We keep a lot of non-perishable food on hand, as well as water and medicine. And if the need ever arose, I want to be skilled enough to be able to keep the family fed with local game. It's not far-fetched to imagine a supply chain disruption, where the supermarket runs out of everything. Look no further than the current economic crisis in Venezuela to understand my point.
A few friends were over recently, and we shot for half a day at the local gun range. Lots of fun!
Next we pulled out the bows, and I found that mine had developed a broken limb :(
This was a pretty old early 1990's era bow. I'm sure it was the hot ticket back then. Now it's a broken down bow that I can't find a replacement limb for. You can buy this bow complete off Ebay for about $50, so is it worth bothering with a broken one?
Instead of replacing or repairing the Jennings, I got a brand new mid-level bow. I also scrapped the old fat aluminum arrows and purchased a dozen slender carbon fiber arrows.
The guys at North 40 were awesome, and set up the draw length and tension, then adjusted the peep sight and the range pins just for me. It's really accurate, and I'm looking forward to seeing how consistently I can hit a target.
Before I set up my little archery range though, I need to clear a few trees that we whacked last week.
I did some archery hunting in Kansas back in the mid to late 80's. It was, for the most part, a very good experience. Learned a lot. Even, on two different occasions, had a big doe not 20 feet in front of me. These were white tail. Now, the big challenge for me is I have to shoot a bow left handed and I'm right handed. Try doing that sometime, without risking dry firing. My bow is very old and probably needs to be replaced too but new ones are a bit expensive, especially left handed models. Once you learn to successfully hunt with a bow you can use the same tactics, but for cammo clothing, for hunting with a rifle and should produce positive results every year.
ReplyDeleteShooting a lefty bow sounds like a royal pain for a righty. Can't even imagine attempting it, so my hat is off to you. All my friends who have taken up bow hunting say they would have been far better rifle hunters, had they bothered to learn the archery skill of getting close to their prey.
ReplyDeleteLike I said, I don't really intend to hunt, but if it comes to hunger or hunting, I'll do the hunting. I just want to be accurate and consistent for right now.