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in reply to: What's your favorite bowhunting song? #11686
“Lips Like A Mazaratti,” Ted Nugent. 😛 sorry just kidding.
I often find myself humming “Brown Sugar” Rolling Stones, while hunting. Always seems to be some old song “stuck” in my head, same verse over and over, as I sneak along. Drives me nuts but I accept it as part of the mental derangement of being in rut. daveToday is the first day of the season, which opened the 28 Aug., that I haven’t been out. The one house guest my wife allows during hunting season arrives tonight for a week, and there were things to do. And I figured it was time to give the elk a break as I’ve been at ’em hard of late. Passed a cow at 7 yards last night. Couldn’t decide whether to shoot a nice 5×6 at 12 yards the previous night (he’d be my second biggest bull but I know bigger boys are on the way) but he solved that by walking away and showing me only a butt shot. A very good year so far so far as numbers of elk and bugling — which we can hear from our cabin porch most nights — but only that one shot op at a cow so far. Very dense cover here so easy to get close to the elk but not unusual to be under 20 yards from a bugler and never see him. One reason I carry a 54″ Shrew — lost too many shot ops in past years due to longer bows in close cover. That’s my story so far. dave
in reply to: classified ad ?? #11674I’ve been wondering the same thing??? However I must say that I sold a bow with the class ads here, so Someone reads them. dp
in reply to: Elk Arrows #11421Mike — so far this has been a banner elk year, with one 4-day “disappearing and silence” period a couple weeks back. This weekend is black powder opener and as every year, those guys running around with bugles glued into their mouths have shut the elk up on most public lands. Damn tragedy to have a smoker season right in the prime of archery season and the rut, but I can’t get CO bowhunters organized to force a change. Stupid CBA has ‘reached an accommodation’ with them. Pooh. Anyhow they’ll fire up again after the end of that season and a calm-down period. So far high points include passing on a cow at 7 yards broadside last night, and being 12 yards from a very nice 5×6 night before last, but no shot op due to dense vegetation even had I decided to take him, which I wasn’t sure I was ready for as the really big boys are yet to enter the game and I have 2 weeks left. Last year was perfect, hunting all 30 days of the season and killing a nice bull on the last day, from 6 feet. I’d love to repeat that trick again! 😯 dave
in reply to: stringing a longbow #11407You can start by asking the previous owner, and/or use the brace height the bow comes with. With a longbow you want it as low as possible until it starts slapping your arm guard and getting noisy. Take it up from there until it quits hitting your arm and you’re darned close. Remember that every change of brace height requires a repositioning of the string nock. Have fun, dave
in reply to: Elk Arrows #9165I’d go with the 680s, as the others are below the “minimum bone threshold” for big-big game like elk. Bones on these giant animals are like interior body armor. You may get lucky with arrow placement, or you may not. Why take a chance? And man, that’s a fast bow at 55#. Good luck, dave
in reply to: Carbonated Clothing #9162A good post, Konrad. Thank you. And Patrick, your genius shines again! By pouring a quart or so of Diet Pepsi (or cheap beer like Coors) other other carbonated beverage over ourselves before going hunting, we can save a thousand bucks! Just watch your backside for bears, and the flies could get a bit bothersome (esp. with the Coors).
Seriously, to even WANT to try and eleminate all body odor so that we can “just hunt and forget the wind” equals a bold attempt to dumb down hunting to the slobbering idiot level. Happily, it will never happen. What more basic rule for big game hunting can there be beyond “keep the wind in your face and stay downwind of your game.” In fact the only scent we need to worry about minimizing is the residual we leave behind us for hours after we pass through the woods, providing game with a trail of our comings and goings. A few hints. For folks like me who mostly hunt a rescricted area day after day for a month or so, it becomes critical. For those walking around on big public land and always breaking new ground, they can afford to be less concerned. A few hints I’ve used for year for elk. Slight changes will work for deer as well:
As we move through the woods we transfer body scent to vegetation from every body contact. So do all you can not to contact vegetation by stepping over it, going around it, and packing some pocket-sized Fisker garden snippers and clipping limbs across paths you regularly use. Avoid using your hands to move limbs out of the way or lean on trees for balance — a majority of the scent we leave behind comes from our hands. Have a clean body and clean clothes. Use a cover scent on the fronts and outsides of your pants and shirt or jacket arms and use those arms rather than hands to push limbs aside when you move. And don’t forget your shoe laces! How many of us wear “scent proof” rubber boots, such as the beloved LL Bean Maine Hunting Shoe, yet never give a thought to the tremendous amount of scent we transfer to our shoe laces every time we lace up? Use cover scent. Carry a small foam pad to sit on. It keeps your butt warm and dry and keeps scent off the places you sit. And more. I do these things instinctively and manage to hunt dense woods right in amongst ’em and come and go on the same route every day for a month, and never get busted … any more. In the early days I did stupid things like spray waterproofer onto boots and wondered why all the elk disappeared after a few days. This caution is as critical for tree-stand guys as it is for me. This is woodsmanship vs. technology, bogus or otherwise.
I’d enjoy hearing from others about non-technical methods of scent control that work for you. Dave
in reply to: HOW SHARP IS SHARP ENOUGH? #63289Thanks, Ed. Inexplicably, for some reason I “want” the El Grande to be the all-around best head; I just really like its looks I guess. Yet all things considered including last year’s elk, I keep coming back to the believe that at the moment, with all Ashby info considered, the Brown Bear is the best head on the market for the money. Yet I’m packing two 200 El Grandes (one of carbon with EFoC, one on a heavier wood shaft with nornal FoC) and an ABS Ashby, as these have been tested (by me) only on freshly killed elk and I want to see performance on a live moving animal. Now to find a cooperative bull! 😀 dave p
in reply to: Rainy day issues… #62373:PIndeed, it’s mineral OIL. Spirits is a solvent with a strong smell that would likely dissolve the foam in a bow quiver. Just turn the quiver upside down and pour a few drops into each hole. Last all season and no smell. That tip comes originally from Sharpster. It was Dr. Ashby who first informed us that Vaseline is a mild coagulant, which works against free bleeding.
On feathers I use Fletch Dry (I think it’s called) a fine powder you dust on and rub in that will last through several light showers and a while in a drenching downpour like I experienced last evening. Goose and duck oil is oil and attracts dirt and grime and also puts weight on the feathers. But it works.
In my experience Patrick is right (for a change! :P) about wet flat feathers working fine on well-tuned arrows. But I don’t care for the loud Pop! of water blasting off the feather when you shoot, or the cold blast of water in the face.
Frankly I’ve never had any luck finding game in a real rain so don’t go out. However if I’m already out and it starts I’ll usually stick with it. One time last year a sudden evening t-storm came up with fierce lightning and thunder and hail so hard that eventually both I and the elk had to take shelter under fir trees. But for a few minutes there a bull and small herd of cows went absolutely insane, running in circles, bugling anc chirping, obviously getting off on the electrical excitement. I got to 30 yards just before they broke for the trees. But long stead rains seem to shut ’em up and keep ’em down. I assume elk in the Pacific NW have adapted to frequent rain and behave differently. dp
in reply to: looking for T.B.H. in Dubois Wyoming #62364Sorry about that. I shouldn’t get on the computer after coming in late from an evening hunt, dripping wet with a gin-tonic in my fist. A pleasant time of unwinding, but not the best attention span. dave 😛
in reply to: Bulls are Bugling #62360It’s an interesting rut year here in SW CO. Thanks to prolonged “monsoon” rains this summer, the vegetation “down low” (I live at 8000′ and that’s “low”) is exceptionally rich. Consequently, the big muley bucks that are nornally at timberline aren’t there and we have one, Bucky, hanging around here, in the near-30″ category. Much the same with the elk, with big cow/calf herds and lots of bugling starting in late Aug., 2 weeks early on average. Then they just quit and disappeard for several days. Then we got a rain front in and cooler temps and they tried to start again when it broke. Then more rain and more quiet. Now it’s breaking for a good long haul of cooler clear weather and they should be going at it again. Alas, black powder opens this weekend with way too many tags allotted and those guys consistently, year after year, shut the elk up tight. We don’t have x-bows in archery season in CO, but BP right in the heart of the rut is just biologically wrong. Anyhow, looking forward to a good crisp evening hunt with lots of singing. See you soon, Alex. I’ll be putting up the big elk camp tent this weekend. dave
in reply to: looking for T.B.H. in Dubois Wyoming #61681Patches — just subscribe. It’s lots cheaper and totally relaiable the money goes to the two families who run the magazine rather than middlemen. dp
in reply to: HOW SHARP IS SHARP ENOUGH? #61250Ed and Ron — speaking of chipping of edges in hard steel, I recently noticed that one of my ABS Ashby heads, probably the one I shot through a bull elk shoulder last year for penetration testing (19″ with an angled shot from 15′, via the scapula flat). I’m thinking that head is 57, which would make it the hardest steel on the broadhead market (though I may disremember), but it’s solid cast and thick. These chips are few and so very tiny as to not be a concern. But I’m rather surprised. Grizzly is about the same hardness, I believe, and thinner, yet I’ve never had one chip. Maybe you can update us on relative hardness of leading single-bevel heads? So far the Brown Bear — around 53 Rockwell? — seems the perfect combo of hardness, thickness, factory sharpness and sharpenability, with a nice price to boot. Even so I’m elking this year with the new El Grande. dave p
in reply to: Arrow quivers while hunting #60002Nudeguy (:P) — If you’re just walking to the tree stand, something you can hang on a limb beside you might be better, so the bow is unemcumbered with a quiver and arrows. For squirrel and other small game and bird hunting, we need something that holds lots of arrows. Otherwise, for ground hunting big game, you can’t beat a bow quiver. Today there are plenty of models that have a short span between mounting points to keep them close to the grip so as not to adversely affect longbow performance. For me, the smaller the better. Right now, hunting elk, I carry 3 broadheads and one grouse arrow. If you shoot carbon or aluminum with screw-in heads, you can carry extra blunts and broadheads and switch heads as necessary. And for really light bows (my Shrews weigh only 14 oz. naked, and some of the selfbows I’ve built even less), I find that the weight of the quiver stabilizes things and improves my shooting. A bow quiver can also help quiet a bow. Others will differ in opinion and have their reasons. In the end, to each his own. dp
in reply to: Grizzly & El Grande: Weights & Dimensions #58874The new, slightly redesigned El Grande went from 190 to 200 in large part because they now have full-coverage steel on boths sides. The offset on the old El Grande left a single layer at the edges and an overlap ridge that complicated sharpening. The new 200s are full double-plate all the way to the edges. The only way I have to measure bevel angle is to set my KME knife sharpener to match the bevel, and the new 200s are somewhere around 24 degrees. Sharpster will know precisely and is attracted like a fly to any thread with “Grizzly” in it. 😛 Aint’cha, Ron. And maybe Doc Ashby will pop in as well. While the new 200s come far sharper than the old ones, they still have grinder marks and need some file work before going to the stone. But I can sharpen these, when I never really could the others. But sharpening aside the El Grande is a huge head and unless you’re going for EFoC for big-big game like elk, the 160 single bevel is probably a good choice. This year in my quiver I’m packing one El Grande on a wood stick, one on carbon, one with an ABS Ashby, and a grouse hex-blunt. So far I haven’t found the “lucky” one that attracts the game, but I’m working on it. DAve 😆
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