An early morning archery hunt. Sun up would come in about 30 minutes and I had a brush blind set up not far away. Just as I was coming down the hill that led to the blind, I fell, and I fell right on my release aid. It seemed ok until I tried to do a practice draw inside the blind. Can you guess what happened? Yup, clocked myself right in the face. Luckily, I had the tools to fix it. Had I not though, I would have been up the creek without a paddle. I didn’t have a backup release aid either. It was a turning point for me.
Bow season is something that I look forward to literally every single day of the year. I fell in love with archery hunting many years ago and it was for several reasons. Some of them are the sheer difficulty involved, intimate encounters with animals, and honestly just the act of shooting a bow and arrow. Along the way to each bow season, there is an immense amount of preparation. This is what I want to share with you. The Road to Bow Season if you will.
Down here in the southwest desert that I call home, glassing efficiently is the key to success. It’s a wide-open landscape that will eat through its fair share of boots in a hurry. Not to mention animals tend to be more spread out, due to the overall vastness of the landscape. So, in terms of efficiency sitting high on a vantage point and surveying the surrounding country with high-powered optics on a tripod is about as good as it gets.
In doing so, there can be a lot of switching between binoculars and spotting scopes. I prefer to glass with a smaller more general magnification like a 10×42 binocular. When I do find something I want a closer look at, I’ll pop those off and mount up a 65mm spotting scope. It sounds much easier than it is, and I’m mainly referring to target acquisition when switching between the two. There’s a trick to it that will save you time and time is money.
You’ve been lacing bullseye after bullseye most of the year with your bow. Confidence levels are at an all-time high as is the anticipation of the coming archery hunting season. In light of that, you finally pick up those broadheads and give em a whirl downrange. Suddenly, the confidence that once stood tall is squashed into the very ground you stand upon. While your field-tipped arrows rest in the bullseye they’ve grown to know so well, your broadhead-tipped arrow does not. It is the outlier in a suddenly uneasy situation. The reality of broadhead tuning is now present.
Throughout my childhood, my Dad would tell me old hunting stories from before I was around. At the time, I hadn’t really experienced much of the hunting life, so these stories sunk deep in my mind. One of those stories was of an archery deer hunt in upstate New York. It was just him and his bow. No rangefinder to speak of.
My Dad was sitting up in a tree and a lone buck came in beneath. He pulled his bow back, aimed, and let it loose thinking that deer steaks wouldn’t be far away. What really happened was he watched the arrow fly right over the buck’s back, followed by said buck running out of his life. “Should have aimed lower” my Dad said. It was my first lesson on shooting up or downhill with a bow.
It was just after Christmas. A new bow rested in my lap and I had a nice buck located in the desert that morning. He was in a lust crazed stare at a few does beneath him. All I had to do was make a small loop and my first archery deer would lay at my feet. Once I reached the base of the hill I needed to climb that would put me in shooting range, I dropped my boots and pack. Long story short, I ended up going way farther than I thought looking for the deer. I also stepped on a jumping cactus in my socks. These two instances made me question if this whole “dropping your boots” thing was really necessary for successful spot and stalk bowhunting. More experience in the coming years would tell me it wasn’t.
Each turn of the calendar I have grown to look forward to a few certain times of year. One of those times that has stolen a piece of my heart is early season high country mule deer hunting with a bow. The views are nothing short of breathtaking, as is the country beneath my feet. It steals my breath in more ways than one. And the sight of big velvet bucks feeding in what resembles a golf course and bedding in what resembles Mordor is addictive beyond measure. This past August I found myself on a solo backcountry bowhunting trip to Utah in search of such things. Along with what I’ve mentioned, I found something else. Something that will hold its weight throughout my days. Perspective.
I just returned from Utah not that long ago. It was a wicked backcountry hunt with just me and my bow that truly threw all of the highs and lows of bowhunting my way. I return to the very area that sparked my love for high country mule deer hunting and this time, the mountains rewarded me in more ways than one. So, naturally I’ve got another film in the works. It’s called “Absolute.” The teaser for this film is down below. Stay tuned in the near future for the full film release.
As always, I’d super appreciate if you hit that SUBSCRIBE button on Youtube to stay up to date with all future content. Thanks and good luck out there. Fall is here!
Index style release aids are without a doubt the most popular release aids in bowhunting. That’s for good reason. They are incredibly practical for the field and easy to use. A seamless transition from shooting a gun and one that you won’t have to worry about losing on a hunt, due to the wrist strap.
That seamless transition though is exactly where many run into problems though. I know I did. The running string of events is similar across the board. Someone grabs an index, says this looks easy to use, hooks it on the d-loop, and pulls the trigger. In the grand scheme of things, that’s all we’re really doing, and if that works for you, that’s awesome. Personally, I ran into issues, because there is a bit more to it than that.
So far I’ve got my new bow for 2022 set up, paper tuned, and sighted in. The next part in my process of getting this new rig ready for hunting season is bareshaft tuning. When I say bareshaft, I’m referring to knocking off the vanes of your arrow so there is no steering aid in the back. If I can get this arrow with no training wheels grouping with a fletched arrow, the result is fantastic arrow flight. This is the most precise way that I’ve found to get my fixed blade broadheads flying with my field points. So, I’m gonna break it down for you here.
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