It is without a doubt that the archery family is a special family. Traditional Archery even more. The last week was but another amazing example of how great this place can be.
Benjy was very kind and brought a myself and Doug Campbell from the mountains of Wyoming and Montana to the low country of South Carolina to hunt the prehistoric alligator.
I didn't really know what to expect from this hunt and Benjy did his very best to prepare us for what we would encounter. I will let Doug and Benjy their tails and I will tell you mine.
Benjy and his wife were amazing hosts. They showed us true southern hospitality. Benjy has a glow of passion for gator hunting and he really knows the game. Once you have a gator on the line its all business and he knows how to make sure you get your lizard. He is patient and deliberate. Through all the gear malfunctions we had he never missed a smile.
This hunt was more challenging than i expected. There are a few western animals that are hard to field judge. Though i am sure any are as tough as judging a gator in the dark when all you can see is his eyes and nose until you have some experience. Also I will rat myself out here and say that hitting a gator was not all that easy. I had difficulties understanding where the body was and how they posture themselves in the water. Hence, I missed several. Doug and Benjy had fun with that ha ha.
Also the dark to daylight hunting schedule is backwards for a western guy. I was pretty beat by the time we had mine in the boat.
The hunt basically works like this, you travel the river systems according to the tide and shine the gators eyes. They glow bright red as if they are rubies. What I found really interesting about the eyes is you have to be holding the light or directly behind it to see the glow. There was no angular reflection at all. Nor could you determine anything about the size of the gator from the glow. Then you approach slowly in a stalk so to speak. You do your best to determine size and make a decision on whether to shoot or not(you have about 1 second to do that). There are tricks to estimating size from a distance such as location. The smaller gators normally stay to the bank and the larger ones often cruised the channel.
Our first night we saw a lot of gators. Many in the 7-9 foot range.I was not successful that evening at anything other than making a few splashes and learning a lot about gators and gator hunting.
More to follow lots to do today.
Topic: Benjy and the Dinasours + two mountain guys (Read 1549 times)
