Stealthy,

I just got back this evening from a week in West Virginia. I hoped to shoot a deer with my new Crusader. For the week, I saw over a hundred deer, but all of them were in fields or alongside the road as I was driving. There was zero mast and they were feeding on browse and grass. There were dozens of deer in fields at mid-day!!

I did not see a single deer in the woods with bow in hand, at ANY distance. It still was a successful week, for me. I went back to one or two of the places I have hunted in past years and saw some beautiful country.

There were 18 shots taken by four of six hunters in the camp. All four were carrying wheel bows. My son killed a healthy 170 lb doe last Saturday. He missed one other shot on which he misjudged the distance in the fading light and shot over the back of the doe.

One other fella took one shot and missed on a yearling. The other 15 shots were taken by two brothers. The result, one dead and recovered deer, one gut shot, and very likely dead and unrecovered deer, and apparently 13 misses.

Right about now I have a bit of a sour taste in my mouth after the hunting trip. Some folks, like my son, are hunters, others are nothing more than shooters, and not very good ones at that!!!!!

I venture to guess these young fellas have no idea what their effective range is, or what the term even means! I've got to do some serious soul searching before I go back again!!! Do I really want to associate with folk that do not respect the game any more than that? I have 48 weeks, or so, to decide.

Bill

Praise the Lord, He is worthy