As I woke up on the morning of December 29th, I told myself that today was going to be the day. Today would be the day that I closed the distance, and filled my archery tag on a mule deer buck. The 29th would be my 5th day of hunting mule deer here in my home state of Arizona. This time of year here is a time that has grown on me and dug its roots deep into my core. Year after year I take to the field with my bow to chase both mule deer and coues deer. Every year I have a few successes mixed in with a ton of failures. Of course I like to look at those failures as lessons learned and opportunities to grow. That goes for all walks of life, not just hunting. This year would prove no different in the “lessons learned” department.
If you are anything like me, you are probably constantly trying to figure out how to be better at what you do. I am not one that tends to settle for good enough. In this case, I am talking about a love that most of us share and that is bowhunting. The thrill of sneaking in close and sending an arrow through the vitals of our quarry is one that is unparalleled. It’s a feeling that wouldn’t be describe as “a dime a dozen.” For that reason, I think is why we want more and more of it. At least that’s how it is for me. I don’t know about you, but I have way more failures than successes in the field and I think that’s how it should be. If I killed something every time I went out, bowhunting would lose the mystique that I’ve grown to love so much. Still though, I am always trying to progress as an archery hunter.
My wife LOVES jigsaw puzzles. Oftentimes my whole coffee table is nothing but puzzle pieces for weeks at a time. Every time that she opens a new box and dumps out thousands of tiny pieces, I can’t help but admire her tenacity. Of course she doesn’t look at them as a whole, she looks at them in sections and breaks them down like that. Usually, she finds all of the end bits and organizes them. From there, she will proceed to actually connect them. After going through this arduous process, while all the while maintaining an intimidating level of patience, she finds success. What happens when she is finished? The puzzle gets broken back down into thousands of pieces and put back in it’s box. Done and done. Onto the next puzzle.
I am going to go ahead and say that “Backcountry Hunting” is the cool thing to do right now. Rightfully so! I think it is pretty cool myself! The ultimate, most hardcore hunt right? A truly wild experience, living out of nothing more than what is in your backpack. The promise of adventure coupled with the anxiety of the unknown. You see it all over social media about how more and more folks are getting into backpack hunting. I personally think it is great. Good on them for wanting to take on such a demanding endeavor. This desire is oftentimes paired with a sudden need to start hitting the gym. If you have ever backpack hunted, you know why. Again, I love hearing this. People bettering their lives and pushing their limits in the name of hunting. In a world where more and more folks are glued to the couch instead of outside, this is definitely a plus in my book.
Fall hunting seasons are just getting kicked off and it is an exciting time of year, to say the least. The very moments we have been dreaming about and training for all year are about to present themselves. Maybe, we will capitalize on them and maybe we won’t. Time will deliver us that truth when it sees fit. That time I spend away from home usually wears me down pretty good mentally. While I do enjoy the disconnect of TV, social media, cell phones, and just people, I can’t help but get struck with a bit of homesick. I think it is necessary to feel this though.
The term “OTC Tags” is one that is growing more popular everyday in the hunting community. For those of you that don’t know what that stands for, it means “over the counter.” It is getting increasingly harder to draw tags through lottery systems. I don’t think it is going to start heading in the other direction anytime soon. We spend a ton of money every year on bows, clothing, optics, you name it. Hours and hours are spent at the range shooting our rifles and sighting in our archery equipment. For a lot of folks, myself included, it is disheartening when you invest so much time and money into something, only to be told you can’t go hunting this season. Not going hunting is just not an option on the table in my house. This is why I focus most of my attention on OTC tags.
As an avid bowhunter, the anticipation of Fall is enough to drive someone mad. It seems like last Fall came and went faster than ever. Unlike the time of year coming and going, the experiences I had are still fresh as rain. So fresh, that I find myself thinking about them daily. It feels like just last week I was on my first elk hunt in the backcountry of Colorado. That was something special I got to share with my brother and will be talking about with him well into old age. We experienced a lot of firsts on that trip. Some of them being our first out of state hunt, longest backpack hunt, and first bull elk we’ve ever called in. This hunt left a mark and instilled an addiction in both of us for backcountry elk hunting and just elk hunting in general really.
I feel like the only way for me to tell you why you need to consider hunting with a bow, is to tell you how I got hooked on it myself. Let us begin!
It wasn’t until around 15 years of age that the bow ended up snuggling its way into my life. It did so for the simple fact that my dad was sick and tired of not drawing rifle deer tags here in Arizona(We ended up moving out here from New York when I was 9). Archery deer tags in AZ can be purchased “over the counter.” That was something that we definitely wanted to get our hands on the following season. So, we bought some bows and started practicing religiously in the backyard. It was pretty cool shooting a bow for the first time. I remember thinking how hard it was to pull the string back and come to full draw. I also remember being amazed when I let the arrow go. The flight of the arrow captured my attention.
As I’ve gone down the road of this blog, one of the things that I’ve gotten asked the most is “what are you bringing on your backpack hunts?” In light of that, I have decided to post up my current backcountry gear list for 2017. My gear list is forever growing and shrinking, but hopefully you can get the gist of what is usually in my backpack. This list is going to be for an archery hunt in the early fall. If it were later in the year, I would just be bringing some extra layers along. I am by no means an ounce junkie, so I can’t tell you the EXACT weight of my pack and all of the contents in it. For most hunts, I am sitting in the 35 pound range though, depending on how much water I am packing in. That number will increase with the amount of days I am planning to be out, simply because of food. Each one of my food bags is in the realm of 2 pounds per day containing about 2500-3000 calories in each one. Besides food and water, everything else pretty much stays the same. If you have any questions, feel free to ask below in the comments.
I don’t know about you, but whenever I miss an animal and lose an arrow, I start hoping I don’t run out of arrows. I know that might sound hilarious, but it’s the truth for me. Probably just a mental thing really. This is especially true when I am backpacked into an area and have only the arrows that are in my quiver. Like a lot of folks, I have been carrying a 5 arrow quiver for quite some time and as of a few years ago, that quiver has always been a TightSpot. I loved the idea of the quiver being so much more closer to the riser, which would make it a lot easier to lay my bow in my lap while crab crawling my way down to a bedded mule deer. Just this past December, I was able to do just that and brought home my first archery buck. It was a day to remember for sure.
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