Getting more and more excited for the upcoming bow hunt.  I even went with Weasel to check his trail camera and got a real eye opening experience.  I can’t tell you what that was, but I can tell you we saw 3 deer and a moose today.  You will have to check out Weasel In The Wild to see what he wants to show you.

Well, I had a set back early this week when my left eye decided it didn’t want to play with the right eye and went whacko for a few minutes.  Seems I had what is called in the medical world a “Positional Vertigo” attack…well not an attack per sey, but the Doc said we all have little crystal floating around in our inner ear area and once in awhile a crystal will break out of it’s normal position and bounce off a nerve that then causes the eye muscles to do erratic stuff.  That is what happened to me and my left eye went East as far as it could, then came back to center, jumped a very hard up move, back to center again, then to the left hard as it could, then back to center and then down to max out in that position.  This all happened in a matter of 2 seconds.  It was scary to me and I thought I might be having a stroke…so April took me to the ER where I totally wasted her afternoon.  Everything is alright now but it took until today to have the muscles around my left eye finally feel normal again.  So, why am I telling you this?  Well, because I have gotten off my physical training schedule.  I’ll be a slow, fat guy on the hunt.  That will be OK as I will shoot my elk up hill from the nearest road and it will die right next to the road….same with my deer.

As for practicing, I have either gone to the field range or shot in my garage almost every day.  In the field I can go as far back as I want, but have restricted myself to 30 yards and have practiced at that range the last two times.  In the garage I can only shoot 25 yards, which is still ok.  Here are my last 30 yard ends (not all my ends, just the ones I want to show you) 🙂

30 yards is quite a ways away with my bow and I have to teach myself to aim a bit to the left if I want the arrows to go anywhere close to where I want them to go.

I’m really liking these new Gold Tip Kinetic arrows.

AND when the groups start to open up like this it is time to call it a practice session.

So, along with all this archery obsession I have wrapped myself up in, I got to thinking about the number of bow hunters there are in the state.  Today we saw a few “staked out camping spots” and we know dang well they are being saved for bow hunters and the hunt doesn’t start for two more weeks.  Anyway, there are a bunch of bow hunters in Utah.  I found a site that showed 40,000 bow hunters in Utah in 2010, and what has happened in the last 6 years?  More for sure, I am one and so is Weasel.

My curiosity took me to search for the first bow hunting season in the U.S…..come to find out it was the state of Wisconsin in 1934.  It took a few years to convince the powers to be to put in place an archery only hunt and 40 (count them, 40) hunters purchased tags and went hunting that year.  How many bucks were harvested using bow and arrow?  One.

Since 1934 every state has enacted an archery season for deer and there are over 3.6 MILLION bow hunters in the U.S. (2010 number).

Along with the numbers, hunters in general are always trying to figure out an easier, faster, cheaper way to bag their animals and so the equipment has changed dramatically in that time frame as well.  We all know where that has gone and it keeps changing almost daily from string materials to broad heads to bows and arrows themselves.  Also, the rules of engagement are changing almost season to season.  Utah is allowing a range finder to be attached to the bow now.  And the way things are going, shooting a bow won’t be much different than shooting a rifle…well maybe not out to 1,000 yards, but still for a bow to shoot accurately out to 100 yards and have the energy retained in the arrow to put it through a deer sized animal, I’m already reading and hearing of hunters taking those long shots.

Well, enough said.  I’m still very much excited to get on the mountain and use my tag!

August 5, 2016

Bears Butt