crossbows are unbeatable for accuracy. So are rifles.

[Walksalot]

I don't need anyone to "rescue" me as you put it Ridesalot. If YOU new the first thing about traditional equipment you would know that 3D shot distances and hunting ranges are two different things,as I said before. Do you think that because there are 50/60 yard shots on a 3D course that you should be taking them whilst hunting? Sadly mistaken if you do! You said you ride a quad because you have an injured knee. It sounds like you participate in 3D shoots on a regular basis, do you ride your quad there?

Onesock, name calling, absolutely brilliant. A feeble attempt at a come back from a guy backed into a corner.

[Marc]

I've already said this in another post and I'm going to say it again just incase it gets missed.It seems that since the hunting season for most of us has come to an end in most areas that people have nothing better to do but sit behind their computer and vent. I'd hate to think that this site would be degraded because a few grown men can't have a sensible discussion without insulting each other.

[sealevel]

Its not just just tradies making bad shots at 3d shoots there are archers in all forms making bad shots ( i think 3d permotes bad shots) cause the easy part is learning to shoot the hard part is leaning to judge distance .

[Walksalot]

Its not just just tradies making bad shots at 3d shoots there are archers in all forms making bad shots ( i think 3d permotes bad shots) cause the easy part is learning to shoot the hard part is leaning to judge distance .

Sealevel, I agree that with a compound bow with fixed sights, peep and release or with a crossbow, with a bit of competent instruction and practice, one can be shooting fairly accurately within a fairly short time frame. The beauty of the compound and crossbow is that after the shooter masters the basics of form the shooter can lay the bow down for a period of time and then return to shooting and within a short time be back in the groove.

With traditional equipment I have to disagree. People go to traditional equipment because it's simplicity but in actuality becoming proficient and remain proficient with traditional equipment is far from simple To become proficient with traditional equipment one has to learn to shoot with fingers and then master the skill of instinctive shooting. This demands a commitment to practice and constant practice which, in my opinion, few archers are willing to commit to.

I laid my compound down for a year and took up traditional tackle which included the 3D circuit. The amount of commitment to practice I found to be over whellming. At the end of that year and just before the start of the bow season I set up a McKenzie deer at 20 yds and flung 30 arrows at it. The net, net was 10 arrows as good killshots and the rest were marginal to down right wounds. I totally missed the target with none. This, in my opinion was totally unacceptable and totally unfair to the animals I was hunting so I sold my traditional equipment and went back to my compound.

We owe it to the animals to be proficient enough to be able to say that the vast majority of shots taken would result in a quick and humane harvest of that animal.

[Onesock]

I totally agree with your last statement Walksalot. Most traditional bowhunters I know, as well as myself hunt at 15 yards and under.Just because you are not accurate at twenty yards doesn't mean you can't hunt with a stick, just don't shoot twenty yards. As far as practise, it is every day or at least every second day. Sealevel says learning to shoot is the easy part and judging distance is the hard part, I assume this is with a compound and I agree with him. Guys that lay their bow down for months on end and then shoot a few shots before hunting season will end up shooting at 40 yards and wounding animals. Suffice it say, Walksalot, that I don't know you and you don't know me. My argument is that we have to do the best we can so we will be able to keep hunting for years to come. If we do not police ourselves we will loose this great pastime we all enjoy so much. I think you have to agree with me that 40-50 yard shoots off of a quad does not make anybody look good.

[CUJO]

Walksalot, one thing you are overlooking is ethics. You said at 20 yards you only had 10 kills and marginal kills and wound with the others on a 3-D animal, what if you limited your shots to 10 yards?? I see a ton of deer going within 10 yards of my stand in the past several years. Take the time and set up right and you should have some good luck.

The problems I have seen with xbows have been with gun guys putting in for bowhunting LEH's and getting a xbow a week before the hunt, thus having no experiance at the range of the weapon. All LEH's forms a single person should get should be gun or archery, and if its archery you should have to show the form seller your lisence showing the archery box checked. Thats why I always thought we should have continued the additional charge on the lisence to archers showing true archer numbers and it would also give us extra leverage with gun hunters when fighting for more bow seasons.

Also there is a future to consider, at this point some xbows are shooting up to 375 fps and withing the next couple years will be into the 400 fps, at what point will the xbow become like the muzzleloader did in archery season?


Gotta go to work, someone has to make those terrable traditional weapons...

[Mooseman]

It is not the weapon that wounds the animal. It is the shooter behind it. Ethics. Boring to some, important to me.

[huntwriter]

I never really understood what all that controversy about different hunting styles is. But it seems to go on everywhere in North America traditional bow hunters bash the compound bow hunters and both together have a go at the cross bow hunters then the riflehunters get involved too and so on with no end. What gets to me really hard is when hunting organizations of a barticular hunting style give their "input" to the government authorieties which is another form of bashing another hunter weapon types.

What I find particularly sad is that the animal rights movement and anti hunters which lobby governments to ban hunting mostly compile their evidence against hunting from hunting forums like this one. As we speak North Americas biggest anti hunting group, the Humane Society of America merged with another animal rights giant making it the worlds largest anti hunting group with millions in the bank account. This anti hunting giant made it their duty to get rid of all bowhunting by the year 2010.

While this is going on we waist all this valuable energy on bashing each other and delivering material to the anti hunting crowd. Just imagine what we all could achieve if we would spend all that energiy in finding out what unites us as hunters. Namely that we are all enjoying our hunting heritage and the great outdoors and that we all an endagered species which others have determind to get rid of.

I hunt for over 40 years and in all this years I have encountered many "slob" hunters from all walks of live and with all weapon types. I never found that one weapon type brings about more "slobs" than another one. But overallI met more good hunters than "slobs" and this is backed up by a study done some years back which clearly indicates that the hunting sport participants have the highest ethical and moral attidude of all sports, now thats something to be proud of.

In fact it is not the weapon that promotes slobiness or is not a proficient weapon. It is the person behind that weapon which is the deciding factor and not the weapon. Diffierent weapons need diferent skills to master but I would hesitate to say that a hunter who has to dedicate more time to become proficient with his weapon is a better person or more ethical hunter because of it, he is just more dedicated to that weapon style.

I hunt with all weapons because I am a Hunter first and foremost but I will admit that I am better with some weapons than with others. For example I simply do not have the time and the inclination to spend all the time needed to become a good shot with a traditional bow and thus I am only able to take game with it at about 10 yards. Does that make me a "Slob"? Yes, if I listen to some other traditional hunters. Heck, I even have heard from one and the other that I am a "traitor" or "would like to be..".(Some hunters make a religion out of their weapon type, these are the worst once they bash everybody even their own). But personally I don't think so because I know my limits and I am sticking to it and that is really all what it is about, knowing once limits with any given weapon and sticking with it. That to me is what I call ethics, to be honest with one self. How hunter hunt and how they get to their spots be that walking or with ATV, who really cares. Do I road hunt, no but I am not against it either if it works and is legal then it is alright by me even if I do not agree with it. We are different people luckely we are not robots and we are not yet totaly organized and "cultured" by a communist government and thus we still can do what suits us best and that is good so and hopefuly we can keep it that way.
I hope the day will come where we all can spend our energy where we should, on defending our hunting heritage and not our special interests.