At what range do you generally get a shot at a deer>

[NovemberBravo]

I am pretty new to bowhunting and when I was shooting my bow yesterday I was thinking about what range I would generally see deer/elk at.

So I pose this question to all you bowhunters. How far away are you when you shoot deer? I was thinking that in the 20-30 yard range would be the norm but I could easily be wrong.

[Bowzone_Mikey]

find some popcorn 'n beer and sit back and enjoy the ride.
I personally have no issues shooting an animal at 70ish or more if all things are ok ...
some say that 30 is as far as you should get ...

personal skill and commitment ... and every situation is differant

[Sofa King]

practice, experience, and confidence pretty much determines it.
everyone will be different, as will every situation.

[Weatherby Fan]

find some popcorn 'n beer and sit back and enjoy the ride.
I personally have no issues shooting an animal at 70ish or more if all things are ok ...
some say that 30 is as far as you should get ...

personal skill and commitment ... and every situation is differant

http://i1087.photobucket.com/albums/j466/WeatherbyFan65/watchdrama8jm.gif More than 70 yards with a bow........I didn't know Weatherby made a "MAGNUM BOW" :mrgreen:



As you practice more with your bow you will know where your comfort level is when the accuracy falls off.

[The Hermit]

Mikey - Man I can hardly see the deer at that distance let alone hold on the vitals and expect it not to move or catch a branch etc... LOL

[monasheemountainman]

im comfortable up to 50 yards with all elements in check. obviously it depends on your practice, confidence and skill. i shoot at least 6 arrows a day, indoors and practice outside when i have the time. you really need to practice in all the elements if you plan on hunting in all of them.

[The Dawg]

http://i1087.photobucket.com/albums/j466/WeatherbyFan65/watchdrama8jm.gif More than 70 yards with a bow........I didn't know Weatherby made a "MAGNUM BOW" :mrgreen:



As you practice more with your bow you will know where your comfort level is when the accuracy falls off.


If there's anyone I know that could do it , it's Bowzone lol

Personally, 30 yards for me would be my limit under a perfect situation as I am new to bows.

[J_T]

Specifically for deer:
Recurve 5 - 18 yrds is my effective and accurate range
Compound 10 - 30 is my effective and accurate range.

Most important lesson is knowing when, not to shoot. Also knowing that in 1/2 a second - the time it takes your arrow to reach an animal that is 50 yrds away - an animal can drop 24 inches and be 180 degrees turned the other way, that your arrow and misjudgement might just result in an arrow being lodged somewhere you really don't want it to be, and having to track that animal while it wanders, is not something you want to experience. Keep your shots close.

[Bowzone_Mikey]

http://i1087.photobucket.com/albums/j466/WeatherbyFan65/watchdrama8jm.gif More than 70 yards with a bow........I didn't know Weatherby made a "MAGNUM BOW" :mrgreen:




As you practice more with your bow you will know where your comfort level is when the accuracy falls off.

tell you what ... here is a pic of not 1 shot but 3 at 70ish yards(I believe it was 68 but cant recall) ... quartering away hard obviously ... Tell me those are not kill shots
Shot was from Tackdrivers porch through a grove of trees and into the 3d deer standing in a feild ... fairly convinced 3006pg was there that night too

the thing is ... I know what my equipment will do at most any range ... my hunting bow is sighted to 80 yards and I can make those shots all day ... I would rather however be touching arrows at that distance
http://www.huntingbc.ca/photos/data/500/Photo0079.jpg

[IronNoggin]

I "kill" targets each and every week out to 80 - 90 yards:

70:

http://gallery.fishbc.com/albums/Ironnoggin/Matrix_Windy_70.sized.jpg

80:

http://gallery.fishbc.com/albums/Ironnoggin/Matrix_80_Yards.sized.jpg

90:

http://gallery.fishbc.com/albums/Ironnoggin/Exomax_90_Yards.sized.jpg

But I keep my shots on game within 50. Average over the past few years has been right around 35 yards. Too much can happen IMHO while the pointy stick is on route beyond 50. Each of us has a "self imposed" limit as to range, and some are obviously Much Better at The Game than I... :wink:

Cheers,
Nog

[Weatherby Fan]

Wow thats great shootin Mikey, I'm curious how many FPS the arrow is going at 70+ yards and how much energy an arrow carries at 70+ yards ?

QUOTE=Bowzone_Mikey;1305778]tell you what ... here is a pic of not 1 shot but 3 at 70ish yards(I believe it was 68 but cant recall) ... quartering away hard obviously ... Tell me those are not kill shots
Shot was from Tackdrivers porch through a grove of trees and into the 3d deer standing in a feild ... fairly convinced 3006pg was there that night too
J
the thing is ... I know what my equipment will do at most any range ... my hunting bow is sighted to 80 yards and I can make those shots all day ... I would rather however be touching arrows at that distance
http://www.huntingbc.ca/photos/data/500/Photo0079.jpg[/QUOTE]

[Bowzone_Mikey]

those arrows are 410 grains ... shot out of my bow at 315 fps ... those particular Vanes are pretty draggy ... but going thru my chrony at 90 meters (100 yards) .. well actually 89 meters ...they were doing 262 FPS.. Moving with plenty of KE with a good Broadhead to zip thru any Ungulate

[Weatherby Fan]

That's still pretty fast at that range.
thanks for the info
WF

[Gateholio]

I've only used a longbow to kill deer, and I'd say not much further than 10 yards. Funny, I used to shoot that bow in my old back yard which was about 35 yards long, and hit in the 4" middle of the target all them time. Archery was my favorite pastime until I got guns. :)

[BRrooster]

Personally I agree with J_T. Shooting at targets at long range is great fun , and obviously good all round practice, but the chance of an animal moving and ending up with a less than perfect shot placement is very real. Buck fever , extra clothing, less than perfect positioning (of both the shooter and the game), and many other variables contribute to the shot. Passing up the shot is sometimes the more Sportsman like thing to do! Ive let more game walk away than Ive shot. There is no worse
feeling than looseing a game animal that you have wounded.
My personal bow shot range is Less than 40 yards. Of the half dozen game animals I have harvested with a bow ; all have been under 30 yards. The last one was
8 yards.
Good luck , and practice practice practice. You owe it to the game you are hunting.
cheers

[jessbennett]

closest was 6 yds, and the furthest was 64 yds. most practice is 60 plus yards. makes everything closer a whole lot easier to hold steady on. the average is around 20-25 yds though.

[Blk Arrow]

I seem to remember an old survey, done in the early 90's, that the average animal was taken at 27 yards with a bow. (Was there a B.C. bowhunting magazine then?) I believed that was probably still a valid statistic. A quick internet search found a survey from the Alberta Sportsman site. It reveals 75% of animals taken between 15 and 35 yards with 65% taken between 15 and 30 yards.

[Wild one]

Compound 40yards or less is always the goal but have pushed past that.

Recurve comfortable 30yards on target just started bringing it out into the bush with no luck. Goal is 20yards or less when trying to get a shot

[Big Lew]

Like most others, I practice at much longer distances than I would shoot at animals. In my more than 25 years of bow hunting the longest shot I've taken was 47 yards at a large muley buck under perfect conditions, hitting within an 1 1/4" of where I was aiming. The arrow went several yards after a complete pass-through. My closest shot was 4-5 yards, but the average has been between 20 to 35 yards. All were by stalking rather than from tree stands.

[mikeboehm]

i know you hated me last year for posting this. i shot a whitetail buck at 89 meter last year. aimed at a different deer and the deer i shot ran in front and got it smack through the skull. the arrow went right thru. im shooting the 50bmg of bows though not a weatherby lol

[bugler]

I'll shoot out to 40 under really good conditions but by far the majority of my kills have been at 25 or less. In other words, if you are accurate out to 30 yards you are plenty ready to go bowhunting.

Blk Arrow, nice to see a fellow compound finger shooter! Cheers!

Mikey, I would call that one arrow below the 10 ring not a kill shot at that sharp angle, just sayin'. Nice shooting all the same.

[J_T]

i know you hated me last year for posting this. i shot a whitetail buck at 89 meter last year. aimed at a different deer and the deer i shot ran in front and got it smack through the skull. the arrow went right thru. im shooting the 50bmg of bows though not a weatherby lol
mikeb - I'll admit to making a few choice comments when I read that during elk camp. But I'm glad we had the discussion we did around that, and I appreciate you putting it up again as a reminder. Great kill on your part. Very fortunate. However, anytime we are shooting at deer, at distance, sometimes, the arrow seems to move in slow motion (I swear it's more like 10 seconds for arrow flight) and we see the 'target' move and change so easily, that we can be very surprised by the outcome.

[Weatherby Fan]

i know you hated me last year for posting this. i shot a whitetail buck at 89 meter last year. aimed at a different deer and the deer i shot ran in front and got it smack through the skull. the arrow went right thru. im shooting the 50bmg of bows though not a weatherby lol

89 meters.....you gotta come clean and post a picture of that "Weatherby Magnum Bow"
You know it's ok to use a "MAGNUM" while bowhunting :mrgreen: even if they have more recoil !
WF

[Bowzone_Mikey]

I used to have a Martin Jaguar Magnum ... friend had a cougar Magnum .... those were great bows ...

Oh ... yea that forward shot still woulda caught the lung ..... longer recovery than most like .... but dead deer none the less ;-)

[jmo]

I too practice out to 80 yards. I don't care who you are, your going to have some questionable shots at that range from time to time. And thats out in the backyard in shorts and a tshirt. I learned in a hurry that when you are in the field, and your adrenaline is running and its cold and you have a pack on and lots of clothing, and on and on and on, that its a completely different ballgame, which makes it so exciting. Even a twenty yard shot isn't a chip shot in the field, and I would challenge anyone who says that it is. Like several others have said, the animal has so much time to move at those long distances. The first buck I ever shot was 64 yards quartering slightly away feeding, and by the time the arrow got there he turned enough that I hit him directly in the hind, luckily hitting a major artery and he only went 20 yards, but it could have been quite ugly. Anyways thats my opinion.

[aggiehunter]

most if not all of my shots are ridiculous...7 to 12 yards....not braggin....but in a tree...

[Ambush]

I'll take the bait.

Nobody should be shooting at an animal at seventy yards. You may have the skill to hit loonies, every time, at seventy yards, but you have have no control over a live animal's movements. And that's the deciding factor.
It's not only your skill level and equipment that limits you, it's all the other dynamics of shooting at animate targets in hunting conditions.

I likely average three big game animals a year and seldom have to take a shot over forty yards.

[Kiese18]

I can hit my bear target at 60-70 yards consistently, somewhere between the nose and tail.
To the OP, practice and learn what you can do with your equipment.
To the bowzone and Ironnoggin those are impressive groups in my books

[Bowzone_Mikey]

I seem to remember an old survey, done in the early 90's, that the average animal was taken at 27 yards with a bow. (Was there a B.C. bowhunting magazine then?) I believed that was probably still a valid statistic. A quick internet search found a survey from the Alberta Sportsman site. It reveals 75% of animals taken between 15 and 35 yards with 65% taken between 15 and 30 yards.

I would state that info is probally fairly accurate ...
while I said I have no problems shooting from afar if all things are right ... I didnt say I make a habit of it .. the closest I taken is rought 5 or 6 yards ... the furthest was roughly 70 .. most however are on the shorter side of that scale

[J_T]

most if not all of my shots are ridiculous...7 to 12 yards....not braggin....but in a tree... What you should be braggin about is that you can have a deer in at under 15 yrds and shooting a recurve, you still have time to get everything on film. Now that is the talent. Moving the camera, zooming in/out, sound on/off, colour balance...... and still be thinking your going to hook your plucking finger on that string and smoke that arrow right through the heart. Now that is talent. Better than any 70 yard shot I've ever seen.

[Onesock]

I would have to say the same as Aggie 5 to 15 yds. Ceptin I don't have a camera. Ha

[Superdeuce]

Alert animals can move (ie jump the string), targets generally don't. Practice long, hunt short.

[knockturnal]

This is always going to be a highly debated topic. Just like the guys shooting long range with rifles. My first deer I shot with my bow was 55 yards. That's well within my range. I'm with Mikey on this one. I have 8 pins on my bow so I shoot out to 90 yards when possible. When you practice at those longer ranges, the closer shots seem like nothing. I'm all for pushing the limits of my equipment. After all, if you don't push yourself, how are you going to get better?

PS... The bottom of my bubble is 130 yards. And have made lots of good shots on 3d targets at that distance.

[Blk Arrow]

Alert animals can move (ie jump the string), targets generally don't. Practice long, hunt short.

I generally do not comment on these matters and feel like I'm taking bait, but here goes. There are two sports involved here, bowhunting and target archery. Each should be viewed differently. In my opinion, we push our shooting limits when we shoot targets, be that paper or Styrofoam. The only consequences here are missed targets and possibly damaged arrows.

Bowhunting involves a great deal more variables and a live animal which we hope to harvest. We, as hunters, be that rifle or bow, have a responsibility to make an ethical shot. Shortening the shot great improves the odds of a lethal shot. For me 35 yards under ideal conditions is my self imposed limit. The challenge of any hunting is getting close and making the shot. That's why I bow hunt.

[Fred1]

Well said....

[hotshot]

Three pins, 20 yard, 40 yard, and 60 yard

Only have used the 20, but will shoot to 40, and if all conditions are ideal maybe 60, but that would be a windless, broadside while grazing condition which I doubt will ever occur, but I'll be prepared.

[jmo]

So you think you should shoot 130 yards at an animal with your bubble as a pin? Pushing the limits with your equipment is one thing. Pushing the limits with an animal is another.

This is always going to be a highly debated topic. Just like the guys shooting long range with rifles. My first deer I shot with my bow was 55 yards. That's well within my range. I'm with Mikey on this one. I have 8 pins on my bow so I shoot out to 90 yards when possible. When you practice at those longer ranges, the closer shots seem like nothing. I'm all for pushing the limits of my equipment. After all, if you don't push yourself, how are you going to get better?

PS... The bottom of my bubble is 130 yards. And have made lots of good shots on 3d targets at that distance.

[Night Hawk 3]

Interesting reading, sounds a lot like the long-range rifle hunting guys...

I too follow the practice long, hunt short philosophy - as much as possible. When I first started shooting my compound about 7+ years ago, 15 - 25 yards was a good challenge. Then 30 - 40 got to be good. Then I put some better parts on my bow and started shooting 50 - 60yds... and then when you go back to 30 or 40 it seems a little like child's play.

The first deer I shot, a WT doe during the W. Kootenay draw of a few years back, was at 35 yds - a bit of stretch at that time. The deer was suspicious to my presence and my 'perfect broadside heart/lung shot' quickly turned into a very different shot in that ~1 second the arrow takes to fully leave the bow and arrive at the deer - the deer turned and quartered away, and in doing so dipped to power up her escape run... the arrow punched right through below her spine in the rear 1/3 of the animal (right where the tenderloins are) and as my good luck would have it, struck the abdominal aorta. I sat in my blind (a bunch of tall grass at the side of a hay field) and to my horror watched the doe run towards the nearby road - hoping that she wouldn't go far, hoping that she wouldn't get struck by a chip truck. When I got up from my blind after waiting very patiently as I was told to do - the blood trail was unmistakeable, it was like someone had a 5 gallon pail of blood and was just pouring it on the grass in the path of the deer about 5 yards from where I hit her. As light was fading, I got down low and could see the deer's path by the knocked over grass and then the blood. I found her piled up a short distance away in a hole at the edge of the field about 10 yards from the road.

The lesson here was to be very sure about the shot, having a deer not wary to your presence is very important to preventing them from jumping the string.

The mule deer I shot in 2011 was at 48 yards (ranged it at 50, took two step forward) on a very windy day, but I was standing in the lee of a copse of hardwoods; it was a quartering away shot in the ribs and out the front of the chest, passing through the heart with the arrow just hanging in there by the fletching. The deer was clearly shot, and hurriedly 'walked' over to a group of other bucks and then just fell over a few seconds later. I waited for the other deer to finally leave - after a few other bucks went to check up on their buddy - as I didn't want them to associate me as hunter with the dead deer. Other than the wind, which was not affecting my shot, the conditions were perfect - they deer did not know I was there, the deer was pretty much totally stationary for quite a long time, and he was looking away. The wind covered any noise and scent.

The past year I screwed up a few - ranged one at 55yds and placed my 50 yard pin on it... not thinking clearly, obviously, and my arrow just nicked the deer's front leg and grazed the bottom of its chest... it limped away and a long, long search turned up nothing at all. No blood, and only a slight tuft of fur where the deer had been standing - I realized my error a bit later and cursed myself for being stupid, especially when I had all the time in the world to make the shot. This was a deer that knew 'something' was there, and was slowly coming in to check me out after hearing my two way radio chirp because of keying the mic.

Later that week I took a crack at another buck that was in a group of bucks, they knew we were there, and the group started to walk away (with the BIG one in it), but this smaller buck stopped to piss on his leg glands, making a big show about it, and I stuck him with an arrow that ended up being on a very steep quartering angle - in just behind the ribs, and through bone and sticking out the other side after passing mostly through the opposite front leg, hanging in by the last few inches. That deer just stood there, and then tried to walk away but was clearly not happy about his leg being pinned in by the arrow. We waited a long time, as well after he lay down and looked dead, we walked up to him - I handed my partner an arrow while I nocked another - he poked the deer and it got up and walked away about 20 more yards - nailed it again through and through the lungs, it walked another 20 yards, nailed it again... and a few moments later it was totally done.

The lesson here is that angled shots can look way less angled than the reality of it when there's a bit of distance involved.... be careful!

My second archery deer for the year was a local black tail at 54 yards, uphill shot, nailed it - and the arrow did a broadside pass through and travelled another 18 yards before it came to a rest. The shot was a slightly high lung shot - due to not compensating quite enough for the uphill - and the deer went about 30 yards downhill before it completely piled up not far from where I was.

So, my comfortable range in good conditions is 60 yards, in anything less than ideal then that distance will drop down to 30 - 40 yards. Since starting bow hunting, I have been able to get closer and closer to deer - either having them come to me by calling (at an arm's length on quite a few occasions), about 15 - 20 yards on a spot and stalk, and at all kinds of ranges during still hunting.

So, where would I leave all of this - shoot within in your ability and practice ranges, allow for errors, don't take desperate shots. It's way better to wait for a good shot. Be super careful of your range! It's easy to mess up shots over just a few yards difference in range.

For your first season, practice like mad and try to get closer to animals once you've located them.

Try to make your shot a muscle memory exercise in that you should not have to think about all the steps to nocking the arrow and releasing it perfectly.

Don't let brush, twigs, grass get between you and your quarry... and be aware of the arc your arrow passes through on the way to the target.


Have fun out there!
~NH3

Adding a little bit in here after the initial post above:
- my rifle shots this year were mostly all long range: Alberta white tail at 454 yds, BC white tail at 428 yds. And yes, I used a magnum, but it wasn't a Weatherby ;) And, to be really honest about it, I spooked one of the biggest mule deer I've ever seen from his bed at about 30 yards while bow hunting, it should have been a gimme, but I screwed up <stupid me>. Next year! I saw him again the day before rifle season, so let's hope he's still there for 2013!

[hotshot]

I agree with NH3, The lesson here was to be very sure about the shot, having a deer not wary to your presence is very important to preventing them from jumping the string.

Last whitey I shot, the arrow went through and it just stood there shocked, the buck next to it tried to figure out what happened went back to grazing while my guy walked ten yards and dropped. It was awesome! Stealth is best.