Experience VS shot selection
12-21-2006, 08:27 AM
#51
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Morgan County, IL
Posts: 1,073
RE: Experience VS shot selection
Right, there is no clear cut defintion ortimeline.
To me, expirience/knowledge is related to the amount of effort put towards making good desicions when the moment of truth arrives. It's two part; not just spending time practicing, but having a few notches on the belt as well. It's easy to say what you would or should do when on the internet, but all that talk drifts in the wind when a big buck offers a debatable shot. How you perform in the clutch.
Knowing you can make the shot and actually doing it are not the same.
To me, expirience/knowledge is related to the amount of effort put towards making good desicions when the moment of truth arrives. It's two part; not just spending time practicing, but having a few notches on the belt as well. It's easy to say what you would or should do when on the internet, but all that talk drifts in the wind when a big buck offers a debatable shot. How you perform in the clutch.
Knowing you can make the shot and actually doing it are not the same.
12-21-2006, 08:34 AM
#52
Boone & Crockett
Join Date: Oct 1998
Location: Hughesville, PA USA
Posts: 18,322
RE: Experience VS shot selection
Experience must have a test of time to it
but it doesn't guarantee you learned a thing.
When ever I draw on a deer I honestly expect it's all over, he's dead. It hasn't always happened, but I'm experienced enough to expect the next one I draw on will die.
12-21-2006, 08:45 AM
#53
Dominant Buck
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: Blossvale, New York
Posts: 21,199
RE: Experience VS shot selection
I would think rather than a fixed number of years experience would include a variety of locations, enough animals taken to feel totally comfortable in ones abilities. Maybe the ability to put a friend in the right spot and want him to truly succeed, not just get him out of the way so you can kill something. There are so many other things that could add to a persons experience level. Wouldn't you think a guy who's hunted a variety of game successfully with a variety of equipment(say recurve, long bow, compound etc) has some vast experience edges over someone that's just started. Since I feel experience should have a test of time and constantly taking of animals, I'd say you're still a rookie after 5 years. Even in states with liberal limits, the number of kills isn't the key, it's consistancy over time. I'd say anyone who's done it constantly over a period of 10 years is starting to get there. Short of that, they're working on it. I knew a guy that hunted for 22 years before he shot a deer. He'll never get it.[8D]
12-21-2006, 08:53 AM
#54
Nontypical Buck
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Almost Heaven. Boone Co. WV
Posts: 1,002
RE: Experience VS shot selection
David,
I understand your point about experience and it's relation to various areas, doesn't that just make the hunter inexperienced in that particular area. Doesn't really make them an in experienced hunter does it?
For example, I have never hunted out west and I would have some difficulty identifying food sources and bedding areas and travel routes simply because the terrain is different. I hunt in WV, but I am confident that I could go to KY, OH, TN, IL, WI, and VA andhaveenough experiencefrom mytime in WVto be successful there also......
I understand your point about experience and it's relation to various areas, doesn't that just make the hunter inexperienced in that particular area. Doesn't really make them an in experienced hunter does it?
For example, I have never hunted out west and I would have some difficulty identifying food sources and bedding areas and travel routes simply because the terrain is different. I hunt in WV, but I am confident that I could go to KY, OH, TN, IL, WI, and VA andhaveenough experiencefrom mytime in WVto be successful there also......
12-21-2006, 09:28 AM
#56
Nontypical Buck
Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: Wadena, MN
Posts: 4,701
RE: Experience VS shot selection
Well put, exactly the way i feel. I just dont like to type that much!
ORIGINAL: davidmil
Experience seems to mean a lot of different things to folks around here. Who would have "thunk it".[8D] Let's see, does a guy that learns his local herd inside and out have the same experience as say someone that's hunted under a variety of situations, places, habitats and weather. Does the guy that's hunted mountain deer, hill country deer, swamp deer from the South, deer from the food belt, public landsetc have to learn all those herds inside and out tobe considered competant. I think experience has to have a test of time to it. Get thrown from your honey hole and you have to start all over, or do you. An experienced hunter will hit the new woods with excitement and knowledge from years past. It's NOT necessary to "Learn everything about a herd" to be successful. To me I enjoy much more walking into a new woods for the first time, taking a quick cruise through, finding some sign and setting up and being successful. Some will say it's luck, but luck doesn't happen year after year. That's experience. Knowing your animal where ever he is comes only over a test of time. The whitetail deer in say a food plot in the South is a different animal than the ridge running cedar swamp dweller in the Adirondacks. They don't even act the same. It's quite easy to learn a local herd on a small parcel of land. I dare say much of it can be learned from the deck of your house overlooking some fields. Does that make you experienced enough to cross a few state lines and hit a big chunk of woods for the first time and to be successful. I really don't think so. If you can do it time after time you have experience. With todays internet, magazines, videos, TV shows etc it's become easy for people to parrott what they've heard and seen. It's quite another to walk into a strange woods and put it to use on your own. First you have to sort out all the bull doo doo in these things, and there is a lot of that out there due to marketing.
Experience to one person may be "Hunting a Food Plot". Experience to another may be walking 3 miles back in a swamp. A lot can be learned of a persons hunting style just by listening to what they say. "I went to MY stand today". 90 percent of the time that's what he mean, MY and he hunts no where else. One or two others maybe. Is he experienced, not to my way of thinking, but that's me. Experience must have a test of time to it, but it doesn't guarantee you learned a thing.
As far as the shot selection. I'll take any shots I have a notion too and feel good about it. When ever I draw on a deer I honestly expect it's all over, he's dead. It hasn't always happened, but I'm experienced enough to expect the next one I draw on will die. I've known some really good target punchers that just can't calm down in the woods. How you react at the moment of truth over and over does allow you some latitude. You just have to know your limitations. There is an autopilot. It works great. I never think of actually drawing it seems. I'm watching the critter and looking for the right moment to draw. The rest happens. I see the deer, the others around, the hole, the hair and TWACK. If you can do that and remember everything about the sight picture, before and after, and follow the deer as he flees, you can have some latitude. IF you're a shaking timber but shot 300 in the spot league, I'll help you track your critter.[8D]
Experience seems to mean a lot of different things to folks around here. Who would have "thunk it".[8D] Let's see, does a guy that learns his local herd inside and out have the same experience as say someone that's hunted under a variety of situations, places, habitats and weather. Does the guy that's hunted mountain deer, hill country deer, swamp deer from the South, deer from the food belt, public landsetc have to learn all those herds inside and out tobe considered competant. I think experience has to have a test of time to it. Get thrown from your honey hole and you have to start all over, or do you. An experienced hunter will hit the new woods with excitement and knowledge from years past. It's NOT necessary to "Learn everything about a herd" to be successful. To me I enjoy much more walking into a new woods for the first time, taking a quick cruise through, finding some sign and setting up and being successful. Some will say it's luck, but luck doesn't happen year after year. That's experience. Knowing your animal where ever he is comes only over a test of time. The whitetail deer in say a food plot in the South is a different animal than the ridge running cedar swamp dweller in the Adirondacks. They don't even act the same. It's quite easy to learn a local herd on a small parcel of land. I dare say much of it can be learned from the deck of your house overlooking some fields. Does that make you experienced enough to cross a few state lines and hit a big chunk of woods for the first time and to be successful. I really don't think so. If you can do it time after time you have experience. With todays internet, magazines, videos, TV shows etc it's become easy for people to parrott what they've heard and seen. It's quite another to walk into a strange woods and put it to use on your own. First you have to sort out all the bull doo doo in these things, and there is a lot of that out there due to marketing.
Experience to one person may be "Hunting a Food Plot". Experience to another may be walking 3 miles back in a swamp. A lot can be learned of a persons hunting style just by listening to what they say. "I went to MY stand today". 90 percent of the time that's what he mean, MY and he hunts no where else. One or two others maybe. Is he experienced, not to my way of thinking, but that's me. Experience must have a test of time to it, but it doesn't guarantee you learned a thing.
As far as the shot selection. I'll take any shots I have a notion too and feel good about it. When ever I draw on a deer I honestly expect it's all over, he's dead. It hasn't always happened, but I'm experienced enough to expect the next one I draw on will die. I've known some really good target punchers that just can't calm down in the woods. How you react at the moment of truth over and over does allow you some latitude. You just have to know your limitations. There is an autopilot. It works great. I never think of actually drawing it seems. I'm watching the critter and looking for the right moment to draw. The rest happens. I see the deer, the others around, the hole, the hair and TWACK. If you can do that and remember everything about the sight picture, before and after, and follow the deer as he flees, you can have some latitude. IF you're a shaking timber but shot 300 in the spot league, I'll help you track your critter.[8D]
12-21-2006, 10:05 AM
#57
Dominant Buck
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: Blossvale, New York
Posts: 21,199
RE: Experience VS shot selection
Huntgus: I agree with you to a point. Yes a seasoned hunter with years of experience on his home grounds is a step ahead. BUT, where I differ with you is that the guy/gal isn't necessarily equiped to handle new terrain and creatures. As I stated earlier, deer in some locations react and are entirely different critters often. Their home ranges vary greatly in size and vegetation. Their habits and feeding patterns are completely different. If a Southern boy goes to the heart of the Adirondacks for the first time he'll look for acorns, persimmons, honeysuckle, crop fields whatever..... NONE of which he'll find there. Hunting pressure and predators in some locals has changed the deers habits totally from say a food plot in Kentucky. They'll travel further, move at different times of day and the population is dismal by West Virginia standards. Go to the outback of Maine and Canada and it's different still. GO out West it can be still different. You spook a deer in WVa, he's not going far. Spook one in Wyoming and he stops when he's over the next mountain. A truly experienced hunter will figure it out. He's learned to try something different. He's also learned what won't work moreso than the guy hunting the back 40 and the local herd. A variety ofsituations gained over years of trial and error in differentenvironments can give a person who sees them for what they are the experience to succeed again. It comes with time. Take for example any of our TV/Video experts today that pretty much have themselves Hunter Heaven, private land, food plots with equipment to maintain them and an under hunted herd. They continually take monster bucks for our viewing pleasure. Send them all to big woods on their own and the true cream will float to the top. I suspect it would not be the ones who necessarily take all the big deer every year. It would more than likely be the Primos, Knight and Hale boy types. Why, they started a long time ago without food plots, onpublic land competing with others orin heavily hunted Southern woods with small herds. They started before the days of "leases" that now lock up the best land for the people with the money. Conversely, take the deep woods boy from Maine and send him to Georgia. It would just torture him to sit on a bean field watching deer 200 yards away. He'd want to go back in the deep swamps while all the deer piled into the fields at night while we all know his best chances in this scenerio are probably learning from the sightings in the fields for a day or two. Experiences comes from a variety of situations over time.
12-21-2006, 12:43 PM
#60
Giant Nontypical
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2004
Location: Pittsburgh, PA
Posts: 7,208
RE: Experience VS shot selection
Great replies. Some of you are really expanding on experience relating to bowhunting in general. I don't have enough time to type all those thoughts.
As stated already, there is no clear line when one becomes experienced, however I really feel that it takes a bit more than a few years to do so. An experienced hunter is going to be able to make the shot under pressure and his nerves will not affect him. A rookie is more likely to blow the shot regardless of how many times he kills his foam buck. An experienced hunter is going to know how to track a wounded deer. This is probably the single most important factor in bowhunting besides actually putting an arrow thru the lungs.
While I feel that neither new or seasoned bowhunters have the right to be wreckless in thier shot selection there is a HUGE difference in the probability of killing and finding a deer with a "less than ideal" shooting opportunity between a rookie and a veteran.
As stated already, there is no clear line when one becomes experienced, however I really feel that it takes a bit more than a few years to do so. An experienced hunter is going to be able to make the shot under pressure and his nerves will not affect him. A rookie is more likely to blow the shot regardless of how many times he kills his foam buck. An experienced hunter is going to know how to track a wounded deer. This is probably the single most important factor in bowhunting besides actually putting an arrow thru the lungs.
While I feel that neither new or seasoned bowhunters have the right to be wreckless in thier shot selection there is a HUGE difference in the probability of killing and finding a deer with a "less than ideal" shooting opportunity between a rookie and a veteran.