My passion is definitely bowhunting, however the time spent with family and friends during rifle season will continue to bring me back. I may find myself carrying the bow more and more during rifle seasonin the upcoming years, however it is nearly impossible to see much less kill a 3.5 year old animal during rifle season anyhow in the areas I hunt. They are there, but they are few and far inbetweenand honestly my best chances to kill those animals are during the almost non existant pressure of archery season even though I'm carrying a primitive weapon at that time. I've had exactly 5 encounters with truly maturebucks over the last 5 years, and 4 of those occurred during bow season.

I will also probablyhunt this year with my girlfriends family in the heart of the Adirondack big woods as well. This is a place where you are likely to only see2-3 total deer per solid week of hunting if your lucky with maybe one antlered animal per season......your more likely to see bears and/or moose than deer in most of theseplaces. I will be carrying my rifle there because the primary means of hunting in the Adirondacks is snow tracking an animal for many miles before getting lucky and maybe having a shot. Anyone that feels this is less work or easier or less impressive than sitting in a tree over an agricultural edge and sticking one with a bow really needs to get themselves into the big woods to see what it's really like......[8D].