Nic Barca

If your gonna get a compound, you' ll want a round wheel (two cam) bow. They have a much better range of adjustability for draw length. That way, it will take a little longer to out grow it. I think I was alot shorter when I was 12.

Or like Arthur P said, you could get him a recurve. But the recurves take a little while to get good with. But that' s not a problem if you get him plenty arrows and judo and rubber blunt points for stump and small game shooting. A kid can have loads of fun with a bow in a woods and plenty of arrows. Get some flu-flu arrows and he can shoot at squirels even in the trees. You can do the same thing with compounds too.

With a compound, for a kid starting out, I suggest he shoot with a finger tab and a simple shelf-style arrow rest. That way he can shoot instinctively with out sights or with sights. When shooting with fingers, your not gonna want a longer axle to axle bow because the shorter bows will pinch the fingers because the angle is too steep. For a kid that small, a 35 inch A-to-A would be perfect. 38 is also good. Any bigger and the bow will get heavy.

You can actually order bows right out of a catalog or off the internet. Cabelas and Bass pro shops both have good selections of top of the line youth compounds. All you need to know is his propper draw length and weight.

There are a few ways to get draw length. I' m gonna suggest he use a yard stick and draw it back resting it on his left hand (if he' s right handed) and draw it back just like it was an arrow to the right corner of his mouth. from the corner of his mouth to the opposite side of his left hand should be close to his draw length. Choos a bow where he has plenty of room to grow. Make sure you got it right tho cause a draw too short, he will be not nearly as accurate as he is capable. Too long and he won' t be as accurate and the string might also hit his arm. But there is a good one to two inch margin of error.

Draw weight is a little harder to figure and you usually need to draw another bow to give you and idea of what your draw weight is. Compounds are much easier to pull than recurves and longbows so you can pull 5 - 10 pounds more with a compound. You want the weight to be about 10 pounds less than the maximum he can posibly pull. You want as much weight as he can comforably and easily draw and hold. Should be able to hold it for 2 minutes. Or he should be able to shoot many shots without betting tired.

When choosing draw weight and legths, because he still has alot to grow, you want to choose the bow with lots of room for him to grow into. If his draw weight is 30# then get a bow with a 30 - 40# draw. Same with draw length.

With a shelf-style arrow rest, there is no way to get perfect fletching clearence, so feathered arrows are best. Plastic fletching arrows, even tho they will fly half decently, will bump into the rest when you shoot and fish tail and or porpoise. With field points, it doesn' t make much difference in accuracy but if you tried them with broadheads, they might fly way off. But feathers are sometimes hard to find these days. You might be able to find feathered wood arrows at archery shop or wall mart but if you want alluminum arrows, they might be hard to get in the sizes that would be good for a small bow. 1916 and 1816s are the smallest alluminums that are easy to find. They usually come with plastic vanes tho. You can use bigger arrows tho. In fact, it' s probably better. Their more durrable and easier to get flying accurately.

And I need to go to bed. See yah!