Article #1: Getting Ready for the Game, by Bob Robb
It’s hot outside. The kids are in summer mode – ball games, camps, all sorts of activities that eat their parent’s days like Pac-man. In our challenging economy, you’re working more and making less. There’s just a lot going on. And yet…
In the back of your mind, you know that bow season is just around the corner. It will not be long until the elk start bugling, the muley bucks cruising the high alpine bowls, the bears eating everything in sight in anticipation of winter. To maximize your chances for success, you know you need to begin preparing sooner rather than later.
Today’s serious western bowhunter knows that he must be much more prepared than the treestand whitetail hunter. In addition to the physical challenge, you must be ready to make shots at long range. Sure, we all want to call a bull into spitting distance or creep up so close to a bedded buck we can grab him by the antlers, but the reality is, it probably won’t happen that way. More than likely, you’ll be taking a shot a half-a-football field away or more – often at a steep downhill angle.
Today’s high-tech compound bows, precision carbon arrows, and streamlined broadheads make such shots practical – but only if you take the time to set them up properly, then put in the practice time. Here’s a step-by-step way to help ensure you’ll be ready to rock on opening day.
Choose the right bow/arrow/broadhead combination: Most of us will be shooting the same equipment we’ve shot for a season or three. But if you’re in the market for new gear, you need to match it to the task at hand. In the past several seasons I’ve shot a lot of new bows, some with very hard cam designs built for maximum speed, others with a bit softer cams designed more for “shootability.” You need a bow you can draw smoothly and just feels good to you when you shoot it. For myself, I’ll never shoot a harsh cam design again just to wring another 10 fps of speed out of it. The last one I owned sent me to the elbow surgeon. No kidding.
There are lots of top-notch carbon shafts out there – the only choice for extreme western bowhunting – and you need to match your shaft to your draw weight/draw length. When it is all said and done, a medium-weight shaft is the best overall choice, even though the lighter shafts will give you more initial arrow speed. At long range, the heavier arrow will be just as fast, if not faster, than a lighter shaft of equal spine, and carry more kinetic energy. Use the smallest fletch profile you can get away with.
My own 2009 set-up is a 70 lb. Mathews Drenalin, 28-inch draw length, shooting a 28 ½-inch Carbon Express 350 Maxima Hunter shaft and 100-grain broadhead. Total arrow weight is 400 grains, and they fly at a chronographed 265 fps.
Set It Up Right: You need to affix the arrow rest and bow sight properly. With the rest – especially drop-aways – make sure the rest prongs clear the inside of the riser and that everything is snugged down. Your bow sight must be level, one reason sights with a bubble level are so popular. It takes a bit of time to get it right, but unless the sight is level your shots will hit left or right at long distance. And make sure the sight has enough pins! The 3- to 5-pin sights so popular with treestand guys don’t cut it out West. My Sonoran Bowhunting Products sight has 9 pins; 7 is the minimum.
Tune it: This isn’t horseshoes or hand grenades; there is no such thing as “close enough.” The bow/arrow/broadhead combination is either tuned perfectly or it is not. I am a paper tuning fanatic, and am not satisfied until my hunting arrows (including broadhead) produce perfect bullet hole tears in paper at 10 yards. This is the only way you can guarantee long-range accuracy.
To that end, I also weigh every broadhead and arrow shaft both individually and together. I want a quiver full of finished hunting arrows to weigh within +/- 2 grains of each other. Again, such consistency is essential for pinpoint long-range accuracy.
Sight It In: You cannot sight in a bow in one range session. To get a new bow ready to go it usually takes me 5-7 sessions to get the sight pins dialed in from 20-100 yards. Yes, 100 yards. Most guys do not stretch it this far, but practicing shots at this distance makes an 80-yard shot pretty easy, really. I set pins in 10-yard increments.
Part of the distance shooting game is knowing how your arrows perform. I start out with a new dozen shafts and broadheads, and number each arrow/broadhead combination. Then I shoot each into my broadhead target at 50 yards. I mark down on paper where each hits the target. You’ll find that most group close together, but there will always be an arrow or two that strikes outside the group. I try a different broadhead on these, but usually they get relegated to the scrap heap. I want a quiver field with arrows that group tightly.
Of course you know how important knowing the exact distance to the target is, and already have a laser rangefinder that has an angle-compensating feature, right? No way am I shooting at long range without painting the target first.
Specificity Training: This is a term exercise physiologists use to describe training athletes to perform a specific task. For example, sprinters don’t try and maximize their bench press, they train to run fast. Western bowhunters train to make those shots they anticipate will be most likely to occur.
For example, elk hunters should practice shooting from their knees, torso twisted at a weird angle, to replicate the shot they’ll likely get if they call a bull in. If they are going to hunt from a ground blind, practice shooting off the same stool you’ll be sitting on. Mule deer stalkers should practice stalking and shooting off their knees and standing. In all cases, practicing downhill shots is critical so you get the feel for exactly where the sight pins need to be held in relation to what the rangefinder says.
I shoot field points a little early on, but several months before season I switch to broadheads and shoot the exact same bow/arrow/broadhead combination I’ll be hunting with. Sure I tear up a couple of broadhead targets each year, but so what? It’s the only way to know exactly how to hit the chest at all distances from all those weird shooting positions. I also like to do some practicing when the when is blowing. Again, this is the only way to know exactly how your bow will dance in your hands on a windy day, and precisely how much the wind will move an arrow off course. Lastly, if you can shoot at life-sized 3D animal targets for a portion of the pre-hunt preparation so much the better.
Extend Your MESR: Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither will your ability to make long shots. It takes several practice sessions just to get the sights dialed in, and several more to learn just how far you can shoot. Many years ago I coined the term MESR – Maximum Effective Shooting Range – as a gauge of how far a bowhunter should take a shot at an animal. To learn what your own MESR is, take this simple test. On the target range, shoot 5 hunting arrows at an 8-inch circle – the approximate size of a deer-sized animal’s heart/lung area. Start at 20 yards, and do not move back to the 30 yard line until you can place 4 of 5 shots in this circle on a regular basis. Do the same at 30, 40, 50, and so on. At first it will be a snap, but eventually you’ll reach the point where it is not. Say that’s 70 yards, and you are only hitting the circle 3 of 5 times. Here’s where you realize that little imperfections in shooting form are killing you. You’ll be forced to concentrate more, tweak your bow, whatever it takes until you can pass the test. If you can’t, it means you should not launch on an animal at that distance.
Oh, and I practice extending my MESR from my knees, too. It doesn’t take long to find out that you cannot make the shot from your knees as far out there as you can when standing up.
One other note about practice sessions. It is far better to shoot a few arrows at a time, several times a week, than try and get it all done in one day. We all have our own limits, but I find that after maybe 40 arrows my mind begins to wander and my shooting muscles fatigue to the point where instead of getting better, I am doing nothing more than ingraining bad habits.
The Bottom Line: Taking an animal’s life is not a game; it is very serious business. To that end, ethical bowhunters never, ever randomly launch arrows at game. While they do everything they can to be the very best bow shot they can be, they know their limits and stay within them. For some that means never shooting past 40 yards. For others, 80 yards may be the limit. They also know that each shot opportunity is different and many factors come into play – the wind and weather, the animal’s posture and body position, how many other animals are in the area, how tired the hunter is, how well he has been shooting that day – and they factor all these into the shoot or don’t shoot equation.
In today’s hunting environment, though, the bowhunter who is prepared to make the shot at distance is the one who has the best chance of consistent success.
