Prevent archery aggravation with these tips
By Dave bates
For the Observer-Reporter
After finishing last week’s archery experience column, I realized I had a lot more to convey. I got to thinking about all the things I wished I had learned sooner rather than later that saved me a lot of problems in the field. Most were learned the hard way and I thought it might serve some of our younger generation some hassle if I were to write them down in one collective gathering.
Things I wished I had learned sooner:
* Wear rubber boots. As a cover scent, step in black walnuts, horse/cow manure, apples, fresh cut grass, etc. This has saved me more times that you might believe. It was also cheaper and more available. Watching a doe walk right over your entry footsteps and not stopping to notice them is a real confidence builder.
* Pay attention to the wind and hunt with it. Tie a piece of sewing thread to your stabilizer and let it hang about 8-10 inches to detect wind direction.
* Better to wait a night and hunt your stand with a favorable wind than push it and find that the wind gave you away, especially when it costs you the buck of a lifetime. Guess how I know this?
* Hang your clothes outside, away from the house. The box o’ dirt method can be OK when necessary to travel clothing on site but outside is always best.
* Maybe as important as scent management is ultraviolet light management. I found this out after a number of bucks stopped dead in their tracks and looked straight up at me that I was glowing like a star on a Christmas tree. Laundry detergents brighten, the opposite of what we are shooting for in the woods. UV sprays work and remember to refresh the application once in a while. This one took me a while to figure out. When it stopped, it ceased altogether.
* Better to have a bad stand in a good location versus a good stand in a bad location. Never hunt the same stand more than two or three nights in a row.
* Sharpen your broadheads. Keep them sharp. Practice with the same style of broadhead which you plan to hunt. Keep one broadhead for practice. Sure it is more practical (see cheaper) to shoot field points all summer, but come fall, work out the kinks with your broadheads. Learn their flight characteristics. Don’t kid yourself, they don’t fly exactly like field points. Also be consistent with the alignment of your broadheads and your vanes.
* In the final weeks approaching the archery opener, I had a ritual of shooting one broadhead per night. If I couldn’t hit with the first shot every time then I wasn’t ready to go.
* I’d rather have a quiet bow rather than a fast bow. Use as much noise dampening material as it takes. Limb savers, string buttons, whiskers, grips, etc. At 30 yards and in, I’ve had very few deer jump the string but always paid attention to the noise level.
* Murphy’s Law still works, especially in archery. K.I.S.S. – Keep It Simple Stupid. This adage has mostly worked for me. If there is a way to screw it up, I’ll find it. Don’t overcomplicate things.
* Always have a spare release handy. I am a sucker for the old-fashioned Scott rope release. They don’t wear the string serving as badly as caliper releases and I don’t have to use a loop. Yes, I just dated myself.
* This is probably the single biggest but most important mistake I made in archery. Don’t push a wounded deer. Now, admittedly, I am color blind and have difficulty in blood tracking deer. Almost every deer that I ever pushed (which is exactly three) I failed to recover. One I found the next spring. If I hit a deer, marginally, I let it go overnight and recovered it the next morning, the earlier the better. I have probably killed 30-40 deer with archery tackle. You can win with these odds, even in Las Vegas.
* Cover your face. Cover your hands. Use camo paint, gloves, face net, etc. It makes a difference.
* Less is more when it comes to calling. Rattling antlers work; so do grunt tubes and bleat calls. Use them sparingly.
* Last 30 minutes of shooting light is the magic hour. Stay put, sit still, good things happen in the half light. First 30 aren’t bad either but never had the same luck.
* Nov. 8 is the best night to hunt during the season. I am not kidding. I read a good article in Field and Stream many years ago. I paid attention in the seasons to follow. It was uncanny that I found myself taking better deer, more frequently on or around this date in Western Pennsylvania.
Please don’t think that I am trying to pass myself off as some sort of whitetail expert. Not even close. Everything I mentioned was taught to me by someone who knew volumes more than me. It is accumulated knowledge. If I can save you a fraction of the problems I caused myself over the years, then maybe the ink won’t have been wasted.
Good luck out there this season. Let me know if any of this paid off.
Dave Bates writes a weekly outdoors column for the Observer-Reporter. He can be reached at alphaomegashootingsolutions@gmail.com