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Feather Shooters and Rain

moog5050

By moog5050,
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moog5050 Mentor

moog5050

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Due to the expected rain this weekend, I treated my feathers with 2 light coats of camp dry yesterday.  Today I ran them under the faucet.   The feathers maintained their shape with no water absorbed.  Those that shoot feathers know that much less water will quickly make them almost useless as fletching.   I was very impressed.  It does have a subtle chemical smell so hopefully that wears off.  Good stuff though.  

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Lawdwaz Grand Master

Lawdwaz

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I don't remember doing much with my feathers when shooting them.  I can't remember but I think even when I went back to shooting the compound after about 11-12 years with the traditional bows I think I shot feathers for a couple years.  I was using a plunger rest (Hoyt) at first with the Darton Maverick then switched to the whisper biscuit and Blazers after a few years.

Even when my feathers were a bit wet, they seemed to still shoot fine at the distances I was killing deer at............:)

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Lawdwaz Grand Master

Lawdwaz

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3 minutes ago, moog5050 said:

I don't know Law.  My experience is that when feathers get wet, they lay down and don't serve as fletching well.  The camp dry definitely prevents that. 

Yea, if they get soaked completely through and lay flat the may not shoot for beans but I guess I usually hit the bricks by then. :)

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Bowguy 1 Newbie

Bowguy 1

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We use dry fly spray. Works decent. I had socks in a sense for the individual arrows but don't too often go out when it's pouring. If so just put my body or something over em to keep em dryer, the truck heat puffs em back up. Compound shooters which aren't shooting from the shelf can shoot Blazers n I've seen no dif at close to mid range. Feathers have been on my arrows since I was a kid n Id not change. Good luck this weekend. Break that new Widow in!

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moog5050 Mentor

moog5050

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9 minutes ago, The_Real_TCIII said:

I shot the winter league in wind rain and snow with feathers and never treated them. They always seemed to fly fine even after getting beat up by other arrows and missing chunks they'd fly great


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Traditional or compound?  Honestly, with a compound, I can shoot bare shafts nearly as well as fletched.  Much harder for me with a recurve, and even more so with a broad head. I will accept all the fletching foregiveness I can get and wet feathers don't help. 

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Bowguy 1 Newbie

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8 minutes ago, moog5050 said:

Traditional or compound?  Honestly, with a compound, I can shoot bare shafts nearly as well as fletched.  Much harder for me with a recurve, and even more so with a broad head. I will accept all the fletching foregiveness I can get and wet feathers don't help. 

Guys don't understand shelf shooting. The bow isn't even Centershot n needs the fletch to recover. You need feathers to be forgiving of the shelf

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The_Real_TCIII Grand Master

The_Real_TCIII

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Traditional or compound?  Honestly, with a compound, I can shoot bare shafts nearly as well as fletched.  Much harder for me with a recurve, and even more so with a broad head. I will accept all the fletching foregiveness I can get and wet feathers don't help. 


Compound. You're the man hunting with the recurve, have you been doing it for a while?
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moog5050 Mentor

moog5050

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8 minutes ago, The_Real_TCIII said:


Compound. You're the man hunting with the recurve, have you been doing it for a while?

No, just season 2 with the recurve.  My point was that feather integrity is important, at least for a recurve, and the camp dry helps in the rain. I assumed most feather shooters use a trad bow since vanes are more convenient and will fly well from any compound.  Vanes don't fly as well for me from the recurve but like bowguy mentikned, I shoot off a wood shelf. 

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mlammerhirt Mentor

mlammerhirt

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I shot the winter league in wind rain and snow with feathers and never treated them. They always seemed to fly fine even after getting beat up by other arrows and missing chunks they'd fly great


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I second that...when I bought my first compound bow in 06' Jeff from Niagara Outdoors set me up with feathers....they worked well for years and deff shot fine missing chunks.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

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Bowguy 1 Newbie

Bowguy 1

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Guys compound are center shot n w proper spine recover quickly hence the smaller vanes n less offset on them. Recurves are wood risers. They don't come in n are normally off center of the string. Now you have solid wood to the side n you shoot off the wooden shelf so essentially you're shooting off a corner. Most guys put a toothpick or matchstick under the sideplate which is on the side wall to help w torque n such so now we're even more side of center. The arrows are shot from bow slightly sideways n need the fletch to help quickly stabilize it n often a little more is better as seen when stickbow guys shoot helical or heavy offset feathers. Add a broadhead n you really need the stability. I've always shot feathers even from compounds but there's a big difference in the two

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Bowguy 1 Newbie

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1 hour ago, mlammerhirt said:


I second that...when I bought my first compound bow in 06' Jeff from Niagara Outdoors set me up with feathers....they worked well for years and deff shot fine missing chunks.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk
 

Feathers always shoot good w missing chunks, vanes can be cut in a clean v around a tear n shoot pretty well too. If you don't the wobble down range. Just a fyi in case you weren't aware or hadnt tried it

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moog5050 Mentor

moog5050

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10 hours ago, MrGroundhog said:

It shouldn't matter too much. I've had wet feathers/ arrows with chunks missing out of the feathers and they seem to fly just fine for me. How is that widow treating you btw? I saw a pic of it on another thread. What model did you get? 

Loving the widow  Its a PCHXS (58" and 50lb).  If you are looking for an all wood bolt down recurve, I would highly recommend it.

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Bowguy 1 Newbie

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27 minutes ago, maytom said:

Made the switch to vanes years ago. Not going back to feathers anytime soon. I respect you guys who still use them.

One reason I still like feathers is I can customize em. You can insert sections of other colored feathers in a main feather after removing same piece n marry em back together. So you have say a chartruese feather w red stripe 2/3 in. Or red w white ends, whatever. Just something fun to do n feathers imo have always been more forgiving. New rests on compounds kind of alleviates some w drop aways (rests). But the timing on that rest must be correct or you still have contact issues

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