phade

That is alot of skinning and fleshing and stretching.

Ohio is probably the best of all worlds. Good fishing, good hunting, decent cities to find work in, not as harsh winter, not overbearing summers. It'll never happen though. I think my wife is more in the thinking of holding things out here until we retire and then looking for an island. I actually am getting to like that idea.

Yes.

This is just bickering on top of bickering. Those who recreate and those who profit rarely meet eye to eye.

You obviously are not the majority of bowhunters. Most bowhunters need to practice much more often to be proficient at killing deer in a hunting situation. Xbow makes that practice need much less.

The lower practice count for mastering hunting accuracy is a huge advantage. My FIL who has never shot a bow in his life and is a lousy shot with a gun...took 25 shots to be shooting softball groups at 40 yards with his xbow. He shoots the thing one practice session a year before going out to hunt. That's a clear advantage in my book.

This thread is annoying. That is all.

These lines must have come from an someone who rides the short bus. That's two clear advantages in my book. Not one.

You can also only kill one buck in Ohio. Now the gun hunters can kill a second in NY.

Those 30 years were also before the internet, forums, online shopping that drop xbows on your door, and increased competition for hunting access. The rate of change is exponentially faster now. 30 years in that situation is more like 2-3 now.

I just bought a crossbow. Crud.

Business vs. pleasure. Big difference.

No offense, but you shouldnt even be remotely thinking the gauge on the battery life will work with lithiums. Those gauges are meant for alkaline. Lithiums wont tell you that they are near death in a game cam.

Not only that, but at some point, the stand will outlive the mesh seat. Chances are finding a replacement will not be easy. Now you have a stand and no seat. Much more of a fan of the metal seats.

Dog is doing fine, but the vet said they missed another stone so they'll likely have to go in again at some point if she doesn't pass it. Free of charge of course.

Thats my point. You burn through strings on xbows. I cant even fathom the number of shots on my bow strings and cables.

Welcome! I'm sure there are some decent places around Oswego for turkey.

One of our dogs is under the knife today to remove a large stone in her bladder. 10 years old...$1,500. I made the mistake earlier this week mentioning to my wife that "You know, she is 10 years old after all. Is $1,500 too much to spend?" Let's just say I won't ask that question ever again. Queue the water works. Sheesh.

You'll pay for it in the long run going cheap cam xbow. Burn through strings and you'll need a shop to swap it out most likely. I still think a base model excal is the smarter move short and long term.

One thing I was shocked at was how fast strings can wear out on xbows, especially the cammed ones. Some people swap out strings at 1k shots and re-serve at 500. That's insane.

I would go with Excalibur even though the cost is higher. They are going to be more likely to last longer than the modern cam crossbows. You can get a base model for $400-500 or slightly less used. I really wouldn't even want to think about getting a cheaper one because of the fact changing strings and working on them is likely something a shop will have to do rather than an Excal which is pretty easy to maintain.

I am a huge fan of getting recovery rights. Huge. But there are situations where this will help. One parcel I hunted on last year was within 500' of a house on a postage stamp lot. Literally a small 1/3 acre lot. It killed a few high odds set locations if we weren't able to hunt it, but locally the owners were fine with us. I could see in that situation where if we didn't have permission to recover, but could now hunt it, I would. A postage stamp house parcel can eliminate alot of huntable ground. Sure, the deer could run and die on that 1/4 or 1/3 acre, but I'd probably be willing to face those odds. Now, if there's even a sizeable parcel, recovery is critical.

My trick was to opt for Silver Lake State Park in the first session (May 1-15). Although I never connected there, I had so many clsoe encounters that it felt like a honey hole for me. Part of my fumbling was also the fact I would go in blind and try to run and gun. The last two years there, the hunting has been non-existant. I stopped putting in for it, I saw zero birds and heard zero birds in all of my hunts there for two seasons. The population dropped off big time there to the point I noticed no sign last time around. I'll put in for Letchworth this time around and hunt it a time or two and that's it. I think alot of the skill that goes into Letchworth is knowing the lay of the land and time on the ground actually hunting and scouting.

I can't justify using an older style ML for the current NYS season dates. I know most people will say that you can hunt with one in the firearms season, but I'd just assume carry my single shot H&R that is a tack driver. Less to mess with, too. The other thing is I've had to re-assess my wants/needs for a ML. My Vortek UL was $500 bucks and I use it 2-3x in ML season and that's about it. It's fun to shoot in summer, but the value isn't there. With MY UL being rusted to heck due to my flood last year, I'm on the market for a new ML and its probably going to be a stainless CVA Wolf for $200-$225 bucks. I just can't value a ML higher.

They would aid in recovery big time.