Youth archery club... Suggestions on bows?

[mgompf]

Hey guys I'm involved with a group that is getting an archery club started for kids age 7 - 14 and I need some help picking out bows. I wanted to get your suggestion on models / brands.
I am leaning towards takedowns thinking we could get more life out of them. Keep in mind we are tying to stay as cost effective as possible as we are a non profit organization.
Thanks.

[macbow]

First you need plenty of light weight bows.
7and 8 year old boys need about 10 to 12 pounds at 20 inches. This is going by my grand kids. I keep trying to up their weight but they like to shoot lighter and shoot a lot.

Are any of the folks involved a member of Comptons?
Comptons tries too get org's started in traditional archery.
Look up their web Page.

One piece bows are easier to maintain.
Ron

[McDave]

I teach archery to kids once a month for my club.

The club provides Genesis bows, which is a type of compound bow that doesn't have a fixed draw length; it just reaches a certain poundage and then doesn't get any heavier.  It's really the only type of compound bow that is practical for a group of kids.  These bows are all in the 15-20# range.

I provide recurve bows that I have accumulated over the years for my grandkids and guests.  PSE makes an inexpensive starter bow that works well for this purpose.  The lowest poundage available is 15#, although I'm sure most of the kids don't pull it that far.  The 15# bow is the most popular and is in constant use.  I have another 25# PSE that is a little nicer, and some of the older kids, maybe 12 year-olds, can pull it.  I have a 30# left-handed PSE that my wife uses sometimes, and hardly anybody can pull that.  So the lefty's tend to go back to the Genesis compounds, whereas there is always high demand for the 15# recurve, particularly since "Hunger Games."  Sometimes I have to remind people that the bows are for everyone to use, so nobody ends up hogging the 15# recurve.

I also have an old 40# classic Bear recurve that I bring along, which really shoots well.  None of the kids can really pull it very well, but sometimes their parents participate and if they are able to handle it, some of them really like it.

[moebow]

mgompf  ,  There are several relatively inexpensive bows out there for the "little ones."  They are available in 48", 54", etc. lengths.  "Focus" has a nice one but they are always back ordered or out of stock and it takes for ever to get them.  You might take a look at the Samic Polaris line $90 - $120 depending on length/size.  You can get them from 10 up to about 40# of draw weight.  For the 7-8 year olds and those girls that are small especially they make great beginner's bows.

I, too, really like the Genesis, BUT the mass weight of the bow for the smaller kids is problematic.

At my club, we have built up a pretty good cross section of both types of bows and they do us well with little maintenance required.

Arne

[LYONEL]

Do yourself a favour & talk to Mike at Maddog archery great value kids bow in both recurve & longbow & mike will do a great range of colours not just hardwood that most younger kids find boring. Yes they are one piece but that makes them less expensive to manufacture which means more bows for your money.

[mgompf]

Thanks guys. We do have some genesis bows but some of the smaller kids can't really handle them. Plus some of them just wanted to try a recurve. We had our first class with 30 kids this week and realized we need some lighter weight recurves. I took all of the ones I had from my kids but we need to get some for the org. I was eyeing some of samick bows on the web.

[Hawken1911]

Bear Archery actually makes a lot of youth bows in various sizes and weights, longbows and recurves.  I picked up a couple 'Goblins' that kids love to shoot at my place.  They are 15#@22" and 18#@24".  They make some bows that are even lighter, and some that are heavier.  They are less than $30 on Amazon, and even the bigger bows aren't much over $50:   Bear Youth Bows

[Brazos]

My archery club bought the Genesis bows.  They are great.  If you do buy them call Mathews up and inquire about their youth club price.  They will sell them much cheaper to youth organizations then if you just go buy them at the store.

[Paul/KS]

Our 4H archery kids have had pretty good luck using the Ragim take down bows. We bought 4 with a donation from TNWTF. (Thanks guys..    )
The Ragim 48" work well for the younger and smaller kids.

[Jack Shanks]

Our club has around 50 youths age 6-16 shooting our JOAD program weekly. We need to run two sessions to accommodate the number of shooters. The club has around 25 T/D youth bows in various lengths and weights that we provide for kids that don't have a bow of their own. We have Samics, PSE and Greatree I believe.

This week a number of girlscout troops are using our club grounds for camp and we are teaching archery to them.