In your own words, why is it so important to connect with "the past"

[Bow Bum]

If you don't know/or forget where you've been. You cannot make a good choce of where your going to go.

Being connected to the past provides to key items.

1. You know what works; and revisiting the past can remind you of what works when things are off kilter. Sometimes we only look back over the past week of shooting to find out what we did only days ago that was working so well. Someytimes we need to look back before our own time and see what was working then that we need to re-implement at present.

2. We know what doesn't work as a result of past failures,or embarassments. I'll save the diatride and say that its nearly the same type of retrospective thinking as point #1.

In fact #1 is what I think brought me to the trad way 5-6 years ago. The wheels had started to become the focus of the hunt for me. The wheels, the insane accuracy, the tweaking, the gadgets etc... A stickbow takes all of the equipment distractions away and lets me focus on the hunt again, whic is why I started in the 1st place.

B

[RC]

Its just fun to me.RC

[gregk]

To me archery is suppose to be a primitive sport, using a wheelie device just has no appeal for me. One day soon i hope to try building my own selfbow.  

[Bowwild]

I shoot bows to hunt. I love to shoot my recurves and do almost every day. I imagine without hunting I wouldn'te be an archer. I write this because I consider these days I'm living in to be the best of times, at least in the past 175 years or so. Wildlife regulation and management have recovered most of our mistakes of overharvest and market shooting our ancestors conducted.

I'd like to say I live for today but in reality I'm always thinking to the next season or, during the hunting season, my next hunt.

My love for archery, and recurves in particular, has nothing to do with the past for me. My first recurves don't compare to the beautiful work of today's modern bowyers.

[ChuckC]

Jumped to the end.  I don't want to live in the past.  Its not about the past for me, its just about what feels right.  Seems what feels right to me is very similar in a lot of ways to what felt right "back then".

I am not into the competition, the need to show off, the need to get one no matter what.  I am into the feeling it gives me to be out and about.  That's all.
ChuckC

[LimBender]

I have no trad background, just the usual weaponry and compounds, so no nostalgia.  When I think of traditional I am looking to the future. It is relaxing, fun, a challenge, a hobby, and something I can see doing with my girls.  And although I happen to think it will make for some intense low light, dense cover deer hunting, it is the first weapon that I don't intend to use as only a hunting tool.

[Friend]

The wind continues to blow directly into your the face as the years pass you by. Look within and sieze the moment. Reaching to connect and fulling immersing  myself while striving for that perfect shot execution and becoming a part of the mystical flight of the arrow has been fully realized thru this traditional art.  No more greater endeavor nor other extraordinary experience has touch me and provides the fulfillment as the stick and string. For some day, I hope to procalim, we are one.

Hunting is an integral part rooted firmly within me , has left its indelible mark and engulfs me at times like an alert and ravenous predator. There is no longer the chronic craving need to harvest an animal, but the desire to be intimately close and well within range, with bow in hand, for the fire burns deep. My prey has received the greatest honor by giving up its life to our traditonal way,

[Kevin Dill]

I can say very honestly that I feel no connection to the past in how I hunt today. I have no desire to collect old bows, or hunt with them. I see old equipment as "interesting", but I don't revere it in any form. I know the history of our sport, but I'm not drawn to it in any way. I have no desire to replicate the past or do it the way our forefathers did it. I have long stated that I use (by the definition of many) "traditional" equipment, but I don't think of myself as a traditional bowhunter. I think of myself as a hunter, and one who likes to use a bow.

I choose my equipment, and hunt with it because I am the happiest with how it performs for me. I'm out there to hunt...and maybe kill something. I like a good challenge. I like knowing I can slip to within 5 yards of a bedded whitetail, caribou or black bear and kill them in their bed with an uncomplicated weapon.

Beating the animal at his own game is what I live for. The bow and arrow is my simple implement to make the kill.

[GreyGoose]

I like connecting with my personal past, shooting traditional equipment (recurves) as a boy and into my teens.  

I am enjoying the added challenge of preparing to hunt with a longbow instead of compounds, not that the latter hasn't been a lot of fun, and more satisfying to me than hunting with firearms. I like the woods to be quiet when I hunt, so I like to be quiet when I shoot.

Perhaps some of us want to connect with a fictional past as well;  I wanted to shoot a longbow instead of recurves just to get in touch with my inner Robin Hood.

[BWD]

To me it's not about the past, but the present. It's what I enjoy doing.

[jim ratcliff]

Simpler times when a man was a man! I enjoy it because the world as it is now is a big race...run...run...run..hurry up I'm going to be late!...I often feel I was born a hundred or so years to late...this is why I like traditional archery!

[thumper15]

It's where it all started for mankind, the first modern weapon. Mankind has used the bow for tens of thousands of years. The cave drawings in spain show humans using a longbow to hunt and survive not a rifle or compound. If it hadn't been for the invention of the bow we don't know how mankind would have turned out. From native americans to african tribes to the jungles in south america it has been used and is still in use as a way to survive and hunt in parts of the world. It has won major battles in conflict such as the battle of crecy in france, and was up until the invention of gunpowder and cannon, the modern warfare weapon. So to me mankind owes much of it's existance to the bow, and for that reason we need to keep traditional archery alive so we don't forget our past and where we all came from. Plus it's more fun and a challenge to live like our ancestors.

[stiknstringer]

I love shooting the longbow.It's honest,uncomplicated, and makes me feel a part of the natural way of things.That's the best I way I can put it.

[John Scifres]

I'm cheap and like to make my own stuff.  Never got the timing down on a homemade wheelbow  

[moththerlode]

After many years shooting competitivly with compound I just want to fling arrows for fun. I went full circle to where I was as a kid.. love it !!!

                 Scott

[Running Buck]

I don't live in the past, but I do like the hard earned reward of taking game with the stickbow. There is a lot of personal pride built into every shot taken during a summer's worth of practice. Modern equipment takes too many short cuts to get to the same reward and as a result removes a lot of the spirit of the hunt.

[Fisher Cat]

You can't connect with the past.  Its gone.  You can only connect with interpretaions of it.  

My interpretation is that the "ancient ones" used archery to survive (for food & warfare).  Ironically, I believe they would have used compounds or firearms if they had been available at the time.

I shoot trad archery in the present, because I find it more fun and more sporting.  Even a crappy rifle will outshoot the most high-tech, hologram sighted, whisker bicuit equipped compound, so what's the point?  These things were created to game the system, so "sportsmen" could get better hunting opportunities with minimal handicap and "the industry" could make money. Technology makes bowhunting easier, but if you want easier, why not use a rifle? - John

[deaddoc4444]

Its simple !  There are plenty of other complicated  things in our lives today.  I have no idea how use  80% of the functions on my cell phone .  I spend enough time daily using complicated equipment and instruments . WHY would I want to spend countless hours  OF MY TIME  making my leisure and my favorite pastime( HUNTING )  any more complicated than it has to be .  
  I have ONE worry to contend with  while hunting , that is "will the bow string break" ? That is the worst possible scenario . I have another string with me THAT I MADE MY SELF   so NO WORRIES !!!   again  SIMPLE

[Kenny Henderson]

I'm not trying to "connect" with the past, I'm just keeping it simple with what I love to do.

[Dustin Waters]

without the past you lose sight of the future.  

Thats why I stay connected to the trad archery lifestyle.  I want to keep the spirit of hunting the right way around for my children to see.  I dont want them to get caught up in the posed picture, advertising, big buck crazy.  I want them to slow down and enjoy themselves in the woods, to learn from nature and what it has to offer, not only physically but mentally as well.