Traditional Archery??

[Gurn]

How many traditional archers do we have out there. Been trying to get into this type of hunting for few months now, but the old body has been fighting me on it. Stand up and be counted! What kinda bow, erras, broad-heads, hunting methods, shooting styles, and so on.

I'll start
Bows: Saxon American 50# Longbow & Martin Stick longbow 35#

Arrows: I've tried Gold Tips Traditional, Cedar, and Carbon Express Heritage.

Shooting Style: I was trying to learn Fred Asbel's instinctive method until I injured my neck

Now I'm kinda just laying off until I'm fit to shoot. My goal is to be able to shoot a consistent group of 6" at 20 yards. Not just sometimes or usually, but most all the time.

My plan will be to set up where my prey will come within 15 or less yards.
I would love to be able to harvest one of them big ADK bears. I can see my frezzer filled to the top already.


Disclaimer: The group size and the distance of said group size goal are subject to change without prior notice.
Might end up being 8" at 10yds!!!

[AlexC]

I used to love hunting with my longbow. It was a custom job made by Snowshoe Longbows(no longer builds bows). I also had a Shakespeare Recurve that I ended up giving to my bro-in-law. I got a bad case of tennis elbow from shooting so much that I had to give it up. Traded my bow in for a compound with all the bells and whistles but it wasn't the same so I sold it when I moved out here from MI. Mostly cause I didn't think there was descent hunting here I plan on getting another bow in the near future, but I've got some other toys on top of the list to get first.

I worked in the archery dept. for a big name sporting goods store in MI for a couple years. My boss was a guy that used to be a guide on Nugent's ranch in Jackson so he had me sold on Ted's broadheads. However I did end up switching to Magnus Snuffers. I'd shoot them with cedar arrows I built myself or sometimes I'd shoot them on carbon shafts.

Two of the coolest things I've done in my outdoor "career" were stalking to within 7 yards of a doe after spotting her from about 75 yards away without much cover between us(she was outta there just before I reached full draw), and shooting a running rabbit right behind the head at 25 yards. My father-in-law said it was the luckiest shot he's seen in 30+ years in the woods. I tried convincing him it was all skill, but I think he was right

[Gurn]

I went out and bought some "Magnus 2" 4 blade heads on recomendation of a sales person at a local sport shop. They look kinda like bear razor heads. These are the glue on style for wood shafts. I put one on a cedar shaft, and it seems to fly great out of my sons 50# stick. What part of Mich did you live in?

I'm quite impressed with your stalking and shooting feats!!

[AlexC]

I wouldn't call them feats, everyone gets a lucky break every now and then.

I lived in Gaylord. Those Bear Razorheads were some pretty tough heads, I shot one into a fence post once and it still spun true afterwards.

[Adirondack_hunter]

Gurn, the last I used a longbow was when I was about 13. I then developed a dislike for archers due to a lack of education. make that ignorance.
I now hunt almost exclusively with a compound and am a Archery Ed Instructor.
Hope your neck gets well soon. The season is right around the corner.

[Gurn]

Thanks. What are adkhunter Reflective Arrow Wraps?

[ken999]

58" Super Shrew Gold, 58lbs @ 29", Western Diamondback skins, Moosehorn overlays on the riser and tips.

I've been using Goldtip 5575 Expeditions with 200 gr of insert weights/125 gr heads and Carbon Express Terminator Hunters 4560's with 100 gr inserts/200 heads. I tend to favor the CE's. Both arrow combinations are around 650 gr total weight.

I use a tab and shoot split finger.

I shoot instinctive on the closer shots but use the arrow to "gun barrel" them in when practicing out past 30 yards. I suppose the longer range stuff could be considered more gap shooting than instinctive....

[Adirondack_hunter]

Thanks. What are adkhunter Reflective Arrow Wraps?

Hope this answers your question.

$6 a dozen shipped.

This late fall I will have brown that reflects orange and black that reflects white.
I cut them 7" long so that you can use them full length or you can cut them down and many of my Blazer customers do exactly that. This way they get twice the arrow wrap for a better price.

These particular arrows are my arrows and as you can see I mark mine a bit differently so that I can identify different arrows more quickly. The arrow that has the orange nock only sports a 5" wrap. The rest of the wraps are 7" long.
No one that I have sold these to has ever to my knowledge lost an arrow.
Can you see why?:

[Gurn]

Ken, Really nice bow!! Don't think I'll ever be good enough to take beyond 20 shots. That's great to be able to gap and instinct shoot.

Hunter, Wow those things really shine !! Might have to get some.

[ADKHUNTER]

Hope this answers your question.

$6 a dozen shipped.

This late fall I will have brown that reflects orange and black that reflects white.
I cut them 7" long so that you can use them full length or you can cut them down and many of my Blazer customers do exactly that. This way they get twice the arrow wrap for a better price.

These particular arrows are my arrows and as you can see I mark mine a bit differently so that I can identify different arrows more quickly. The arrow that has the orange nock only sports a 5" wrap. The rest of the wraps are 7" long.
No one that I have sold these to has ever to my knowledge lost an arrow.
Can you see why?:

That shine is amazing. What creates it? aAny chance they can spook game?

[Adirondack_hunter]

ADK,

They only reflect light that is being cast upon them such as a flashlight. Other than that they are just white weighing in at about 17 gr per arrow wrap at the 7" length.
That picture was taken during daylight hours with a flash. Picture a dark evening
with a flashlight in your hand. They become almost blinding. I have tested these at about 250 yds and oh yeah they shine up well.
Can they spook game due to their reflectivity? Only if your buddy is shining a light at you while you poach. I hate poachers!!!

George at Tollgate Archery in West Winfield carries these for me as well. www.tollgatearchery.com

[Ordin Aryguy]

For one season, in the late 80's, I carried a compound bow. It was my first bow, I learned to shoot with it, I learned to bowhhunt with it, and I also learned what I didn't like about bows with it. After that first season I put the bow in its' case, bundled up all the do-dad's that neccesarily went along with it, and sold the whole lot to a friend. That same day I called Dick Robertson and talked to him about a bow, choosing him soley based on the simple elegance of the bows he built in the ads in Bowhunter Magazine.

That was to be, as I learned many years later, a great decision for many reasons. Dick Robertson builds a fine bow and hunting with it, a 50's style recurve he built for me, more fits me and my personality than the metal handled compound I'd started with.

Bowhunting, MY bowhunting, isn't a numbers game. It's not about the biggest, the most, the farthest, the fastest, or the anythingest. It's the time that I have, alone, to smell the things that I'd forgotten, to see the sights that had been pushed into a dark corner in my memory for many months, to watch the world come alive at dawn and to see the world go to sleep at dusk. MY bowhunting has no room or time to tinker with sight pins, axle bearings, release aids, or any other form of viscera that I've deemed, for me, as not required, a hinderance.

Through the years, I've killed with my bow, much more time than animals, truth be told. However, each season, each day afield, even each hour afield is a success. I went to places few will know, I saw the wonders of Mother Nature, I participated in the circle of life, even, as I usually do, when I come home empty handed.

Killing is not hunting and hunting is not killing. Sometimes the two seperate and unique acts come together for a few minutes, and when they do I'm sad and remorseful. I don't regret when it happens, but the moment of the death of my prey hardly seems the appropriate the time to be joyous. Sharing a meal of venison with family, bringing the gift of wrapped venison roast or wild turkey breast over to my retired neighbor's house, that's the time I'm happy with the brief collision of hunting and killing. Bringing a piece of our ancestral past, that being the bounty of wild game and the sense of community and sharing, to others that don't, or no longer hunt, brings me huge joy.

When I'm hunting it's about observing, using every sense I have to its' fullest to reconnect with all that my modern life has kept me seperate from. Killing is no more than accuracy under pressure.

Over the years I've realized that my way of thinking about hunting certainly isn't like most. Doesn't bother me a bit. I do what I do, how I do it, for no one other than myself.


Ordin

[Gurn]

Ordin
Very good! Thank you.