Doc

That really looks like fun. Will you have equipment available or does the shooter use their own? What is the distance? Sights allowed? Some guys are pretty good with their recurves, especially when they finally get zeroed in on the target. By the way..... to answer your original question...... Yes I would pay the $5 for the shot, and probably do it several times. It's one of those things that are a challenge an archer simply couldn't pass up....lol. Doc

I'm brand new at this trailcam thing so there is quite a novelty factor involved, and I seem to have difficulty going any longer than once a day ..... lol. I know that's excessive, but I still get a bunch of pictures everytime I check. I'm sure that will eventually wear off a bit, but it's kind of like checking a trapline ...... I just can't wait to see what I got. I've got two cameras out, and they are not far from the house and real easy to get to. Doc

The one thing that I need the most is the practice, skill and equipment to create consistancy. I can get around just about anything else, but if I can't shoot that bow and arrow in a way that has consistant form and execution and results, then I might better stay home. I can't think of anything that deserves to even be on the same list as that one item. Doc

When I look at some of these high-priced bows on the market today, I am hard-pressed to see anything that would justify spending $1000 or anything near that amount. There was a time when I could sit there and talk myself into the fact that I needed that bow in order to bring down a deer. Some how I was always able to ignore the bows already hanging on the wall and the fact that each of them had a proven record and already had taken a pile of deer. Well, today I understand just what it really takes to take home a deer, and the price-tag and age of the bow has absolutely nothing to do with it. I've saved a ton of money since making that revelation. However, these days, consumer purchases are what is required to get this economy going again, so I suppose that it is real good that my cheap-skate ideas are not catching on. Doc

I put my beard and mustache on back in 1972, and it never came off ...... still there. It's a whole lot whiter now .... ha-ha ..... but it's the same style and length. It helps people remember that old man when I come walking at them ..... Doc

Bowhunting has become the cheapest recreation that I have ever taken part in. It is almost free. How can that be? Simple ...... I have taken control of all of my bowhunting expenses and froze out all new purchases. I did my time trying to keep up with the latest and greatest and fastest and smoothest and whatever marketing buzzwords that they could throw at me. I looked on my wall downstairs and including recurves, I counted 11 bows. I went into my shop and there is a bundle of arrows that I can't put both hands around (a lifetime's accumulation from outfitting all those bows). And then I remembered that each one of those bows hanging on the wall have taken deer (except for the two tournament models). Some of those bows have taken more deer than my new one. All of the deer taken with the older bows were just as dead as the ones taken with the newer bows, and also just as dead as any deer I would take with a $1000 bow purchased today. This also pointed out the fact that I can't buy a deer with expensive equipment. It kind of put it all in perspective for me. I'm not into bowhunting to try to buy my way into a deer kill. There is nothing in my basement that will not kill a deer. I may have to occasionally buy some vanes, or replace or re-make an occasional bow string, or I might have to pick up a tube of fletch-tite now and again, but all those expenses taken together still make bowhunting the cheapest pastime I could ever have. I decide how expensive (or cheap) it will be. I have control of the cost not some sharp madison Avenue huckster in the magazines or on TV. If bowhunting is expensive, it's because we make it that way. I don't play their game anymore. Doc

Now is that a picture of a happy hunter or what??:clap: I love it when a plan comes together. Doc

But the bean field that Catrat was talking about was "plowed". That doesn't leave a whole lot of stubble or anything else if the farmer knows how to plow. There might be some action along the hedgerows leading to the part of the field that still has corn. That may be worth a look. Otherwise, the trick is to find exactly what they are currently feeding on and how they are approaching it and set up accordingly. I think the old bean field is a non-issue now. By the way, I wouldn't put all my eggs in one basket either. That cornfield could suffer the same fate as the beanfield at any time. Doc

We're talking about a special "urban hunt" where the object is to get rid of the deer population. It's not being done to manicure the herd or improve the herd. It is being done to eliminate the herd, or at least put a severe dent in them. It's not a sporting event, but rather a utilitarian job that needs to be done. I think when you sign up to help with that task, you have to be able to put aside your prejudices about gender and quality of the kill, and even the quality of the hunt, or back off and let someone else do the job that will actually do what is needed. Doc

Last picture ......... What is that on the horizon? Are they a row of those big round hay bales? Looks like 9 "things" stacked in a row. Doc

If the field has just been plowed, what will draw seer there?

The only way that I could imagine a mechanical out-penetrating a fixed-blade cut-on-contact head would be in cases where the arrow with the fixed blade could not be, or for some reason was not, tuned well and entered the deer in an improper axial orientation, and the mechanical was tuned and flying straight. Other than that, its pretty hard to imagine a mechanical head winning in a penetration contest. Doc

I have never known anyone (including professional archers) who could quantify how much inaccuracy at the target you get for every one thousandth of an inch of out-of-straightness. So your question is very hard to answer in a very scientific way. The only thing I can say is that a shaft that looks like a hockey stick probably won't fly very good. If it's a few thousandths of an inch out of straight, it probably will go right in with the rest of the group. I don't think I would pay a whole lot of money just to improve straightness by a thousandth or two. Doc

I have no experience with urban or suburban hunting, so I am simply asking a question here. Does the participation of bowhunters in population control activities in areas where non-hunters and antihunters are so heavily concentrated, ever cause situations that publicly damage the bowhunting image? I'm thinking of situations where a deer may be running around a neighborhood with an arrow sticking out of it, or a deer going through the death throes in a rather public fashion, or unfound wounded deer that eventually succumb to their wounds in a rather embarrassing location like a school playground, or the yard of a day-care center, etc. I know that most bowhunts are special hand-picked bowhunters and some even with qualifying activities in order to be picked as a participant. But I also understand that even with the most careful and highly skilled shooters, unhappy things can and do happen. So I guess I am curious as to whether getting involved in such public activities has caused any P.R. problems for us anywhere. Doc

I support keeping bow season for bows. Seems like a reasonable thought to me. It has nothing to do with bashing. In fact the only bashing that I have seen in the whole crossbow controversy is the name-calling (selfish, elitest, etc.) from those who insist on cramming an inappropriate weapon into bow seasons. It's not a controversy that was brought on by bowhunters.

Perhaps an effective ground stand would be a rusted out Volkswagon bus up on blocks. A good camo pattern would be petunias or something:D

LOL ..... Everybody wants to turn bowseason into T-ball.

First of all, if indiscriminant removal of deer was what I signed up to do, that is what I would do. However, you have piqued my interest with the term "urban hunt". It kind of conjures up some comical and/or distressing images of hunting in people's back yards. Or perhaps erecting a treestand over-looking someone's sidewalk. Or tracking a wounded deer with an arrow sticking out of it, through a dozen properties and finding a sandbox with a bunch of kids crying and screaming at the flopping deer in it's death-throes in their sandbox. What exactly does an urban hunt really look like and how do you avoid the potential social conflicts of hunting in a densely populated residential area?

However, the reality of it all is that nobody really cares about that sort of thing anymore. It's just a sign of the times.

I saw that video. It was kind of interesting. I have no doubt that if the device has the killing potential that they portrayed, it will wind up in our so-called bow seasons. Obviously, the definition of a bow has become meaningless, so why not? You might be surprised what all will be stuffed into what used to be bow seasons in the future now that we no longer worry about bow seasons being for bows.

It's interesting to see all the different ways that people try to interpret what all should be included in "bow" season. But it seems that most of the replies indicate that nobody really wants any definitions applied at all. To them, bow season is just another time of the year that has absolutely no more significance than some place-holder on a calendar. Jam in whatever you want. On other forums, I have even seen people pushing the idea of putting primitive black powder guns into bow seasons and calling the whole thing a "primitive weapons season". That is an idea that I predict will eventually find traction. But anyway, the point is that since bowhunting is in the process of completely losing its identity, I am expecting that eventually people will be looking at eliminating it. I know the gun hunters are already looking at ever increasing success rates of bowseasons and questioning why we continue to enjoy a head start over them. They are wondering why we have exclusive access to the herd during the rut and have the unfair advantages at the better bucks (i.e. thinning the herd of quality bucks) before they even get a chance at them. And with the new attitudes toward archery equipment, who can blame them. Their point gets stronger and more convincing with every new type of equipment that gets added. Sure let's keep heading toward eliminating the definitions of bow hunting. There will undoubtedly come a time when we no longer have unique set-aside seasons. The way we're heading, there won't really be any purpose or justification. If all you want to do is to cram more people into the bow seasons, by golly we're on the right track. Notice I didn't say cram more people into the iover-all hunting ranks, but simply moving people from gun hunting into bow hunting. I'm not sure just what that is supposed to accomplish other than to destroy the primary reasons that many hunters decided to take up the bow. But anyway, the crossbow is just one more move toward integrating gun hunters with the bowhunters and blurring the whole reason we ever established a bow season in the first place. Fortunately for me, I am of an age where I really shouldn't worry about such things, but I do have a fondness for bowhunting and it is an activity that I would like to see continue after me without being diluted into something that is hardly recognizeable anymore. But then, I suppose that's just the way things evolve. Doc

Let's straighten out a few of those minor points. Since I was around back in the days of adoption of compounds, I can pretty well describe just what was accepted traditional archery equipment back then. I had a sight on my recurve long before the compound was accepted and it actually didn't function any different than the sights of today. There were people using releases although I never did (too cheap to spend the money). By the way the idea of a release goes all the way back to the "Turkish ring" used centuries ago. Today's generation seems to think that archery gadgets and inventions didn't begin until the advent of the compound bow.....lol. As far as the reduced hold weight, That is the ONLY true difference between a compound and recurve or longbow. And from that one sole difference, people are now claiming the precedent has been set for the inclusion of crossbows into archery seasons. If you can make that wild leap, imagine what kinds of different equipment future generations will be able to justify using the same principles of precedent. As I said before, there will come a day when all hunters will be wondering just why there is a special archery season. Already I hear gunhunters questioning the reasoning behind our having a "special" season. The inclusion of a crossbow doesn't exactly bolster our case and the inclusion of who-know-what in the future based on the fact that archery season definitions can be and are being randomly bastardized, will continue to blur that reasoning for the special seasons. It's not like we don't already have muzzleloader hunters eyeballing the archery season here in NY. Doc

I remember the arguments in the days of old when compounds were being discussed as legitimate weapons to be added the bow seasons. Oh those old-timers were convinced that we were setting a precedent that would be used in the future to add other more inappropriate weapons into the bowseasons, and that eventually bowhunting would lose its identity and purpose. Of course being a young brash upstart, I argued the foolishness of such notions. Who would ever have guessed how right those old-timers really were? That's exactly what is happening today. The compound is being used as a precedent for inclusion of the crossbow. They nailed it. Of course in order to use it as a precedent you have to ignore the fact that all the principles of archery shooting still apply with the compound, the stance, the draw, the anchor, the bow arm consistancy, the grip consistancy, the follow-through. It's all the same whether you shoot a recurve, longbow or compound ........ exactly the same. Which one of these shooting disciplines do you use with a crossbow? Yes, that's right ...... none of them. But we'll overlook that as we make room for one more weapon crammed into bow seasons. Forget all that stuff, it doesn't matter, the compound still serves as the precedent for stuffing in the crossbow. That's the beauty of precedents. We can make up excuses for modifying seasons to include whatever kind of weapon we want, even those that don't make any sense. We can keep at it until you can't even remember what the actual reason was that you had a special bow season to begin with. Makes you wonder what sort of contraption the crossbow will serve as the precedent for at some point in the future doesn't it?

Unbelievable how docile that deer became as soon as its eyes were covered. Doc

It will be interesting to see just how the recent states where crossbows have been jammed into bow seasons will go. I don't think you will see a whole lot of difference in the first bunch of years. Look how long it took for Ohio crossbow shooters to take over the majority position in their bow season. It doesn't happen over night. Doc