Belly-Crawl Shot & Other Ground Shots

[YosemiteSam]

Partly for fun and partly for hunting, I like to practice shooting while seated on the ground.  I've taken only one animal this way and was about to take another last year but the critter moved to give me time & cover to stand up.  All the same, I like to practice this shot just in case.

I've got it down pretty well out at <12 yards & can hit a fist-sized target most of the time.  Out at 15 yards, I can still keep it within 10" but I'm probably only 50/50 within a 6" circle.  Past there, I can't pull it off consistently.  Part of the problem is the different sight picture.  I have to keep shifting my arrow point off to the left as the distance gets further away due to my eye now being positioned to the right of the arrow instead of above it (head and arrow are sideways).

If anybody else practices this kind of shot, do you learn the new trajectory & offset for whatever distance?  Or is there a way to get the eye and the arrow in vertical alignment again?

[reddogge]

The only shot remotely similar was I had a nice Sika hind come in near dusk and had me pinned while she ate a leaf and stared at me sitting on a stool. It got darker and she moved off a little and I slipped out of the chair onto one knee and leaned way out to the right around a tree and took a shot. I missed it.

[Markp]

Have not killed many deer, but all but one  were from sitting on the ground. I have to cant  much to keep the bow limb clear. But, since I practice this as the majority of shots, its seems natural, and keeping the arrow under the is no problem. That extra 0.35" drawlength I picked up pushing w bow shoulder goes away, so far. Sitting is different ball game, but it really works. I like to Rhodesian crawl into thickets, so you are already sitting.

[Sam McMichael]

As a much younger guy, I used to tinker with similar shots. I could shoot reasonably well sitting flat on the ground but not well enough to depend on it in a hunting situation. I could also make a shot lying totally prone, but it required extreme arching the back. It was very uncomfortable, and totally useless. Arthritis says I can't even attempt such foolishness now. Since I do all my hunting from a prepared stand, I don't need to do them in the field, as I am seated on a stool. I am the only bowhunter in my deer camp, so I won a couple of bets that I could do it. In all honesty, I see no real usefulness for these shots in the style that I hunt.