Tradhunter - Traditional Archery Bow Hunting Forums

Thanks. Shooting those Hail Marys is the best way I’ve found to keep my form and everything dialed in. Past 40 those heavy arrows really start to drop, it’s a challenge.

Glad to see you back around, Dan!I doubt I could even hit the bag at 40+ yards. You have some very good instinctive skills, my friend!

If you can find a field shoot in your area, go try it. Lots of fun. Make sure the "catch area" around and behind the long target is open and not treed in or full of brush.

I used to love to practice on the long 80 yard target when no one else was on the range. It's a walk up target, so the yardages are all marked. My groups wee always best with well tuned arrows that had very tight tolerances - carbons.

Real frustration is a field shoot with untuned, wrong spined arrows in the rain - with wet feathers.

Good shooting Dan. I do the same thing, but can’t get much over 40 where I shoot. I shoot often at 30, it helps me learn to slow down and concentrate on the target. Up close I tend to shoot quick and sometimes before I get focused.

Uh oh carpy....is that gonna happen on a 10 yard deer?

I use to shoot 30 when I could see. It does help dial in the form...but as Tony mentioned doing it a lot also makes very close shots seem so easy it often makes you rush. It's easy to overlook the needed practice of 7-15 yards and that's where most of our deer will be. Put it this way....if we as experienced shooters aren't breaking nocks pretty consistently at 10 yards we need to be practicing it more.
Try this and see if 40 yards is helping your deer shots. Shoot 3 arrows at 40 then move up and shoot 1 arrow at 10 yards. Then move back to 40 for 1 arrow, then up to 12 yards for 3 arrows. See if you are staying accurate.

I get my close range practice in too. I practice a lot in my garage at 8 yards. I usually vary the distance between groups and sometimes between arrows. I’ve noticed in the past that if I don’t get enough close range work in I tend to miss high. Usually get some rounds in at a 3D range too. Great advise to vary distances frequently. Haven’t lost sight of the goal to be lethal at hunting distances.

I practice shooting randomly around the target in anticipation of the animal randomly jumping at the moment of the shot.

Way to be ahead of the game on those jumpy critters

I have a little foam ball about the size of a ping pong ball hanging in front of my target in the garage that I’ll shoot at while it’s swinging back and forth.

Dan wrote: ↑Sun Aug 19, 2018 7:59 pm I have a little foam ball about the size of a ping pong ball hanging in front of my target in the garage that I’ll shoot at while it’s swinging back and forth.

Yeah, but do you hit it?