By: Bears Butt
'I forgot the arrow.'

‘I forgot the arrow.’

Today was Memorial Day and after visiting some of the graves and having lunch with some relatives I took my bow down to the field for some practice.  This Fixed Crawl method really has be excited. Practice is what I need right now to get it down to hitting what I’m aiming at…..and I am aiming now and not shooting instinctively.  In my mind, the more ethical I am at shooting a game animal the more I will like taking the game I’m after.  Practice to hit where I’m pointing at is number one right now.

In anticipation of the hunt, I know I will be “rattled” when the opportunity presents itself.  I need to be within 30 yards of that animal and closer will be better.  So, before the hunt I will be practicing out to 30 and maybe 40 yards.  Not that I will be taking a 40 yard shot, but to make that 20 yard shot that much easier to make.

Tonight my first end of 11 arrows ended like this:

FirstEnd5302016

That one arrow off to the left was my fault…well…all the arrows were my fault, but the rest of them seemed to fly right about where I wanted them to fly.  A bit low and so I lowered the fixed crawl tab point.  Then continued to shoot the rest of the evening.  It was a beautiful evening for sure.  Toward the mid point of my practice I took this picture of one of my ends.

MiddlePracticeEnd5302016

Oh Boy!  Things are beginning to come together!  Still a bit low.  And with a short discussion with Weasel, I decided I was dropping my bow.  What that means to me is that once I release the string, I am letting my bow hand relax and the bow drops down (gravity you know).  I told him…”Just one little thing and the arrows don’t go where I want them”….he said….”There is NO ONE LITTLE THING in archery”…I believe that now.

So I spent the next few ends trying my best to keep the bow hand up after the shot and watching the arrow go down range.  It was quite the eye opening experience.  Pretty satisfying too.  My last end looked like this, and this is after shooting for almost two hours at 11 arrows per end:

LastEnd5302016

Only 4 of the 11 arrows didn’t hit the target!  And those were arrows number 2, 3, 4 and 5 that I shot.  After that I really put the concentration effort into each shot.

Time for a new target!

May 20, 2016

Bears Butt

 

Written on May 30th, 2016 , Archery stuff
By: Bears Butt

MyHangingbow

Don’t give up on me!  I’m still trying out the Fixed Crawl method of shooting.  I was down on the farm on Monday (the only evening fit to shoot so far this week) giving it another go.  I decided to shoot all my arrows for each end and before the practice session was over, I had ruined one arrow and damaged a second nock.  That is a sure fire way of knowing things are coming together for you.  When you are punching arrows into the same hole you are becoming a machine.

With so many arrows being shot during one end, it doesn’t take long to wear yourself out and that is exactly what I did.  The strength endurance is quite demanding and holding 50 or so pounds of draw weight gets to this old guy pretty quickly.  I keep thinking….. Butt, you are only going to get one shot so make it count!

I recorded my first two ends and this is what they looked like.

523End1

 

523End2

For some of you old time archers this is probably a pretty disgusting set of arrows, but for me they look pretty good.  I still have all of the months of June and July and half the month of August to get them tightened up.  I think I’m on the right track.

I need to place a stump at the 25 yard mark and do some sit down practice like I was doing before this new method caught my attention.  I’ll be doing that when this evening shower and wind issue leaves us.

Weasel came down after I had been shooting an hour, so I think I had probably shot 10 to 15 ends of 12 arrows each end and I was quite tired.  I recorded this end and then called it a day!

SMileyEnd

I call it my “Smiley End” and a good one to quit on!

May 25, 2016

Bears Butt

UPDATE:

I was shooting last night with Weasel and I noticed most of my arrows were hitting lower than the target.  Similar to the two pictures above.  With that I decided to move my fixed crawl point up toward the nocking point.  I moved it the width of the clamp and this was the result.

MovedMyFixedCrawl

A closer look:

4of11arrowsoutsidetarget

Only 4 out of the 11 arrows are not in the target!  I’m very pleased and will continue to use this method and practice, practice, practice!

Bears Butt

May 28, 2016

Written on May 25th, 2016 , Archery stuff
By: Bears Butt

BigTimeFiltration

Last weekend Weasel, Kenzie and I joined up with Ken and Sam Snyder at the 3D shoot for the upper course portion of the shoot.  The shoot was very fun and those two made it even funner.  They are relatively new to archery, as I am, and it was fun to know not everyone on the course wanted to hit 12’s….hitting foam was what it was all about for us.  Anyway, during the course Sam commented on the fact that he was thirsty.  Weasel and I both had on our backpacks with hydration bladders and we both offered up a drink from the straw.  We were declined, but the fact remained, Sam was thirsty.  During the course, we crossed a stream of clear, cold water a couple of times and Sam looked like he might just lay down next to the water and take a big old drink!  I’m glad he didn’t.

Well, we talked about some of the small, packable filtration units that are on the market and how you can suck water right out of a dirty pond or stream and it will filter out any bad stuff that might be in there.  That got me thinking.  Why would an outdoors person be without something like that?  We were on a hike near Tony’s Grove a few years back and we ran out of water but continued to hike to the next lake instead of turning back.  That was not a very bright thing for us to do.  Had we had one of the filtration units on us, we would have been fine.

Well, yesterday, I had to stop in at Smith and Edwards to pick up some stuff Sherry had purchased and she showed me a small devise called  a “Sawyer Mini”.  It is a compact little water filtration unit that will filter up to 100,000 gallons of water before you have to discard it.

MiniFiltration

This little thing fits in the palm of your hand!  Comes with a small, 2 cup size bladder, a straw and a plunger to clean out any moss or junk that might tend to plug it up.  You can screw the bladder onto the “input” end of the filter, or you can screw on a common plastic water bottle.  BUT, you don’t need the bladder or a water bottle to make it work.  Just lay down next to a stream or lake, put the end into the water and suck through the straw.  They claim it will filter 99.999999999% of any E-coli, giardia, salmonella, cholera and an assortment of other bad for you stuff that might be in the water source.  AND it will filter up to 100,000 gallons of water.  Think about it!  100,000 gallons of water!  If you drank one gallon of water a day and used this filter to drink it, you could use it for 274 years!  100,000/365 = 274!  Or in other words, you and 273 friends could all use it every day for one year before you needed another one.

I put mine in my backpack!

Smith and Edwards (The Ikea for Rednecks store)

SmithAndEdwardsStore

sells these little units for about $20!  Twenty bucks!  But after talking to the guy in charge of making sure the store has a supply of them they will sell out fast once the word gets out about them!

I suggest you hurry your little butt right down there and pick one up….Tell them Bears Butt sent you!  It won’t get you any discount, but it will make them smile!  And then you can enjoy 100,000 gallons of worry free stream and/or lake mountain water drinking!

May 25, 2016

Bears Butt

Written on May 25th, 2016 , Uncategorized
By: Bears Butt

ButtAtPetesCabin

About a year ago, I was looking on Google Earth and located a small pond high above any access roads near home, at that time I told myself…Butt, you need to make that hike!  It isn’t as though I’m into hiking all that much, it’s more that I like to find out of the way places that might hold a game animal I’m in pursuit of.  At this pond there could be deer, turkey, moose, elk, grouse….all of those critters live and play around this place.  At the same time I also saw, not too far away, the remnants of an old cabin.  I figured I could hike and visit both some day.

Well, this old body of mine will be 67 come August and if I’m going to be doing any hiking I figure I best be getting on with it.  I needed a full day, good weather and an excuse to go.  Yesterday I had two out of the three and chose to “do it”!  What do I mean I had two out of the three?  I had nice weather.  An excuse to go…turkey hunting.  But I only had until 10 o’clock….I had promised Wapiti and Tracker I would meet them in Logan at 11 a.m. to do a mountain man demonstration to a group of 90 some 4th graders!

I was at the parking spot at 5:30 a.m. and it was just light enough I could travel without the aid of a flashlight.  I also had the makings of a full moon (not quite).

FullMoonMorningSo, up the trail I had never been on before I went.  It is quite steep at the beginning and I thought as I plodded along that if it continued to be that steep, I could see I was not going to make it.  But after a couple of switch backs it mellowed out a lot.

MorningTrail

As you can see the trail is very well defined and so a lot of folks use it.  It used to be a trail that ATV’s used, but that activity has been banned and so the trail continues to grow in to the path it is today.  I noticed some bicycle tire marks in some of the muddy spots.  So some very ambitious people are using it for that.  I know I could not bike up, or down for that matter, this trail.

I took pictures every once in awhile to document the trail so that YOU can see what it looks like if you ever decide to venture up it.

TrailThroughChaparell

My goal was to make it to a pond that is situated just to the lower right of this point of pines on the hill.

PondBehindPineHill

I’m still quite a ways from there and I trudged on, all the time hoping a turkey would present itself for a shot.

RockySlideTrail

The morning sunrise from up on this trail was very pretty.

SunriseComing

And as I climbed and climbed my goal became closer and closer.  Again, the pond sits just to the right and down from that point of pines on that far hill.

GettingCloser

Soon the trail began a slight down hill grade and I knew I was nearing a junction in the trail.  If I were to go to the left at the junction, it will lead me to the pond, the trail to the right will take me to old Petes Cabin.

TrailGoesDownhill

TrailForksAhead

It was an amazing morning for a hike like this one.  It had rained pretty hard the day before and so everything was wet and the air was crisp with the smell of the rain still in the air.  Not a breeze was blowing but I could hear running water rushing down the narrow draw to my left.  Some of that water would be coming from the pond, while other water would be coming from other narrow draws that seemed to converge on this spot.

I chose the left trail and forged the small stream.

LookingBackToFork

The picture is looking back toward the junction in the main trail.  I took the picture after I made it across the water without getting too wet.  On up the trail a little ways farther I found an old fire ring where someone who spent a night or two camping had made.  What a nice little hide out for a quiet camp.

CampFireRing

In the background you can see the trail climbing up the hill beyond the fire ring.  That was going to lead me to the pond.  Looking back toward the fire ring you can see the nice little grassy spot to pitch your tent.

LookingBackTowardCampfireRing

It was only 100 or so yards from here to the pond and the nice little meadow that it sits in.  I really expected to see deer, moose and turkey in this meadow and I moved slowly and quietly up to it.

PondAndMeadowThePond

You should be able to put these two pictures together  and see how it looks.  The meadow stretches for 3 or 400 yards off to the south ending in a large stand of quakies.  A perfect spot for deer, moose, turkey and elk.  But wait!  Perhaps a fox as well!

DogOrFox

I stayed around the pond calling for turkeys for about a half hour and decided I was wasting my time.  Except for the fact that it was such a pretty spot in the world to be…peaceful, quiet and beautiful.  I hope to return this fall.

Well, with it being around 7:30 a.m., I decided I would venture up to Old Petes place to see what that was all about.  What I didn’t know was in store for me was the extremely steep climb up portions of this trail!  And how narrow the trail is in some places.

NarrowAndSteepTowardCabin

FirstViewOfCabin

There it is!!!!  My first view of the cabin from down below!  I knew I would make it at this point and so I continued my slow ascent until suddenly there it was!

PetesCabin

In its day I’m sure Old Pete enjoyed staying up in this out of the way place watching his flock of sheep grazing the hillsides.  But those days are long gone now.  Luckily for me the cabin is still in as good of shape as it is.

WestEnd

NorthSidePetesCabinEastEnd

I took a picture down toward the pond area to give you an idea as to how far it is from the pond up to the cabin.

LookingDownIntoPondMeadow

That narrow strip just out of the shadow, way down there, is the meadow and pond.  I’d guess somewhere close to 1/2 mile, maybe 3/4 mile.  Don’t be scared of the steepness of the terrain…..the trail makes two switchback turns on the way up. 😉

Well, what a great place to be at 8:30 in the morning!  Time for a snack!

KippersAndRitz

It was sure a pleasure to have had the health to be able to climb up to this beautiful spot.

ButtAtPetesCabin

OldPetesCabin

After munching down a whole can of Kipper Snacks by myself, I looked at the time….8:45!  I have to be in Logan by 11, so that gives me 2 hours and 15 minutes to get off this mountain and drive to Logan.  I gotta hustle!

My trip down the mountain was pretty much uneventful until near the end when a hen turkey putted her way around a bush and then came straight at me!  When I finally decided to take a picture of her and reached for the camera, she noticed me in the trail and high tailed it out of Dodge as quickly as she could.  Why can’t I get a dumb tom turkey to do that?

I made it to Logan by 11 and got things arranged at the school before Wapiti and Tracker got there.  Our show went off with only one minor hitch….I demonstrated how to start a fire with flint and steel and had a good smoke going on right under a smoke detector.  90 plus kids were all yelling as loud as they could….”GO BEARS BUTT, GO BEARS BUTT, GO BEARS BUTT…..”  I’m glad the alarm didn’t go off!  We won’t do that trick again inside a building….always load and shoot parade loads outside and always start your flint and steel fires outside….two very important lessons for any of you who like to show off your mountain man skills!

May 24, 2016

Bears Butt

 

 

Written on May 24th, 2016 , Uncategorized
By: Bears Butt

3Turkeys

It’s nearing the end of turkey season here in Utah and I have only a couple of days available to try and fill my tag, this being one of them.  Several months ago, while looking closely at Google Earth, I spotted a small pond of water up and away from any roads and I told myself that someday I would take the hike up to that pond to check it out.  Today is going to be that day and even though it has rained heavily the past few days, I still think a turkey just might be hanging around that pond.  At any rate, that is where I’m headed today.

We have a full moon out which should have all the animals excited.  My plan is to be at the trail head just at first light (which means I have to be going very soon) and then slowly walk the trail up to the pond.  Of course I’ll do my usual calling and setting up along the way and on the way out as well.

Turkey hunting is the excuse to go see this pond as there could be other possibilities in the hunting world later in the year.

I have to be in Logan to help Wapiti and Tracker entertain some 4th graders with a mountain man demonstration, and what is a mountain man demonstration without a flint and steel fire?  That is one of my parts in this effort.  So, my turkey hunting will be a rather quick one this morning.

Wish me luck, both with the turkeys and with the fire!

More to come later on.

May 23, 2016

Bears Butt

After 2 p.m.

The hunt turned out to be more of a hike.  I don’t know how far it is, or what the elevation change is, but my feet are killing me!  As a Wild Ass Guess (WAG), I’d say 3 miles one way and only saw one hen turkey…about 300 yards from the truck on my way out.  But the scenery was spectacular!  If you are healthy enough to make this hike do it, and do it soon!  The mountain flowers are at their peak, the air is crisp and the country side is in its prime!  I’ve decided to put the hike under a different heading than hunting.  Probably “uncatagorized” and the title will be something like “Hike to Petes Cabin”….  Go check it out!

Oh and as for the fire….well, I got a lot of smoke and had 90 some kids yelling “GO BEARS BUTT, GO BEARS BUTT”!!!!  It was awesome!  When my hand started burning I put the nest down!  The kids still gave me a big applause!

Bears Butt

Written on May 23rd, 2016 , Hunting Stories
By: Bears Butt

Last night I took a few minutes and ran to the field to shoot my bow using my new found method called Fixed Crawl.  I didn’t want to take too much time but I figured an hour would help me decide if my arrows liked the method.  I separated my arrows into common groups and quickly found out that some Easton 2213’s would NOT work with my bow.  They flew random, wild and crazy.  I put them away after shooting them twice.  By the way, I am shooting at 25 yards with this method.

Next I tried my old Warrior arrows (with one Apocalypse mixed in).  They didn’t do too badly, but I would have to work a bit more with them to get them to digest this new method:

Warriors

Then I pulled out my Easton 2117’s, some that were in the “$5 Frank” purchase a couple of weeks ago.  I have recently fletched them and put new tips on them.  These have glued on nocks and so I could not turn them so that the cock feather was out, but the fletchings were ok, I just had to turn the arrow until I had one feather at 90 degrees to the left.  Not a problem.  Those arrows flew pretty good as well.

2117

I decided to try them once again and the group came in like this (if you call this a group)!

2117again

Well, I think these 2117’s just might work out.    I don’t know if Easton still makes these arrows or not, but I have 5 of them, 4 of which are cut to 26 1/2 inches and one that has not been cut yet.  It seems like the cut ones fly better than the uncut one.  They are 12 grains per inch in weight and spined at 400.  Easton rates them for a 61 to 70 pound bow weight.  With 125 grain tips the FOC is 14%.  I think because my bow is cut about 1/8 inch past center, it likes these arrows.

Well, with time running out, I decided to shoot my newest arrows, Carbon Express Thunderstorms.  These guys come ready to shoot out of the box and are considered youth arrows.  I don’t care what they call them my bow likes them.  They come from the factory at 29 inches long and weigh 8.3 grains per inch.  I have 125 grain tips on them and a FOC of 13.79%.  After I shot my 6 arrows I was sort of amazed at the results:

CEThunderstorms

CEThunderstorms CloserLook

I’m not at all familiar with the speed my bow flings arrows, but it makes sense that the lighter the arrow the faster it will fly.  So, with the 2117’s weighing at 464 grains total weight and the Thunderstorms at 386.7 grains, that means the Thunderstorms will reach the target faster, even if only by a portion of a second at 25 yards.

Now let’s talk a little about kinetic energy.  From one source I found this:

KINETIC ENERGY

Hunting Usage

< 25 ft. lbs.
Small Game (rabbit, groundhog, etc.)
25-41 ft. lbs.
Medium Game (deer, antelope, etc.)
42-65 ft. lbs.
Large Game (elk, black bear, wild boar, etc.)
> 65 ft. lbs.

I don’t know anything about this, but I have to figure it out for the hunt coming up in August…I drew a deer tag for archery this year, by the way, and I plan on buying an over the counter elk tag in case a spike bull or cow walks within my 20 yard range limit.

In order to figure out kinetic energy (KE) of my arrow I need to know the total arrow weight and the speed at which it is traveling.  I know the arrow weights, but don’t know the speed.  But let’s pretend my arrows will fly at different speeds and then let’s figure the KE.  Easton 2117’s = 2117, Carbon Express Thunderstorms = Thunder:

Arrows                 Speed            KE

2117                       200 fps         41.17 foot pounds

Thunder               200 fps         34.31 fp

2117                       210 fps          45.39 fp

Thunder               210 fps          37.8 fp

2117                       220 fps          49.817 fp

Thunder               220 fps          41.5 fp

2117                       250 fps           64.3 fp

Thunder                250 fps           53.6 fp

Now the big question for me!  Does my bow spit out arrows at over 220 feet per second?  That seems to be the magic speed at which I can take a big game animal like a deer, but not fast enough for elk.  AND, the next big question, at what distance are these numbers in effect?

There will be lots of discussion on this subject I’m sure.  Whatever the outcome, I like the way the Thunderstorms performed in this practice round and I’m not totally convinced the 2117’s aren’t going to be my hunting arrows!

May 18, 2016

Bears Butt

Written on May 18th, 2016 , Archery stuff
By: Bears Butt

GhillieHat

Well, once again I find myself sitting here at 3:30 a.m. waiting for the magic time when I head off to try again to outwit a turkey.  This morning’s plan is similar to what I’ve been doing in the past few trips out, but this time a slight twist to it.  I won’t be walking much.  Well, that is what I’m saying right now.

Game plan:  Take Gretchen and set up for the flydown.  Last time out, I took a few minutes and made myself a smallish blind to overlook the ambush meadow.  If a gobbler comes to the decoy, it will be about a 15 yard shot.  I only have one window and so if it goes anywhere else there won’t be a shot.  So….here is hoping.

Once the flydown has happened, I will move my location to a spot about 200 yards away and set up without Gretchen.  There have been too many days afield in this area when the toms have wandered through a certain spot, sometimes gobbling and sometimes not.  I’m just going to set my butt down and wait.  I’ll give it until around noon and if nothing has come through, I’ll call my way out.  The way out is only about 4oo yards more.

Another fine detail to my plan is my calling.  I don’t know how to call very well and my slate call isn’t of the highest quality, even though I have had several gobblers fooled by it.  But the thing is, a couple of years back, I found a striker that someone had lost…(by the way, if you can tell me what it looks like and pay the shipping, I’ll return it to you, otherwise, I’m keeping it and using it)…This particular striker has a wooden part to it that makes for a deeper toned sound than the one that came with my call.  I’ll be mixing up my calling using both of these strikers to make it sound like two or 4 different birds.  My original striker sounds to me like a young hen, while the found one sounds like the old boss hen.  We will see how all of that goes.

Time is flying by this morning, so I have to stop for now and will post up a “post hunt” addition later on!  Wish me luck!

May 16, 2016

Bears Butt

NOONISH

An off day on the mountain.  I had the whole mountain to myself this morning.  The air was crisp but not too cold, lots of dew and rain still on the leaves which made for soft and quiet walking.  All the while walking in I had a strange feeling that something was following me….I hate that feeling, but I never saw anything.

My fly down setup was perfect except for the lack of birds.  No gobbles, no hen clucks, nothing.

From there I went and set up on a nice flat place where lots of turkey crap is scattered around.  Sat there and called softly for over an hour.  Nothing.  Moved to another spot, set up and stayed about half an hour…nothing there either.

So, I packed it all up and went on a stroll through the woods.  Calling every 100-150 yards.  Always soft, followed by a medium call.  Nothing.  I walked a trail all the way around the bottom of the steepest part of the mountain until the mountain itself forced me down hill to the main trail.  I heard two gobbles during this escapade and both were very far off in the northern direction, barely audible.

Aside from the lack of turkeys, there were lots of other critters to keep me entertained.  I had a doe and young fawn trying to figure out what I was for a very long time.  Finally the wind must have shifted because momma let out a snort and off they both went.  I saw 6 deer total, no bucks.

So, there you have the turkey hunt for this day.  Not sure when I might get another chance to go out, and I hope this isn’t the last time for the season.  I still have one spot I want to go check out and that hike will take some doing…steep and deep!

Bears Butt

Written on May 16th, 2016 , Hunting Stories
By: Bears Butt

MyBowInBush

The other day I shared a video on Facebook that a guy named Matt Dernzack (sp) put together, the video is titled “The Push”.  It has to be the best video I have seen to date on shooting traditional bows and he covers nearly everything about shooting them.  His details on how the different bows look, fit the hand and shoot really helps you understand the minute differences in the various bow styles.  He is an accomplished marksman in his own right and shoots competition as well as hunts with his bows….all traditional.  He talks about shooting olympic style, gap and string walking in three different portions of the video and even though the video is over 2 hours long, it is worth every minute watching it.

One of the main reasons for him putting together this video is to show us how he has developed a shooting method to help us with out hunting.  He calls it “Fixed Crawl”.  I’ll get into what that means in a paragraph or two.  The other reason (main reason) he put this video together is to explain his thoughts on hunting with a bow.  As I recall, his words were something like this:  We are all hunters no matter what we choose to use as our primary weapon, be it spear or 2,000 yard rifle.  We need to embrace each others styles and quit hammering each other on ethics and start supporting each other on proper technique and ethical kills.  He goes on just about bow hunting and says that as a bow hunting group, we too need to support each other any way that we can and still encourage ethical kills as our number one priority.  That means practice and getting as close as we can to the animal we are hunting.

There was more to his statements on supporting each other as hunters, but that is what I got out of it.  His statements are worth the watch and to listen to, if nothing else is gained by the video.

Now, as for the “Fixed Crawl” method of hunting.

“Gap shooting” is getting to know how far below your target you need to place the tip of the arrow at various yardages and last summer I showed you my “gap chart”.  You should have some understanding as to what is meant by that.  It is obvious in the archery world that you can’t just aim straight at your target while shooting an arrow.  The arrow is going to arch to the target.  And so it leaves the bow going in an “up” direction and then reaches an apex somewhere along the line, and then falls down into your target.  A pretty simple concept.  So, the closer you are to your desired target, the fact is, you have to aim below it.  That is, the tip of the arrow will be below the desired spot you want that arrow to hit.  As you progress farther back, away from the target the less you have to have that aim point below the target and there is that magical spot somewhere back there, where the place you put the tip of the arrow and your desired spot on the target you want to hit, are one and the same.  That is called the “Point On” distance.  And for a 50 pound bow, that usually is around the 40 yard mark, give or take a few yards.  So, that is Gap Shooting in a nutshell.

“String Walking” is marking your string, or your glove, or tab in such a way as to help you move your string hand “down” the string in order to change the angle of the arrow as it leaves the string, so that you can aim your arrow at the target.  The farther down the string you have your string hand, the steeper the angle placed upon the back end of the arrow, and thus the farther you can shoot while aiming the tip of your arrow at the desired mark on your target you want to hit.  Of course there are maximums in everything and this method is no exception.  I’ve never looked into just how far down the string you can have your drawing hand but I’d guess not more than 5 inches, maybe less.

Both String Walking and Gap shooting incorporate a method of “aiming” using the tip of the arrow.  Well, when a man was using a spear to bring home the meat, he would have had some way to make it easier to hit his mark.  And I doubt there were anyone in the clan against whatever he used just as long as he consistently brought home the meat.  Then someone decided he could shoot his spear from a bow and I doubt, again, that anyone said anything but praise to him for inventing such a way to bring home the meat.

And so go the inventions in hunting that bring home the meat better and more efficiently than before.  You can’t throw a spear 2,000 yards and hit anything but the ground, but you sure can shoot a long range rifle with high powered scopes and lots of ballistic charts and graphs and practice.  Well, Mr. Matt Dernzack has come up with another, and in his opinion, more efficient way of hunting with a traditional bow and it is what he calls “Fixed Crawl”.  With his method, he is taking parts from both the Gap shooting method and the String Walking method and here is how it works.

This is all about using traditional archery equipment.  Given a “point on” distance of 40 yards using a 50 pound bow, his thoughts are that normal shots at big game animals should be taken at 20 yards or closer.  In that distance kinetic energy is still enough to push an arrow through most of Americas big game.  So, when setting up your equipment with this Fixed Crawl system, you are going to set your fixed mark at 25 yards.  Why 25 yards and not 20?  Well, under normal hunting situations, a hunter will most likely “fudge” and take that shot a bit farther away than what he says he will take.  So, set this system up at 25 yards and hope your shots are closer than that.  What you will do then is find that point on your string, where you will anchor your string fingers (tab or glove) below your nocking point such that when you draw back, you can use the tip of your arrow and put it on the point of the target you want to hit.  The arrow itself will be closer to your eye than any other way of shooting, especially instinctively.  You will be able to look right down the shaft of the arrow, find the point, put the point on the impact spot and release the arrow as usual.

Setting up your string hand is more of a trial and error thing than anything else.  To begin with, I marked my 25 yard yardage and then used some tape to mark my string about an inch below the nock point.  After shooting about 5 shots from this yardage and with my string point marked, I found I was fairly close to where I wanted to be.  Of course, over time I will adjust my string hand up or down to fine tune this.  But for now it looks like this:

20160511_195147

The green threads is where my arrow is nocked, and the brass clip is where I bring my string hand up to when I shoot.  This is a good starting point for my Fixed Crawl shooting.

Well, there is always some doubt about trying something new and this is nothing but new to me.  Will it work?  Well, according to Matt, if you set this up well to start with and practice (practice is always a key to anything archery related) you will find that shooting at 25 yards will put your arrows exactly where you point them on the target.  He then goes closer to the target and still using the tip of the arrow as his sight, he shoots at 20 yards, 15 yards, 10 yards and even 5 yards.  Each consecutive arrow hits the target higher above the bullseye.  But even at 5 yards it is only 10 inches or so above the bullseye.  AND, going the other way, at 30 yards his arrow is hitting about 10 inches below the bullseye!

So now, picture a mule deer buck standing broadside at 20 yards.  You place your arrow tip exactly in the center of the kill zone and release the string….the arrow will ideally hit exactly where you are aiming, or perhaps an inch or two higher than that.  A dead buck!  At 10 yards the arrow will hit high in the kill zone, but still be a double lung shot!  And at 30 yards, the arrow will strike near the lower portion of the chest, taking out the heart…a dead buck!

So, you see, using this method for hunting, you have a “point on” between 10 and 30 yards, yielding you a dead buck every time!  You don’t have to think or know about what your “gap” is  between those distances, nor do you have to worry about moving your string hand up or down the string from the nock point.  Place your tab on the marked spot on the string, put the tip of the arrow on the point you wish to hit and release the string!  TWANG….dead buck!

I tried it last night.  I set my mark on my string where I bring my tab up to it.  Draw back with my arrow nocked in its normal spot.  Anchor a bit differently, with the nock of the arrow now touching my nose, I sight down the arrow and place the tip of the arrow on the spot on my target and release the string….here are my results after 3 successive round of “all the arrows in my quiver”, light weight ones, some with 100 gr. tips, some with 125 gr. tips, some fat arrows, some skinny arrows.

5:11StopCrawlEnd

5:11StopCrawlEnd2511StopCrawlEnd3

With no practice at this game, I was rather impressed at my groupings.  These are not weighted and tested arrows, these are right out of the quiver arrows, the ones I have been using for target practice for a few months and several of them are some I just purchased in my $5 encounter for a box of arrows.

I think with some practice my groups will be better and more around that 5 inch circle of a target.  Keep in mind too, this is at 25 yards.

I am impressed with this method of shooting and I will continue to post more as I progress, but folks, I believe this guy is onto something with this “Fixed Crawl” method of his!

May 12, 2o16

Bears Butt

Written on May 12th, 2016 , Archery stuff
By: Bears Butt

3Turkeys

It’s every turkey hunters dream to come upon a scene like this one, or maybe have the scene come upon him.   At any rate you can’t see something like this if you have your bed on your back.  I have gotten up late, have two dogs wishing they could go outside, but I’ve got to run!

Today will put me near to where I was the last time I had the chance to go out turkey hunting only this time I’m taking my little hen decoy I call “Gretchen”.  I’m hoping she will be seen by the gobbler sitting on his roost and cause him to fly down to within shotgun range.  The little meadow is my goal before first light!

CoolLittleBasin

More to come!

May 9, 2016

Bears Butt

Noonish……

I was almost late getting to my first stop this morning.  I pushed hard to get there, set Gretchen out in an opening in the sage, hurried back to my hiding hole and sat down.  Within one minute I heard the beating of heavy wings as a turkey landed about 50 yards to my right, just the other side of a small rise.  The gun was up, safety off and the bead held steady on Gretchen….I waited.  No sounds were coming from the direction the bird landed and I knew it was going to be that big tom I saw last time I was there.  My heart was pounding really hard, my breathing was too.  Then in my peripheral vision I saw its head peering over the sage, looking right into Gretchen’s eye.  The bird was no farther than 5 feet from the decoy and about 15 yards from me….a Hen!

I walked closer to the decoy and then decided it was a danger and began putting….two puts and then it flew off and down onto private property.  That was a close one!  Had it been that big tom I would have easily filled the tag!  And that is how easy it could be.  I sat there for about an hour and I kept hearing the gobbling of three different toms down on the private property.  I figured that was all I was going to see in that spot and so I picked up and started my sneak around the hill, just like I did the other day.

The weekends rains had everything soaking wet and I was glad I had chosen to put on my gaiters for this trip.  They saved my legs from the knees down from getting soaked.

As I rounded the hill I could hear the faint gobbles of some birds ahead and so I hurried myself a bit.  With all the wet, I didn’t even make a sound when I broke twigs.  Pretty soon I was straight up the hill from three gobblers sounding off.  They were very vocal.  I figured they were about 100 yards down the hill from me, so I set up on a point, tucked myself back up above the decoy about 30 yards and began calling.  They responded to every call and at one point I thought they were going to bust up over the hill and right into my lap.  They moved to my right, then back to my left.  I don’t think they could see the decoy and I didn’t want to call any more so I just waited.  Their gobbling began to get farther away and to my left.  I hurried up, grabbed Gretchen and boogied around the point of the hill toward their gobbles.

Suddenly I saw a turkey coming up through the trees below me.  It was on a direct line to where I was,  I plopped down on a rock, pushed the safety off and aimed at the trail ahead.  The trail actually went down over a slight rise as it went.  Within 5 minutes I could hear the turkey making sounds that at first sounded like a kid smacking two rocks together.  That was the first time I had ever heard that noise.  I was ready when its head came popping up from the trail.  It was coming straight at me at about 15 yards again.  Another hen!  When it saw my blob sitting in its path it stopped and stared.  Did a little walk around keeping an eye on me the whole time, and then went off the trail and up the hill through the brush and trees.  It didn’t make any sounds once it saw me sitting in the way, it just went off the trail and out of sight, not in a hurry either.

Well, the gobbles began to go down hill after that and I figured another hen had their attention.  There were for sure 3 distinct birds and they gobbled down and across the meadow and up the other side of the draw.  Gobbling like crazy and continued to do so until I couldn’t hear them anymore.

I figured there had to be others still on my side of the canyon and so I continued up the trail past the point where I almost got a shot last week.  There is some beautiful turkey looking country up there and I sure was hoping for a shot but all I saw were deer.  Maybe next time.

Bears Butt

Written on May 9th, 2016 , Hunting Stories
By: Bears Butt

I came across a guy wanting to sell a box of old arrows for $5 and I put my bid in with the others.  Seems he lived too far away from the other guys and so I ended up making a deal with the seller.  We had a tough time getting together but this morning I went to his place and picked up the box of arrows.  I figured for $5 even if I only got 3 or 4 arrows out of the deal it would be worth the gas and cost and maybe some of the arrows could be made into flu-flu arrows to shoot at doves and such.

BoxOfArrows

Well, I brought the arrows home and dumped them out on the floor.  Not knowing if this was really worth the $5 or not.  I immediately started seeing broken arrow pieces and jammed tips, bulging and bent arrow shafts….not sure about this “deal” of mine.

JumbleOfArrows

So, I went to sorting them by color, that seemed like a good idea at the time and then again by arrow manufacture and whether it was aluminum or carbon shafts.  Pretty soon I was sorting them by size as most all of them are Easton brand aluminum arrows.  Some had good tips inserted and some did not, but most have the tip inserts in which the tips are screwed.  Nearly all of them have plastic fletchings and/or vanes and so all of those will have to be replaced (enter the Bitzenburger)!

Sorted Arrows

So, what did I end up with except a half a garbage barrel full of junk?  Here is the break down:

Arrow size:  2315 (.342 deflection/ 11.8 gpi)  4 each of them!

2216 (approx 400 spine/ 12 gpi)  11 each of them!

2213 (.458 deflection/9.9 gpi)  30 each of them!

2117 (400 spine/ 12 gpi)  5 each of them!

1914 (.658 deflection)   7 each of them!

And 7 others of assorted sizes and lengths.

A grand total of 64 arrows.  Also, I scrounged 2 points/1 blunt rubber tip cover and 1 nock!!!!

The arrows range in length from 30 inches to 21 inches, so there is something for just about everyone!  I might even find some of them suitable for hunting with.  The 400 spine ones will be my test arrows.  Next will be some of the .458 deflection arrows as one guy I know said I should cut 500 spine arrows down to 27 inches and they should fly perfect for my bow setup!  We will see.

May 6, 2016

Bears Butt

Written on May 7th, 2016 , Archery stuff

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BearsButt.com | Stories, Ramblings & Random Stuff From an Old Mountain Man

Just some of my old stories, new stories, and in general what is going on in my life.