Maybe it was a sign

[handirifle]

#2598

I must admit for the past 8-10 years I have mostly hunted with my Mathews wheel bow. Arthritis in the hands has made hours of practice with my recurve too painful. The arthritis is slowly redefining the direction my fingers point. Such is life. God still provides me with strength to do the many chores necessary here at home, so all is good. Just the usual aches and pains and finding parts of me that have grown, that one does not necessarily WANT to grow 😯 that come with being in my 60’s. 😀

Our early archery season starts here in 6 days (yea pretty darn unbelievable to me too. It was 103 today:() and about a month ago, when I went to dust off the wheel bow, I noticed the case had a bulge in it at each end. Opening the case told me the story. One of the cables had snapped and the force of the limbs hit the sides of the case frame (aluminum) hard enough to bend it. No idea how much, if any damage is done to the bow, other than obviously needing new string and cables.

So not wanting to spend the $100 or so to get that done, I pulled out the recurve and started working on it. I am one that really likes a bow quiver, but didn’t like mine so I made a new one, and am so much happier with it so far.

Anyway, I got to thinking ,it might just be a sign for me that it’s time to go back to my roots, in archery that is, and try for a muley with my recurve.

So far, God has kept the finger pain at bay and I “discovered” my ideal drawing technique and have become more consistent than ever before.

My license and tag is in the mail, and permission granted from my neighbors who kindly let me hunt their land (320 acres combined), so I am good to go.

I do have another neighbor that has another 320 acres himself, but he’s a Vegan, so he’s not hot on the idea of hunting on his land. Or at all I’m pretty sure.

Will see what this season has in store for me. On our evening walk a week or so ago, my wife and I spotted a lion waiting near a water hole, that’s almost dried up, with three nice bucks approaching. All this was only about 100yds from the dirt road we walk. We’ve been in drought here for 3 years now and water is SCARCE. The three bucks spotted us and eventually bounded off, spoiling the lions dinner plans, we think. He just slowly turned his back to us and walked off.

The next night only 2 bucks came to the water. We may have only delayed dinner it seems.

[Mohawk13]

#11115

Good Luck to You. I deal with arthritis also, but I never seem to notice it when I am drawing on a game animal, rest of the year I suffer…

[handirifle]

#11134

Yea the fingers really affected by it I have lost about 50% of my grip. So far my pinky is the worst one, so it hasn’t affected me quite as bad as others will.

[handirifle]

#14420

So far the fingers are holding up pretty well. I have switched to a 3 finger under, and just a very slight cant, and it has made a HUGE difference in my group consistency. I have for decades shot cross dominant (left handed, right eye dominant) but will most likely make the switch after this season.

I will hopefully build a bow from an old wheel bow riser, and make it so I can switch limbs to work my right side strength up.

But with my new method I have been getting 4-6″ groups, mostly, at 25yds. NEVER did that well before.

I say mostly because occasionally I will have the goofball flier, but most of the time, even those would be in a kill zone. Assuming my target animal stays still.

Odd thing is, I have tried 3 under before, but I think I was canting the bow too much. If I were shooting RH it might not be as much an issue, but with the non dominant eye over the arrow too much cant starts stringing arrows left and right.

One reason it has sorta come to a head this season, is I have a slow developing cataract in the left eye, keeping it from being as sharp as the right. That’s why I will most likely switch to RH after this season. Not afraid of getting older, but some parts of it are not good.

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