Just be proficient with the tool you are using and go hunting!!
Do you mean that ? Crossbows included ?
silentassassin is right to a point. If you got your compound tuned, same assessories as year before, chances are you can pick it up a few days before archery season and shoot it just as well as before with little loss in accuracy. I don't think many trad archers can say this though because of the hand/eye coordination thats involved. It'd be like walking away from basketball for 12 months then trying to play again ... something would be lost there because of the lack of practice.
Would your views change if in your heart you felt adding Xbows would highly affect(and in a BAD way) your hunting?
Not my hunting, no. If a given weapon affects the herd, or the archery season as a whole, then yes, it need to be looked at. If I see it as affecting "my hunting" thats a selfish thing to think and I could easily say compound hunters affect my bowhunting because of the sheer numbers of people it brings into the sport. Remove compounds and "my hunting" would be so much better for lack of sportsmen in the woods. See ?
We have a boatload of hunters in PA and even in the archery season, it can get quite crowded.
Weapons of choice aint the problem, its the number of people. Take away mechanical releases and see how many guys would drop archery. Take away grater than 65% letoff , less than 40" ATA, illegal solocam bows, drop away rests, carbon arrows etc etc and see how many guys would quit bowhunting.
I mean, you DO want less bowhunters, right ? Crowded and boatloads are adjectives to describe a situation that needs resolved - so you're infavor of no crossbows AND maybe restricting compounds to limit the number of archery hunters ??? Am I reading that right ?
Add in several more thousand Xbowers and there starts to be more deer shot in the archery season, so then the next step is shortening,
Same fear AR, OH and GA had ... never came to pass. Same fear trad hunters had when the compound was introduced ... never happened. Why the same fear now ?
Have you really thought about how dramatic compound have changed the face of archery ? Take the compounds out and archery season is back to recurves and longbows, few hunters, longer seasons etc etc. Isn't that what you're kinda envisioning ? Except you want to use YOUR choice of bow, right ?