Core

I realize I came into this thread and made a few posts and then got overwhelmed by its growth and haven't returned. So in light of that, feel free to ignore this post, but here is one of my concerns about full inclusion. Vertical bow tech has almost topped out, but it hasn't for xbows. This xbow (Ravin) is currently illegal for hunting in NY due to its draw weight and limb width, but I picked one up at field and stream and let me tell you it made all the others there look like antique garbage. This thing is very fast, streamlined. it's basically a slow gun. Shooting this is nothing like "archery", anymore than shooting a competition 1000 yard gun is like shooting a kentucky longrifle. Yeah they are both guns, and this is "archery" like a recurve, but let's get real. This isn't legal in NY (too thin and draw weight over 200 lbs). Will it be? What about when somebody else gets an NY legal Crossbow to shoot at 480 fps? Are people okay with this tech shrinking the gap between harvesting with an actual firearm? BTW I mean it if you are in field & stream pick one of these up. They are gorgeous.

Good luck. Still hunting with a bow is tough, but it can be done. Like you said, it will give you exercise and if nothing else an appreciation for how skittish deer can be. Your best bet would ultimately end up being to bring in a light climbing stand (20 lbs or less) and find a spot, assuming you can't find a mentor in the meantime. I hunted first couple of years without anybody else and had some success.

ding ding ding. Exactly. It's not on the news, and that dog has the most unusual shot from a bow that anybody in the world has ever seen. If this shows up on WHEC then somebody please quote me with a dunce picture to my post, but until then I think this is a whole load of BS. All we know is what is posted along with the picture and it just looks like nonsense. Some reasons: 1) A hunter in a park deliberately shooting a dog in front of its owner = highly unlikely 2) Dubious story is not matched with any official information provided (e.g. news) It might have happened. But I bet it didn't. Google "webster ny hunter shoots dog" and the second hit is this thread, first hit is from two weeks ago.

Field and stream is selling this. It has the heart dead center in the deer's torso. This is by far the worst target I have seen.

You're describing rear-deploy vs forward opening one. I have been using forward opening and the last deer I hit had zero blood trail within any area I could find. Losing a deer is one thing, but not having any blood trail is BS. A cut on contact broad head will start bleeding immediately. So will a rear-deploy BH like the Rage (heck, even if it doesn't open it will still have it). I blame losing this deer first and foremost on it not hitting the right part of the deer, but I feel my forward opening BH must have opened up inside, leaving a neat hole where it entered. I just don't want that to happen again, so I'm moving away from those heads.

You're right. Personally I like hog hunting, but these 200-300 lbs hogs people go after are babies. I'm in final negotiations with the state to let me sell clients access to my pig farm. I have 600 lb piggies on this that normally are butchered for pork and bacon, but I figure some rich heroes who are too busy to hunt will pay me up to $5k for a prize hog. For an extra $200 we'll even photoshop the picture to take away the domestic pink tint so common with livestock. This could be a profit center. Do other deer farms have post-processing on photos? Edit out the feeder and the fence and the chain that the deer is tied to the tree with, etc.?

Story reeks to high heaven. Fails sniff test on multiple counts.

Doc needs to spend more time on deer farms to see what real deer are! The naturally occurring deer that can exist without generation after generation of selective breeding and still have the ability to live in the wild without being fed corn out of a box are so mundane.

On the contrary he makes a load. In my defense I can't find my belt when it's on top of a freshly made bed with nothing else on the bed.

What happens when these hit rib? If perpendicular to rib cage I could see the rear blades often hitting rib--do they jam up or temporarily slip back into the head's body? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Just bought a pack. $25 today only at dicks/field. $30 in store at field through oct 7. Come with practice tip. When I look at my front opening mechanicals from Walmart I don't like how they don't seem to open until through the deer and I am holding that responsible for a despicable blood trail on the last one I hit. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

This thread is about bow hunting not 50 BMG deer hunting chas, it sounds like you do very well with fixed. Why are you looking to switch to mechanical?

Arrows are about 400 total, maybe 410, but for all I know they are hitting ribs or whatever and I haven't hit a ton to say either way. When I break out the xbow in november I do expect some pass throughs.

My mechanicals never make a second hole let alone come out the other side Shooting at 60 lbs currently.

Yes, no, not really sure. it just kind of explodes. It uses some energy to do it, but very little. I think the plastic is shaped such that when it is impacted it wedges the blades apart, and then they just keep flying more until it pops up. From the link at bowhuntingmag this is the most accurate of all their broadheads, hitting as if it isn't a broadhead. The penetration test is interesting, though, as it seems to really penetrate very far. Which is normally good, but one might wonder exactly why it's doing that.

Yep, another broad head. Exciting, right These are a couple of years old and caught my eye because they claim--and I agree with the theory--to fly like a field tip. Other broad heads try and fly like field tips by minimizing the difference between the broadhead's profile and an actual field tip. This thing said screw it, we're done. Let's just wrap it with a damn cover. It flies covered and the cover snaps on impact. Before you ask: somebody on youtube has one video if it hitting a target at a 45 degree deflection and it does not bounce off. Cutting surface is not huge on these, but what do you think? You need to buy replacement covers, but I am not aware of a better flying broadhead (it's true the tip on this is slightly fatter than a normal field tip, though, so FPS would be infinitesimally less). This test from last year has them doing well also: http://www.bowhuntingmag.com/gear-accessories/2016-mechanical-broadhead-test/ https://www.innerloc.com/product/100-grain-shape-shifter

I mitigate this by hating waking up early. I always get there as the light is starting to come up. I know I shouldn't and I should be in the stand, but I always have a long enough drive that waking up at 5:00 AM on a saturday is quite early enough as it is!

Those are big. Interesting video.

I feel led astray by some of the diagrams online showing where the lungs exist on deer. My belief is these foam targets are largely incorrect as well. The last deer I hit with an arrow (I had an illuminated nock so I am very confident of where I hit) was comfortably within--but to the rear section--of where these foam targets consider to be an acceptable hit (it wasn't). In these foam pics I have placed the arrow within an inch or so of where I now believe optimal placement is for double-lung. I think both foam targets are wrong to hint that the lungs go that far back. In this diagram "Make the shot count", they have optimal shot placement well behind the vertical line made at the back of the front legs and the lungs go half the way back to the rear! In this one they are very far forward. What do you guys think? Because if these foam targets are correct somebody forgot to tell the last deer I hit that its lungs are in the wrong location

It doesn't surprise me. The difference between stationary targets we practice with and a moving deer at a potentially unknown range that doesn't have a white circle exactly where you should hit I'm actually surprised recovery rates are reported as high as they are with a bow.

Some study found recovery rates for bow to be 80%+, which puts it similar to gun. I agree with some of what you're saying. My recovery rate with deer is clearly well below average. The last deer I failed to recover I must have hit very slightly behind the lungs because I found 1-2 tiny droplets of blood 10 yards past the impact point and then nothing. A friend and I could not pick up blood anywhere. I've never seen anything like it. The arrow just plugged up the hole. I have lighted nocks and I knew the hit was perfect in vertical plane but just behind lungs and I'll be damned if that thing bled at all near the site or even out in any sort of grid pattern that we looked at. At least with a gun odds are much higher you pop a hole out the other side on a bad hit and you can find a blood trail. I suppose crossbow has a higher chance of this also due to hitting much harder.

What recovery rate do you have on deer with a vertical bow (compound, recurve, etc.)? Names on this poll are not public, so don't be worried about picking a choice. Please be honest

Well take public land for example, that I've hunted. Bow season I never see anybody. The deer are pretty chill. By the time gun season is over the deer are few in far between because all the people going through the woods have had these deer hissing and blowing for weeks. It's less, i think, about the sound of the guns and more about the people. Xbows are infinitely easier to use than vertical bows. They take virtually no practice and effective range is significantly more than bow. And they keep charging up in tech (now well over 400 FPS, with kinetic energy 2-3X that of a vertical bow, with better accuracy, too). Open it up to Oct 1 now instead of a casual month of few hunters (most can't be bothered to get proficient with a bow, and some can't due to injury) and you'll see ever increasing numbers of xbow hunters, so by the time Mid-November comes around those people who refuse for whatever reason to shoot arrows will be getting only the stupidest or least lucky deer. I don't care if xbow is extended a bit so that anybody, even those who are injured (shoulders, etc.) can hunt with an effective implement at peak rut. Have xbow start at nov1. I just like to have a few weeks of vertical only.

Nope, not arguments like that. IMO a crossbow, in a practical sense, actually has more in common with a firearm than a vertical bow. Have any of you ever seen a pre-teen girl pick up a compound bow and on her third ever shot get within an inch of bullzeye at 30 yards with over 100 FPE? Because I have with a crossbow. I know y'all will get your way eventually. So this is just delaying the inevitable.

Well the most essential reason for full inclusion is: I want to hunt more season and earlier.