Triple C
Well-Known Member
Learned something new this weekend while hunting with one of Georgia's legends in the world of traditional archery. When I decided to try my hand at traditional archery, I met this gentleman and he became my mentor for all things traditional. He lives not too far from me so I spent quite a bit of time shooting with him 3 or 4 years ago. I've invited him to the farm to hunt over the years but things just never worked out until this weekend. Our calendar's aligned and it was game on.
I picked him up Friday morning and his weapon of choice was an osage self-made bow, river cane arrows and stone points, all made from his own hands. I'm like...okay, let's see how this works out. We arrive at the farm and I proceed to show him a number of stands already pre-set. He chose a couple of different stands to hunt friday evening and saturday morning without any luck. After saturday morning's hunt, he tells me he loves our stand locations for cruising and rut phase and they were ideal for compound bow hunting but too high for traditional equipment due to the sharp angle of a deer at 12 yds or less from the stand which is mostly where it all happens with trad equipment. He asks me to show him my best food source as of now. I immediately thought of a prolific persimmon prouder on the edge of the swamp and off we got to check it out.
It's love at first sight when he sees it and tells me he can't believe I don't have a stand overlooking that tree. So off we go back to the shop and grab a hang-on and 3 sections of a stick ladder. We go back, he hangs the stand not more than 10 ft off the ground and no more than 10 yds from the persimmon tree in a pine that had decent cover around it. I look at the low height of the stand and question his sanity thinking you gonna get busted trying to shoot out of that stand.
Off he goes at 5:30 to hunt that stand. I got a text at 6:30 of "doe down". The doe was no more than 5 yds from the tree and perhaps 12 ft below him as the pine set on a little knoll overlooking the persimmon tree. The angle of the shot, even at 10 ft high was so severely steep that he felt like he only hit one lung and wanted to wait to track the deer so he told me to hold tight...that he's gonna wait for a couple of hours before searching.
He also uses a string tracker taped to the front of his osage bow. He said only about 30 yds of line went out of the tracker and suddenly stopped. The deer dove back in the edge of the swamp with about half of the arrow sticking out from the entry hole so we knew there would be little to no blood trail. We returned to the cabin, ate a fine rack of baby back ribs I had cooked prior and then headed back down at 8:30...two hours after he shot the doe. As a side note, he lost his left eye years ago and also about one-third of the his periphery vision out of his right eye. I've shot with him a lot and not sure how he manages to shoot instinctive with no depth perception but mercy me...the guy can shoot a trad bow.
We arrive at the shot sight in front of the stand and pick up the white string that was attached to arrow and start following it into the edge of the swamp. I'm following the string, trying not to mire up in muck and even though I had snake chaps on, was a bit nervous of what we might bump in to wading through the muck. Low and behold, after a couple of zig zags, there lays the doe not 25 yds from where he shot. The string led us straight to her with no blood visible anywhere. The arrow was broken off at the point from where she fell and we were never able to recover the point.
Lessons learned...1) think traditional, not compound when hanging stands for trad bows - no higher than 12 feet. 2) A tiny stone point on the end of a river cane arrow that's not perfectly straight will freakin kill a deer! 3) Add a string tracker for easier tracking. 4) Forget setting a stand 20 ft high that allows me to see 50 yds out when the only thing that matters is 12 yds in front of me. 5) Use a rock climber's safety harness with the tether in front instead of in back in case you fall so that you will swing facing the tree rather than hang with your back to the tree and set the loop in the tree belt directly above the steps so that in the event of a fall, you are directly over the ladder/steps. 6) Wrap a piece of reflective tape on your arrow just below the fletching to pick it up with a flashlight in the dark.
This feller is 71, blind in one eye and still using a climber and hanging stands, and absolutely loves the outdoors. He's on a quest to take Georgia's big 5 with this particular self made bow, arrows and stone points. He added the deer to his total on his trip to my farm. He's already got the turkey and hog under his belt. He's still chasing a bear and gator. He leaves tomorrow to try and get it done on a N GA bear.
Quite the inspiration to be around someone so passionate about life and doing what he loves to do. And...I know exactly where I'll be hunting when I'm down in a couple of weeks - 10 ft high overlooking that persimmon tree.
I picked him up Friday morning and his weapon of choice was an osage self-made bow, river cane arrows and stone points, all made from his own hands. I'm like...okay, let's see how this works out. We arrive at the farm and I proceed to show him a number of stands already pre-set. He chose a couple of different stands to hunt friday evening and saturday morning without any luck. After saturday morning's hunt, he tells me he loves our stand locations for cruising and rut phase and they were ideal for compound bow hunting but too high for traditional equipment due to the sharp angle of a deer at 12 yds or less from the stand which is mostly where it all happens with trad equipment. He asks me to show him my best food source as of now. I immediately thought of a prolific persimmon prouder on the edge of the swamp and off we got to check it out.
It's love at first sight when he sees it and tells me he can't believe I don't have a stand overlooking that tree. So off we go back to the shop and grab a hang-on and 3 sections of a stick ladder. We go back, he hangs the stand not more than 10 ft off the ground and no more than 10 yds from the persimmon tree in a pine that had decent cover around it. I look at the low height of the stand and question his sanity thinking you gonna get busted trying to shoot out of that stand.
Off he goes at 5:30 to hunt that stand. I got a text at 6:30 of "doe down". The doe was no more than 5 yds from the tree and perhaps 12 ft below him as the pine set on a little knoll overlooking the persimmon tree. The angle of the shot, even at 10 ft high was so severely steep that he felt like he only hit one lung and wanted to wait to track the deer so he told me to hold tight...that he's gonna wait for a couple of hours before searching.
He also uses a string tracker taped to the front of his osage bow. He said only about 30 yds of line went out of the tracker and suddenly stopped. The deer dove back in the edge of the swamp with about half of the arrow sticking out from the entry hole so we knew there would be little to no blood trail. We returned to the cabin, ate a fine rack of baby back ribs I had cooked prior and then headed back down at 8:30...two hours after he shot the doe. As a side note, he lost his left eye years ago and also about one-third of the his periphery vision out of his right eye. I've shot with him a lot and not sure how he manages to shoot instinctive with no depth perception but mercy me...the guy can shoot a trad bow.
We arrive at the shot sight in front of the stand and pick up the white string that was attached to arrow and start following it into the edge of the swamp. I'm following the string, trying not to mire up in muck and even though I had snake chaps on, was a bit nervous of what we might bump in to wading through the muck. Low and behold, after a couple of zig zags, there lays the doe not 25 yds from where he shot. The string led us straight to her with no blood visible anywhere. The arrow was broken off at the point from where she fell and we were never able to recover the point.
Lessons learned...1) think traditional, not compound when hanging stands for trad bows - no higher than 12 feet. 2) A tiny stone point on the end of a river cane arrow that's not perfectly straight will freakin kill a deer! 3) Add a string tracker for easier tracking. 4) Forget setting a stand 20 ft high that allows me to see 50 yds out when the only thing that matters is 12 yds in front of me. 5) Use a rock climber's safety harness with the tether in front instead of in back in case you fall so that you will swing facing the tree rather than hang with your back to the tree and set the loop in the tree belt directly above the steps so that in the event of a fall, you are directly over the ladder/steps. 6) Wrap a piece of reflective tape on your arrow just below the fletching to pick it up with a flashlight in the dark.
This feller is 71, blind in one eye and still using a climber and hanging stands, and absolutely loves the outdoors. He's on a quest to take Georgia's big 5 with this particular self made bow, arrows and stone points. He added the deer to his total on his trip to my farm. He's already got the turkey and hog under his belt. He's still chasing a bear and gator. He leaves tomorrow to try and get it done on a N GA bear.
Quite the inspiration to be around someone so passionate about life and doing what he loves to do. And...I know exactly where I'll be hunting when I'm down in a couple of weeks - 10 ft high overlooking that persimmon tree.
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