No, Buster T there is no ONE correct answer here. Just because making things difficult trips your wire doesn't make it THE right answer. Personally I find a hunt much more enjoyable when I'm not miserable. There's a line of diminishing returns IN MY BOOK. I enjoy a challenge but there's a level where I stop enjoying and why cross that line? I've done both (well not the elk part). I will be hiking into a wilderness area this weekend and if I kill something I'll debone it and carry it out on my back because that's what's required. That doesn't make it a better hunt for me. In fact if you showed up with a horse halfway back and offered to carry the meat (if that were legal in the wilderness area) than I'd probably enjoy the hunt a little better because of the happy happenstance. I don't stand knee deep in freezing water with rain pouring down my back, a step away from hypothermia and think to myself "Now I'm really having fun!"

BUT I know that some people really get a thrill from making things as difficult for themselves as possible and overcoming the situation. I don't understand it, but I acknowledge there are those kind of people. Seems a bit masochistic, and I wonder if they vacation at paris island but to each his own. Just keep in mind if that works for you and makes your hunting experience a richer one don't assume that it works for others or that your method is superior or richer than another FOR THEM. Personally I can enjoy a little of both. I could work my butt off all day and then come back after dark to a cabin and have a gourmet meal a hot bath and a nice bed and get back up before light and hike some more and love it. I can also camp in, sleep in a hammock and eat dried food and love it. Each is it's own unique experience and I'd love to taste both. Never was a one course meal kind of guy.

Enjoy it all, you will be dead before you're ready.

You think there isn't a difference packing everything in on your back, working hard all summer getting in shape to do that, eating rehydrated foods on a propane burner, sleeping in a small cold tent and walking everywhere vs riding in on horses, having a wall tent set up with a stove to keep it warm, hot breakfast and suppers, riding horses all around the mtn etc ?

Good gawd ........ you've never been elk huntin have you ?

BobCo19-65 There is a huge fear to call one kind of hunting more difficult than another.

I don't know why that is, becaue it most certainly is true.

People who shoot self bows are far mor accomplished that I am, their kills have more meaning because of the WAY they're doing it. More respect is due to those guys. I got no problem with that, because I'm comfortable with my own challenges, but I will NOT take anything away from what those guys do. I'll not try and say my hunting is just as difficult, it most certainly isn't and to try and elevate myself to the challenges of what self bowyers do is wrong.

It just is.

And thats not to say my challenges in my choices of hunting isn't worthy, they most certainly are, just like yours is and everyone else.

But I'm not afraid to step up and say that a bowhunter is doing it harder than a rifle hunter, a OTC backpack hunter is doing it harder than a private land outfitted hunt. A self bowyer is doing it harder than a Mathews shooter etc etc

I think those are universal trues - and the accomplishments of the guys that choose the harder route shouldn't be covered up just to make others feel good, or whatever the reasons might ne.

I might go back to a compound. If and when I do, I'll not for one minute pretend that my bowhunting is as hard as a guy with a recurve in his hand - it most certainly will not be, and when I use llamas in Colorado to elk hunt, I'm not doing it nearly as difficult as the backpack hunter is.

That just is

Exactly; the most physically demanding thing I have ever done in my life. You lug a 70# pack back in 5 miles at 11,800 ft and you are from flat land midwest you know you have done something.

I love the logic on archery forums. "I do it this way, its harder, so im a better hunter than you".


Personally, who cares. I dont. Do what you enjoy. Is that not the ultimate goal. If you do not enjoy working your butt off, dont. I have a brother who use to insist on making his own shafts with a draw knife, napping flint for his broad heads, and making his own stick bows. It is very hard work to do it his way, I wouldnt, and never will. He did it that way for years because he got more enjoyment in busting his butt. Now he doesnt even bow hunt. Every now and then he will get out with a compound, but thats it. I guess we could say he is not a very good hunter now, but use to be.

Good post burnie,

And I believe a person that does what he loves and is driven to do with passion and focus doesn't necessarily care whether or not they getting "respect" from others.

As someone once said a true "Rebel" does not need to be calledor reffered to as a"Rebel" by himself or others.

Talondale that you or I don't "like" a particular kind of hunting doesn't demenish the fact it IS a more difficult type of hunting.

I don't self bow hunt. I don't build them, I don't shoot them, and I don't hunt with them. I probably never will. However I can FULLY appreciate the people who do, and I recognize that they're doing it a much harder way than I am, and the respect given to them is more deserved.

hardcorehunterwhy did your outfitter not carry that pack on the horses ?

burniegoeasily

who said that ? I don't think anyone did, I don't know where you got that from.

Your brother chose a very difficult way to hunt, and you can't even recognize that ?


You tell me that a guy doing it himself in a wilderness are with self bows for elk and killing a big 6x6 isn't a more accomplished hunter who deserves more credit, more kudo's and more admiration than the guy buying a canned EBAY hunt for $5,000 and killing it within minutes of showing up on the farm ?

Ya'll know that isn't true, and while its an extreme example, what it does show is that there are many, many different accomplishments in hunting and its a far swinging pendulum from canned hunts on one end to self bowyers on the other end.

If you think its all the same challenge, then grab a recurve and hunt your next full season with it and with it only and come back here and tell me it was the same challenge. You'll quickly find that it isn't the same at all

Buster
Put down the pipe and step back from the computer. Open your eyes, you are one of the most guilty of bashing others means of hunting. Look at your last post, it is woven with disrespect. Also, think back to your crossbow rants as well as your high and mighty compound rants. As for my brother, was my post not articulating my respect for his means. I simply said he goes well beyond my preferences. Never showed any disrespect.

I think the guys is nuts personally, but he can hunt any way he hunts. Everyone else does their own thing so he's entitled to do his own thing.

Do you realize that you are speaking to traditional archers including burnie, talondale, I believe hardcorehunter shoots both compound and traditional and myself? BTW, my son uses a selfbow that we made (pictured).

Busta, you need to get a grip on something besides your chicken. Post your mounts if you want to get into the my weiner is bigger than your weinergame. We all know you do it the right way, the hard way, the Tred oops I mean Busta rhyme way.