Chris Barton, from the Brigham Bowmen came to the house this morning and presented me with an award for winning the Mens Senior Division 60-70 year olds, Traditional Bow competition.  My first award shooting the bow!  I know there are more hidden in that bow!

She was on her way down to present Weasel, Squirrel and McKenzie their awards as well!

A great way to start the day!

Thanks Chris and the Brigham Bowmen!

Bears Butt

April 26, 2015

I’ve been joining Weasel down on the farm the last couple of nights to shoot bows.  He has his goals and I have mine.  It doesn’t seem too long ago my goal was to shoot my arrow and hit the backstop holding up the paper target.

These arrow stopping blocks are made of layers of foam, compressed together and held with metal bands.  Watching Weasels arrows slip through the air at a very fast speed and slamming into the foam block is pretty impressive.  But when he goes to pull the arrows out of it, he has to use his arrow pulling devise as the speed of the arrow causes it to melt the plastic foam.  There is a lot of heat produced via friction.  On my side of the coin however, I don’t have to worry about that.  My arrows arc high and hit the foam with a slight “bonk”, sticking in maybe 4 inches.

So, back to my story.  Hitting the backstop is a good thing.  First off, it saves you time trying to find the arrow that missed it, second, it saves money because the arrows don’t get all bent or broken by the rocks and other debris down range.  And best of all, you feel pretty good about your accomplishment.

At the indoor range the blocks are 20 yards down range.  In the field it can be whatever you want it to be.  Weasel is trying to hit the bullseye on his paper target, 5 out of 5 times at 60 yards.  The bullseye is a circle about 3 inches across.  He has his mind made up that he will be doing just that some day, but now, he is working his way up to that goal.  I’m not exactly sure what his method is, but he keeps moving up 10 yards every once in awhile.  I think when he puts all his arrows in the bullseye or no farther out than the 8 ring, he moves back to 60 yards and shoots again.  60 yards is a very long way to be that accurate with a bow set up for hunting.  So, while he is shooting at 60 yards, we have my backstop set at 40 yards and we stand on the same line to shoot.  That keeps things safe.  When he moves up, so do I….he will shoot at 50 yards and me at 30.

Well, I’m still learning this bow shooting thing and my target is much bigger than his.  I can pretty much hit the backstop at 40 yards every time, but I use the entire thing right now.  My goal at this point is to put all my arrows within the paper of the target at that range.

To a lot of archers that is an easy thing to do.  But for me it a pretty lofty goal right now.  In my mind, I think if I can hit that paper at 40 yards every time I shoot at it, when I move up to 20 yards it should be a no brainer that I’ll hit it and maybe then my goal will be like Weasels is right now, to hit the white circle in the center of the paper.

By the way, I’m still working on my gap chart and 40 yards is still my point on distance.

(Note:  The pictures of the backstops are NOT the ones we use on the farm).

AND, I absolutely LOVE this picture that Addie took the other day:

My Samick Journey resting on a bush!

Berz But

April 22, 2015

Photo by Addie!

Winemaker and I took Windy’s kids and joined Weasel and his family up for a campout at the Hardware Ranch over the weekend.  The Cache Archers were holding a weekend long 3D shoot and archery golf shoot and we wanted to play.  It seemed right to camp over and be close to the action.  There had been a very slight rain storm that blew over late in the afternoon on Friday, and when we arrived it was just enough to have settled the dust.  It was going to be a cold night though!

What was evident right from the start was all the work that the Cache Archers had put into setting up the target ranges.  They had two distinct coursed of 3D targets set up and each course had 20 targets to shoot at.  Big ones and little ones, but it doesn’t matter if it was big or small, it still took someone to hike that target up the mountain and anchor it down.  Flags were also tied out indicating the safe trail from one target to the next.  That was one heck of a lot of hard work!

As for me, I wanted to shoot in the event and take pictures as we went, what happened was my camera decided it didn’t want to let loose of the pictures that were stored on the disc and so I could not use my camera.  I resorted to using my phone a few times and then relied on two of my Grandkids to take pictures and hopefully use theres.  Most of the pictures in this story are taken by McKenzie or Addylin Zundel.

Saturday morning we began with some breakfast burritos heated over the camp stove.  That little bit of smoke flavor sure made them taste good!  When breakfast was completed we headed over to the registration room to get signed up and learn a little about the rules.  We had never been to a 3D shoot like this one before and were quickly told to relax and enjoy ourselves out on the course(s).  The kids under 11 got to shoot for free and we wanted them to join in on the fun.  Everyone in camp was going to be walking the course and only Winemaker and Hot Spark would just walk to see what it was all about.  The rest of us would shoot.  So, we had 7 shooters in our group.

That caused us to be slow in moving and we let several groups go ahead of us at different points in the trail walk.  It also caused us to watch the arrows as best as we could so we could find them should they happen NOT to hit the intended target.  But, with all arrow slinging sports, the arrows some times have a mind of their own and go where we didn’t want them to go.  Before the day was out, my collection of arrows was down 3 to the bush gods, lost forever, and 4 more in need of various repairs that caused them to be un-usable.  Was it fun and worth the loss of arrows….ABSOLUTELY!!!!  I will know for future shoots like this one to bring lots of arrows that could be “sacrificial” in nature.

From high on the hill you could see the staging area which was the camp and the parking lot.

A prettier setting could not have been made!  Thank you to the management of Hardware Ranch for allowing this to be done on your property.

The range courses were set up with stakes at which the shooters were to position themselves.  There were two different stations for each of the targets, one a little closer than the other.  I’m not sure why they set it up that way, but as time goes on I’m sure I’ll learn.  What we did as we progressed was let the younger shooters, Addy and Chase pick the spot they wanted to shoot from for each of the targets, while the rest of us stayed back by the stakes.  We kept it safe at all times and usually, but not always having the older shooters go first and then moving up for the younger shooters to shoot.  We found that Addy likes a bit of a challenge in the shooting part, while Chase liked to “sneak in close” for a guaranteed kill shot.

So, while Chase liked the close in shots, some of us had to shoot some pretty long shots like this one at two elk down below us.

A shot I would never take in real life with a bow.

So, once we were done with the first course we took a bit of time out for lunch.  Most of the kids wanted to stay back at camp rather than hike around and we had already had a talk with them about the lost and broken arrows.  I only had six left in my quiver that were good enough to be shooting and only two of those I would sacrifice at long range shots or where it was nearly guaranteed to have an arrow break by hitting rocks.  You know how I shoot and the arrow is always at risk of injury.

Well, we decided that Conner, Weasel and I would be doing the shooting on the second course and any of the kids that wanted to tag along could.  We started out with Kenzie, Addy and Chase and soon it was just Kenzie and Addy.  With just 3 of us shooting the course went by quickly and about half way through we found ourselves waiting for the groups ahead of us.  That was fine, it gave us time to enjoy the scenery.

One of these days I’m going to surprise myself by hitting what I’m trying to hit.

When you consider we were each shooting two arrows at each target and you count 5 arrows, 9 out of 10 times it is one of mine that missed.

This is a picture of the parking/camping lot late in the afternoon on Saturday.  Lots of folks were there to enjoy the shooting and the nice weather.

Hey, where are my arrows?

These are the two photographers, Addy and Kenzie, Kenzie doubled as our score keeper!  Good job on all counts girls!

Don’t bother looking for my arrows to be sticking out of this guy.  He was just far enough away I had to elevate a good bit and the cross wind helped move my arrows very far away from the intended target.  That’s ok, I have come to live with it.

I had this buffalo scared!  And after I shot and went down to retrieve my arrows, they were laying in the dirt even with the Caribou I had just missed earlier.  Oh well.

One thing is certain, the scenery was beautiful!

On each of the two courses they have at least one target where the arrow is in grave danger should you miss the target.  These rocks “eat” arrows when they hit them.  Someone ahead of us had one of their arrows eaten and they placed it in the curl of the horns!

I had to look for both of my arrows and lucky for me, they both hit short and glanced into the rocks.

Later in the course were two very long range targets.  The elk was about 85 yards while the white circle was 101 yards away.  I told Kenzie to give me two zeros on my score sheet as my arrows wouldn’t go that far.  We did manage to find two arrows when we went down there to pick Weasel and Conners up.  We turned those arrows into the Cache Archers Club in hopes of someone getting them back.

 HEY!  I hit one!

HEY!  I hit another!

But, the classic for me happened way back toward the beginning of this course.  There was a small bear with his back to the shooters and two red dots up on the shoulder blades.  The object, of course is to hit the two red dots.  Chase says to me, “Hey Grandpa!  Shoot the bear in the butt!  That would be funny!”  Well, it wasn’t because I tried, but the outcome looked like this:

What a fun day it was.  We got a lot of hiking in and by mixing it up with the shooting of arrows, the hike wasn’t really noticed….well, not until later when the stiffness settled in.  I need to get out and do some exercise before the turkey hunt.

Chase is six years old and just beginning to write.  Weasels truck is so dirty, the kids were using it as a “canvas” for their art work.  Chase joined in with this:

Berz But……Close enough Chase!

A fun time was had by all!  Thanks for all the work you did for our entertainment Cache Archers!

Berz But

April 20, 2015

This weekend will be the shake down for our coach as we are heading up to the Hardware Ranch area for an archery 3D shoot.  The event sounds like a very fun thing.  Not only do they have 2 different 3D trail walk courses, but they also have an archery golf course set up.  I’ve not shot either one and so this will be a very fun event.  Most of it will happen for us tomorrow (Saturday) as we will most likely sleep in on Sunday, have a great breakfast and then come home.  All the grandkids are going!

So, today will be a busy day getting prepared to go and then waiting until the kids all get out of school.  BUT, Weasel and I are going to take their trailer up and secure a spot somewhere.  Then we will swing over to his trail camera area and hike in to retrieve the disc.  It will be a fun experience even though the hike will be a long and arduous one.  I plan on loading up my hydration pack and use this as a training time in preparation for the turkey hunt.

I’m beginning to feel that Spring is as exciting for me as Fall is with the hunting.  Turkey hunting really got into my blood and even though I have yet to tag one in Utah, I have had one shot and had a couple of gobblers fighting just behind where I was sitting one day.  To be SO close and yet so FAR away from getting a shot the excitement is there just the same.  The memories made are unbelievable.  If you are a hunter and have never gone turkey hunting you need to put it on your bucket list.  It is not easy by any stretch of the imagination.  Sure, some people luck out and get them by road hunting, but not very often.    We have found you need to get up very early in the morning, get to your spot and hike a long way to be set up long before the first hint of morning light comes around.  It is then that you sit and listen to the morning wake up of all the critters out there in the woods.  The deer, birds, mice and other animals all coming around after a long night of sleeping.  And then the Gobbling as the turkeys wake up and sound off in preparation for their fly down.  FUN!

So, I plan on posting up the events of the weekend when I get back.  If you are interested in this weekends fun, check out the Cache Archers on Facebook and see what they have written about it.

Bears Butt

April 17, 2015

The second day of the Formal Invitational was a very fun day.  The Brigham Bowmen group allowed me the pleasure to help run the 9 O’Clock line…what does that mean?  Well I got to wear a blaze orange jacket and carry a ping pong paddle.  It also allowed me to mingle with the shooters and take pictures.  There were two of us and we were actually supposed to watch the line for unsafe conditions and to let the announcer know when the field was clear of people so they could call the shooters to the line.  But, in reality, we just stood around and looked cool.

The only way I could have been “cooler” would be to be bigger….but those of you who know me, that ain’t gonna happen.

My goal for the day was to get some video of the archers shooting and bigger than that, the arrows hitting the targets.  I’ll be posting up links to some of that action once I get them loaded on You Tube.  Stand by for that in a future story.

What did happen at day two was some fun.  The group seemed to be more relaxed than yesterdays group.  I’m not sure why, but it seemed that way.  There was one lady shooter who had a story to tell.  It happened last weekend while camping.  Her husband pulled his bow out and started shooting at a milk jug or something and she decided to try a shot or two.  That was the first time she had ever picked up a bow in her life.  She continued during the weekend and her husband decided he needed to buy himself a new bow and gave that old bow to her.  So, they decided they needed to come to this formal shoot and give it a go.  Now, you would not believe the “rest of the story”, here is a picture of one of their groups early in the day.

I think this lady is going to be at many more events like this in the future!  Way to go!

It is always a pleasure to see the parents out encouraging their youngsters to do the best they can in all sports, but it just seems to me that archery is the one in which is it totally up to the archer to exceed expectations.  Sure it is nice when there is enough money available to set the youngster up with the “best” equipment, training and all of that, but it doesn’t take a rich person to play.  There is plenty of used equipment around and people willing to give free advise etc. to make anyone feel welcome to the sport.  I was fortunate enough today to spend most of the day with young people and watch how incredibly good they are with a bow and arrow in hand.

These two fathers were very proud of their youngsters as the days shooting progressed.  I was proud as well.  I’ve said this before…archery is one sport where it does not matter if you are large or small, girl or boy, strong or weak, handicapped or what not….YOU CAN DO THIS!  It is fun, clean, up lifting and as safe as the environment it is being played in.

To see a group of arrows all in the yellow ring, means no score is less than a 9!  This group appears to be all 10’s and X’s to me.

Remember too, that this shoot requires the shooters to pull back that bow over 90 times and after a bunch of shooting you can expect the groups of arrows to begin to spread out.  This is still an outstanding grouping of arrows!  These kids sure don’t have much of a problem with it!

And along with the shooting comes the scoring.  Each youngster would call out the score for the other shooter.  These kids were not shooting for the money, but if they had, then there would have been a double scoring sheet being written on.  In this case each shooter had their own score card and one shooter would write down the score for the other shooter.  It’s only fair.

You have been seeing the two shooters on the right, but at the 10 yard line, they were joined the the two boys on the left who had been shooting on their own line because they are younger.  Put the 4 of them together and look at the group of arrows finding that yellow circle!  Incredible shooting!

The smile says it all!  Nice X young man!

Let’s move over a line and see what is going on over there!

Boy!  That target is a LOONNGGG way down there!  But this young archer is not afraid to fling that arrow to find the mark and mom is right there to score the target!

When the youngsters start out at a young age, they pick up their form rather quickly and mold themselves into some very incredible shooting machines!  Going from groups like the one in this picture to shooting like this later in life.

So, from the line to the target it is all up to the archer to do their best.

And it wasn’t easy, but there sure were a lot of X’s scored today!

When you shoot like this and all but one of the arrows stay in the yellow circle, THAT is some great shooting!  This young lady hasn’t been shooting for too much longer than me and look that that group!  Is there an X in her day today?

Absolutely!  And even though I didn’t get a picture of it, I was told she had a 3X grouping before it was all over!  I sure wish I had been told of that one!  Congratulations!   I love X’s!

So, as with the others, the moms and dads like to participate in any way they can and mostly they were the ones scoring the targets.

Now I’d like you to follow me on a picture extravaganza showing just how X’s are born!  There were three young men who got into an “X shooting spree”, the fever to shoot X’s was growing as each end was shot and one X was not going to be enough for them!

A little background from my limited knowledge of these three shooters.  The guy on the left had 3 arrows to shoot and a heart as big as big.  His bow is a little big for him as well, but you would not have known it by his attitude to make those arrows do what he wanted them to do.  The young man in the middle has been a member of YHEC (Youth Hunter Education Challenge) for a few years and has been shooting a bow for that much time.  He placed in the State championship just this past weekend.  The archer on the right is a member of the Brigham Bowmen and has a couple of years of shooting under his belt.  All three of these young men were very fun to watch and be a part of their day.  I hope I wasn’t a pain in their behinds.

Count the fingers!  That is how many X’s they have racked up today!

We are getting close to running out of fingers!

HEY!  Where did that extra finger come from to make 11 X’s?

NOW can you see how much fun this game can be?  The pictures pretty much speak for themselves as to how much fun kids and adults alike can have shooting arrows!

A big thank you to all the archers who played this weekend!  I hope you had as much fun as I did!  Thank again to the Brigham Bowmen and the staff at the Box Elder County Fairgrounds!  A very nice venue to play in out of the rain and cold….well, it was a little cold in the arena this weekend, but at least we didn’t have any wind to blow our arrows around!  We will take that over the alternative!

JUST PLAIN FUN!

Bears Butt

April 13, 2015

Last year the Brigham Bowmen set up their formal invitational event outside at the Box Elder Fairgrounds and this picture showed my view of the targets.  Those big targets down range are 60 yards from the line.  A very intimidating distance for a guy shooting a bow.  At least from my prospective at that time.  Who would have known that one year later I would be trying to shoot an arrow that distance?

Yesterday I had the privilege of helping set up the Formal, actually help with the range enforcement and then get to shoot it.  What a fun day!

As you have read on here, there are three different lines to be shot from.  60 yards, 50 yards and 40 yards for the adults.  The kids have three different distances they shoot from, but still very far for kids.  The older kids get to shoot out to 50 yards and believe me, that is a pretty good poke!

We picked up the pieces of the setup at 6 a.m. yesterday morning and there were a lot of folks that came to help.  The trucks were loaded up and off we went to the fairgrounds to get things ready for the 9 a.m. line.  I was a bit skeptical that we would have everything ready for the 9 a.m. line, but we still had a half hour before anyone came to sign in.  From the bleachers, the line looks like this:

And down range the targets are spaced just right to allow for everyone to have plenty of room to shoot and score.

Those targets are a LOOONNNGGGGG way down there!

Well, the shooting started promptly at 9 a.m. and it’s a good thing too.  There were 90 arrows to be shot by each shooter and that takes time!  Yesterday was especially tough as the arrow stops (bunks as I call them) didn’t want to let the arrows go once the arrow was stuck in them.  Arrow pullers were used throughout the day.  Most of the shooters shoot fast, flat shooting bows and arrows that are tuned perfectly to fly straight and true.  When that combination is put to use, the arrow hits the target and the backing and drives on into it creating a lot of friction and heat.  The make up of the bunk melts onto the arrow shaft and that is what causes the arrow to be sooooo very hard to pull out.

As could be expected the 9 a.m. line didn’t have a whole lot of shooters.  Heck, who wants to get up early on a Saturday anyway?  I didn’t get any pictures of that line, but I counted about 17 shooters including some very young ones.  I have to say, the young shooters are pretty dang serious when it comes to flinging arrows at targets!  Congratulations kids!

You can see them beaming!  And actually that is a pretty good target from the far distance they had to shoot!  Good job fellas!  Keep practicing!  You are definitely on the right track!

At the other end of the line and age bracket the targets were taking quite a beating in the yellow 10 and X rings!

Look closely folks, those are two separate targets with clusters of arrows all in the 10 rings and X rings!  Absolutely impressive shooting!  With me, I like to use up the whole target and not discriminate between the different colors.  I even like to hit around the target, like in the ground and into the arrow stopping wood.  I’m a nice guy that way.

Aside from what I do with my shooting, the targets “printed” all day long were impressive and only the bottom line will tell who out-did who for the money.  Most people played for the fun of it and believe me it IS fun!  To challenge your ability to hit that yellow ring from 60 yards away is a great way to spend the day.  It makes you tired as well.  Those back muscles pulling that bow back 90 times lets you know it by the end.  My neck muscles even got into the act.

Back to the game!

The noon line was the largest of the day.  I didn’t count the number of shooters, but the line was full for sure.  To have more would have meant shooting double lines.  We didn’t have to do that.  What I did notice was the sounds and I hope to set up a camera to show you how it was for me.  Shooting outdoors doesn’t have the same effect as shooting indoors.  When the shooters step up to the line and get the signal to go ahead and fling arrows, there is a silence that comes across the area.  Then the sounds of the bow strings being released, followed by the sounds of the arrows hitting the targets….whop, whop, whop, whop.  There is little to no person noises and if you could monitor “concentration” the chart would be off the graph.

The way they had things set up, they put the adults on the right side (facing the line from behind) and the kids were on the left end.  To finish each distance the shooters walked forward when the ends were finished.  It was very organized and safe.  I wish more would come and be entertained in the arena seating.  You would not be disappointed!  Bring your binoculars.

As shooters finish shooting the required number of arrow, they are instructed to step back away from the line so the line judges will know when everyone is finished and then call for shooters to go down range and score their hits (misses in my case).  It was very apparent that everyone was having a great time and what a way for people to get to meet new acquaintances?  Come on out folks!  You too could be doing something like these kids did!

I only know Conner in this picture, he is the young man on the left in blue, but take a look at that grouping of arrows!  These four young adults are going to be shooting like those 10 and X ring shooters VERY SOON!  I was impressed with these four and their abilities to place their arrows in and around the 10 ring!  Good going guys (and gal)!  Guys is my way of including both sexes!

By the way, when 6 X 4 number of arrows are all sticking out of the target like this, it makes for scoring a little bit more difficult!

So who does this arrow belong to?

So, 3 p.m. came along and yours truly got to play!  One thing about this sport, it does not discriminate.  Even 65 year olds with antiquated methods can play.  And play I did.  My partner was a young Sophomore in high school who also was shooting a recurve bow.  His was set up with stabilizers and a sight, but a recurve bow none the less.  His arrows were a lot skinnier than mine and he said they cost around $300 per dozen….I think I’ll stay with my $6 arrows.  I can break or lose them without having an ulcer each time I pull one back and chance it down range.  Of course his score was a whole lot closer to perfect than mine, but you will see in a minute how mine faired out.

I’m 4th from the end in the purple shirt, hat on backward, not only to look like a “cool old guy”, but to get the bill of the hat out of the way.  Functional and cool!  Thanks Winemaker for the grand stand picture!

So, how did the Old Bears Butt fair in his shooting?  Remember there are 30 arrows shot at each distance!

60 yards (my practice did in fact pay off)…300 points possible and I got a 96!  And best of all, I only missed the target (bunk) 9 times!  Is that good or what?

50 yards!  Let’s talk about this for a minute.  We are going to move up 10 yards.  From 60 yards to 50 the target gets larger, right?  Well, it does in reality, but behind my bow 50 yards is still a LOOONNNGGG way down there.  My strategy was not to raise the bow too high and shoot over it, but still, too low and the arrow will hit the dirt.  The score please!

142!  And 4 zeros!  Damn!  If I had to say it for myself, I’m getting gooder!  My best end was a 44 out of a possible 60.  I need more practice I know, but I’m improving!  Now let’s get down to the 40 yard mark!  20 yards closer than that hail mary distance of 60 yards.

40 yards!  Score 147 and the best part!  1 (one) count them!  1 zero!

My final score was 385 out of a possible 900 with 14 zeros!  My personal best…..well, heck it was my first ever time shooting an event like this…of course it’s my personal best!

I can tell you from experience, PRACTICE pays dividends!  I can only imagine how this shooting event would have played out should I not have PRACTICED!

I’ve looked at a whole bunch of videos, read a book on the subject and every one of them come down to the same thing:  If you are going to get good at shooting a bow and hitting what you want to hit you need a few things behind your belt:  A good and consistent anchor point (points in my case), good and consistent form, a good and consistent follow through and tons of practice!  Do you notice anything here?  Good and Consistent!  Anchor point, form, follow through and practice!

More to come from todays (Sundays) shooting!

Bears Butt

April 12, 2015