Long Shots

[Jeff Strubberg]

I shoot better at 30 yards than at 30 feet.

I still won't take shouts much over 20 in the woods.  The longer that arrow is in the air, the more opportunity for game or wind or weather to do something unexpected.

Avoiding long shots is not just a matter of your accuracy. An archer in the field is, at best, one-third of the shot equation.

[longbowman]

In the past 15 yrs. the longest shot I've taken was a buck I killed at 27 yds.  However I've taken whitetails out to 73 long steps back in the mid 60's when I didn't know better.  I killed my first whitetail at 47 yds. and I killed a mulie at 48 yds.  As for arrow penetration.  The 73 yd. shot had my arrow completely penetrate both hams fortunately cutting the femoral artery.  The other 2 were both pass thrus on double lung shots.  While I practice at very long ranges I have a "feeling" zone and when they come into that zone I'm pretty darn accurate on game.  Fortunately that feeling of "needing" a kill has long gone and I want my shots to be as sure as they can be before I let the arrow go.

[BobCo 1965]

I also regularly practice out to 50 yards. BUT, I usually will not do this when hunting season gets closer. I like others gap shoot at that distance, but do not gap shoot within hunting range. I have a real hard time switching from one style to the other mentally.

All that said, I feel comfortable on a deer up to 25 yards, if everything is right. But my normal limit is about 20 yards.

[Shawn Leonard]

I shoot at long distances and will agree withthe guys who say it depends on the day and how I feel when th eshot presents itself. I myself have a feeling that comes over me that says I can kill that, sometimes it is 10ft. other days it is 40 yards. I like longbowman have taken some long shots and have been successful and at long distances I have never not recovered an animal I hit, I wish I could say that about all my shots. Out of the bows I was shooting than 60-70#s and a 600 to 650 grain arrow penetration was not an issue. I shot a 5pt. with my recurve at 47 yards and double lunged him and th earrow went right on thru and kept going, I though tI shot over him at first. I know will shoot out to 40, if everything just feels right. I know I will get beat up for this but I have been to quite a few Trad. shoots and most guys at these shoots should not shoot over 15 yards on a live animal, sorry but it is what I see. Shawn

[laddy]

Years that I get a lot of long range practice and being a ground hunter I like the 20 to 35 yard range.  When the deer are very close I get busted more often. This year I had two deer jump the string at less than ten yards with a dead quite bow.  Lucky that both were clean misses.

[Rico]

Before compounds a lot of archers where shooting out there beyond 30yds your trajectory is more than a compound so your yardage estimation needs to be more accurate but once you know the yardage (rangefinders) make this easy, and know your bow very doable if your style is sight reference. Quite a different story if you’re shooting instinctive.

[cjones]

Originally posted by Jason R. Wesbrock:

When a person only practices out to 20 yards and then shoots deer at that distance, what he/she is doing it attempting the most difficult shot they know at a live animal. I'm just not personally comfortable doing that.

Boy did ya ever hit the nail on the head with that one Jason. I shoot alot out to 50 yards and sometimes even farther. I feel very comfortable at 30 yards and sometimes will shoot farther if everything feels right. My  buck this season was taken at 36 yards. I'm not a very good shot so if i can do this, with practice others can too.

[Guru]

Jeff, With all due respect bud...how can you be a better shot at 30yds than you are at 30ft?

[Swanny in MD]

Guru - here's my experience with a Warf I had for about 7 months this year.  I could consistantly put 4 out of 5 arrows in a grapefruit @ 50 yards because it happened to be my POA, which ended up always being a better group than I could do @ 20 yards....couldn't set the gap consistantly.  Not saying I'd take 50 yard shots at a deer either.

I missed a big doe @ 8 yards this year on the ground with a lh'd bow I made...sent the arrow right in front of her brisket....mental collapse...too much adrenaline flow.  Missed a couple chip shots with the Warf too.

Felt like this was my first year hunting.

[Swanny in MD]

I guess it's not the same as Jeff is saying...

though I couldn't gap as good at 20 as I could at 50, I could stringwalk a baseball size group at 20 with the Warf.

downside - wish I was like Rusty, but I found I fumble at the last second in hunting as to what system of aim I should use....messes with my mind too much.  now I'm back to just one system and am in my old ways now.

[Jeff Strubberg]

Guru;

Darned if I can explain it.  Been this way for the last eight, nine years.  

I've shot over javi at fifteen feet, walked a quarter mile further down the road and pinwheeled a texas cottontail at 32 yards.  I shoot consistently left at close yardage and spot on past about 25 yards.

Took a nice eight point this year at about 14 yards.  Fairly long recovery, the shot was about eight inches left and hit one lung and liver.  Two weeks later I shot a turkey out of the same stand at 23-24 yards.  Dead on, dead bird.

Understand, I am not advocating long shots.  That turkey is the longest big game shot I have turned loose.  As I said above, your proficiency is only one third of the shot equation.  As distance increases, your skill becomes even less of the overall picture.

[Bill Carlsen]

Well said, Jason. Paul Schaefer was a proponent of long range practice as it made closer shots easier. I wish we had a field archery course nearby. I miss the 80 yard walk up and the 60 yard fan. When my shooting form seems to be giving me trouble I find that I can usually diagnose the problem more quickly shooting for a while at my point blank range than loosing a hundred arrows at 15-20 yards. Consistent shooting at long distances requires very careful and conscious awareness of your shooting form and little problems at 20 yards are big at 80 or so.

[Arwin]

Over the summer I shot pretty consistantly at 30yds and over. I was doing alot of 3-D shooting, but I have way more confidence when shooting at something that isn't living. When I have a deer in front of me, all I can think about are the shots I don't want to take.
 Stump shooting has been a big help too!!!

[Bill Turner]

Unfortunately, I have limited my practice to 20 yards and closer. Most of my shots at game have been between 12 and 15 yards. I'm now hunting public land, after hunting Texas leases for 20 years. Over the last two years I've come to realize that I must increase my accuracy and therefore my confidence level out to 25 or 30 yards. Not that I will ever take a shot at game at that distance, but I sincerely believe that practicing it longer distances will make you a better, more comfident archer. If nothing else, it should help my 3-D scores.  

[Jason R. Wesbrock]

Ken,

If you tune your Warf for a 20-yard crawl and just gap for slightly high/low, you don't have worry about switching your shooting style at the last second. That option's gone.   :D  

I decided for grins to set mine up like that last week. Call me nostalgic for my old NFAA Barebow days.    

 

The arrow goes under the upper nocking point. An eliminator button keeps it from sliding down (I had extras, so I put two more on in case the first one breaks). The lower nock marks the 20-yard crawl. And no, the arrow doesn't really go on top of the plunger. I didn't realize it had slid up there when I took the photo.


 

A closer look.


 

A little tip: Trying to see the tip of the arrow in low light can be difficult. Why do you think sight shooters love fiber optics and tritium? A narrow wrap of soft white Velcro makes things a lot easier in the first or last minutes of legal shooting light.

 

[Jason R. Wesbrock]

Originally posted by Bill Carlsen:
 When my shooting form seems to be giving me trouble I find that I can usually diagnose the problem more quickly shooting for a while at my point blank range than loosing a hundred arrows at 15-20 yards.  

I do the exact same thing. When I'm at the range and I start noticing my groups are consistently off the mark (in my case, usually right or left), I immediately back up to my point-on distance. This tells me if something went goofy in my tuning or if the problem's me.

It's usually me.   :D

[Swanny in MD]

"If you tune your Warf for a 20-yard crawl and just gap for slightly high/low, you don't have worry about switching your shooting style at the last second. That option's gone."

Surely that would have been the best remedy, Jason, but I (regrettably/prematurely) sold the BB Warf and Samick Extreme limbs.  Best bow for tuning to all sorts of different ways of shooting bar none.  Would have made an awesome 3d bow (which I don't do).  Was too heavy for my type of hunting - ended up to about 4.5 pounds with bow quiver.

I like the low light remedy - thanks!

[JDinPA]

Can you explain how the 20 yard crawl works? I've never string walked.

[Jason R. Wesbrock]

JDinPA,

"Crawl" is just a sort of slang term for string-walking, as in, you kind of "crawl" your hand down the string.

The point of string-walking is to keep your anchor the same, but get the nock high enough that the tip of the arrow is directly on the spot you want to hit at a given yardage. You're basically using the tip of the arrow like a sight pin of sorts.

For example: without walking the string, my Warf is point-on at 35 yards. If I come to anchor and put the tip of the arrow on the bullseye at 35 yards, that's where the arrow should hit. But by "crawling" my hand 1 1/4" down the string and coming to the same anchor, I've gotten the nock closer to my eye. Now instead of being point-on at 35 tards, I'm point-on at 20 yards.

So for bowhunting, if a broadside deer is 20 yards away, I can come to anchor, put the tip of my arrow behind his shoulder and shoot. If he's a little closer than 20, I can just hold the tip of that arrow a little low (4" actually). If he's a hair past 20, I just hold a little high.

For a great how-to on string-walking, you may want to check out Masters of the Barebow, Volume 2. Ty Pelfrey has a great section in there where he really goes into a lot of good detail on how it's done.

Personally, I'm more of a regular gap shooter (instinctive on occasion too). But I used to string-walk competitively years ago and always had a itch to try making it work for bowhunting. So I figured I'd set this bow up for it and see if I could turn some of that white Velcro red.  

[Cherokee Scout]

Guru.........I do the same thing. I started canting my bow more for the close shots, and it helped a lot. You might want to try more or less canting up close!