So how long before you got "good"?

[Walt Francis]

It was three months between the time I started shooting a traditional bow in mid January and when I went hunting for spring bear on April 15.  The first morning I got a rock chuck  and that evening spot and stalked my bear for my first Traditional big game animal with a longbow.

[Thumper Dunker]

Heck I just was born good.     At messing up.

[Stumpkiller]

Originally posted by Over&Under:
I'll let ya know when that day arrives:)

 

I shoot every day.  I'm not the best, not the worst, but adequate and when deer hunting, patient and persistant . . . which, as they say in Russian Aircraft Factories, seems to be Godunov.

As far as comfortable hunting - you will get no better sitting home.  Go out, shoot at small game, shoot at stumps, clumps and watch rumps (whitetails waving "goodbye" as they scamper off).  Eventually your stars will align and the deer will be where you want when you want and your arrow will find the right spot.

Truthfully - I don't remember not being good enough with a bow for hunting.  I just had a problem getting within three yards of deer at first.    

[Bowwild]

ChuckC's advice was terrific!

Measure the size of your quarry's kill zone. On a deer this would be about the size of a full-size magazine (horizontal). When at any distance you can consistently put arrows in an area 1/2-3/4 that size you have established an effective range. If that's 5 yards your chances are very restricted but you can do it. I'd move back 5 yards at a time.

Some of the most range extending practice I've ever done (this goes back to my original curve days in the early 1970's)was to start at 5-10 yards and shoot an arrow. If I hit the "zone" I stepped back another 5 yards and shot again. I wouldn't reward myself by stepping back further until I had an arrow in the "zone" at that distance. Sometimes I can start at 5 yards and make it all the way to 30 with 6 arrows.

When I returned to recurves in 2010 I practiced for the 8 months prior to season opening until I could do this at 20 yards. I killed two deer with the curve that year, one at 21 and the other at 16 yards.  Last year, 2012) I only felt solid at about 15 yards. This year I'm at 30 yards thanks to preparations for a Moose hunt that didn't happen.

I absolutely woud not attempt a shot, on an unwounded deer, at a distance more than 1-2 yards further than my established effective range. I don't believe in luck. Nor do I subscribe to the theory that "nothing dies unless arrows fly".  It doesn't turn my stomach to gut shoot a paper deer. Nor do I have to spend 8-24 hours or more trying to recover a poorly struck paper or foam target.

When I was 16 a veteran bowhunter came into camp with an empty quiver. He had launched all his arrows at about 80-90 yards at a buck across a gulley. When I asked him why he shot so far, he quoted that line to me. I knew back then (1970) that this fellow twice my age had an unworthy ethic.