I am just curious why, on any given day or any time of the year, there are so few hunting threads posted. Sure, we get tons of posts asking how much poundage is needed, how do I tune this, I got this great new gadget, here are some pictures of me shooting or roving. But relatively few posts about a hunt that someone has gone on and details of that hunt. Personally, those are my favorite posts. You may actually learns something, and you get to somewhat experience a hunt that you weren't able to participate in. Is it that there is a small percentage of LWers are actually hunting? Are others not interested in hunting threads? Not really sure, just curious.

So, Uncle Paddy - tell us a story!

Funny thing is that a lot of the time I will throw in a quick description of an Actual Hunting Situation which is relevant to the thread.....and I often get to feeling like I'm probably posting more than most people will take the time to read...

You know, I dropped all subscriptions to hunting mags years ago when it seemed ALL "hunting" articles ended with, "even though we didn't harvest (I hate that term) any...name the species...we enjoyed the camaraderie and being in the wilderness..........".

In other words, do we feel the need to almost apologize for being a hunter in todays touchy-feely "civilized" age? I dunno, but it seems to be.

I too miss the great stories of yesteryear. Another site has an excellent moose hunt thread, told masterfully in serial fashion, by a new-found "internet friend" from Canada...including photos. I'll have the pleasure of meeting this gent at Comtons next month...to which I look forward.

I recently read again the fine narrative "Death In The Long Grass" by Peter Hathaway Capstick...one of the few Americans to hold a professional hunter's license in Africa...written, I believe, in the 1970's. He has an interesting writing style, and is most definitely a "been there, done that" fella.

I'm certain we all have stories worthy of regaling with others...but perhaps we fear we'd appear as bragarts.

Can't speak for everyone else, but my mind is on fishing right now. Finishing up chasing trout and getting ready to float the river for smallmouth. Also have to catch up on work around the house. I will get fired back up with bow hunting in a month or two.

I'm with you my friend. Truth is, many traditional archers don't kill that many critters. Many of the guys that do just don't get online as often.

I like seeing pictures, getting details and also like the autopsy pics and info...gives you info you might use down the road.

I do not find hunting very rewarding anymore. I used to really look forward to hunting however, hunting has become a pain in the rear end. No trespassing, no hunting, no parking without some damn pass... Many places I used to hunt have many roads closed by the damn government. Many places that are public land are land locked by some rich guy that has bought surrounding land and posted it. When one asks permission to hunt you find out that a group of rich guys have leased the access. The public camping areas that offer camping close to good hunting areas are taken weeks in advance by groups that move in and setup camps for their buddies. Some people move into the camping areas and setup " false " camps ( pitch an old tent to deny you access ). Another favorite trick is to put your own lock on gates thereby blocking public access to public lands.

Next consider the local poachers. If you scout and see a good animal chances are high you will find a gut pile before the season opens. If the area is to be logged you can forget about hunting because the loggers will have everything poached out ahead of season.

In WA State there is lots of public hunting area...if you can hike 5 miles to access it! Access for the regular guy is becoming more difficult every year. At 67 I am content to shoot the 3Ds and rove shooting stumps.

Heck, I usually post something of my more succesful stories, but I am thinking of posting ones when I get outsmarted, which is often. Always something to be learned, and maybe good advice from others. Chasing this one big boar that is giving me fits right now, but I will put most of it together if I am succesful on him. GF, you never have to be worried on my account. If I see a hunting thread, I will be reading it.

Most hunting stories are like watching Groundhog Day. In all honesty, how much different can they be. I guess a good writer can have a lot of tangents to keep you into it, but I'm good not reading so many "hunting stories." Of course some folks seem to live for it.

I will say the term "harvest" doesn't bother me, it's been used by our own game commission since the 1920's to describe game that was both killed and recovered. It's a proper term when used in that manner. Killing game is one aspect of it, recovering it is another...and that is where the context of the term belongs.

I guess if people feel that way, that may explain why there are so few posts. I, for one, think every hunt is a little different or special, and I live vicariously through other people when they post. The posts that get redundant for me are more likely to be posts about equipment or 3d shoots, but too each their own.

The term harvest doesn't bother me, either, unless it is being intentionally used to make what we hunters do more politically correct.

to

I love the pics of successful hunts and a "brief" description of equipment and location. No more info is needed IMO. George kinda hit on it already, unless something out of the ordinary happened the stories get redundant. Speck

I often though the same thing. I really pushed to write original stories and put them in a book to preserve them for many years. I honestly think there are far more hunters than killers in trad/prim archery. That is one of things that I find ironic about these few trad forums.. lots of advice given by people that only successfully kill paper. no offense intended to anyone in particular, but I do humbly chuckle a little when someone that has never killed anything tries to correct my shooting form or down my weapon choice.. ;-) There are actually many successful hunters on here if you scroll through the harvest threads, most people are just not writers and have a hard time with anything other than.. "I came, I saw, I conquered." or on the contrary, others like to write 8 pages about how the grass smelled that day and 1 paragraph about the deer...lol

I have noticed the same. This site has drifted more toward equipment.,I agree most don't kill much.

ok, 30yrs ago, I went hunting with my dad, he and I tried a little 2 man drive, I did the pushing, when I came around to him to see what he seen I found him stalking something in the field. He was about 30yrds from a ground hog and closeing in, I was in the tree line left and 30yrds back and took a snap shot with my Herters, the shot was perfect and the groundhog went two feet and fell over. My father stood there staring at the groundhog for 30 seconds trying to figure out why the thing is playing dead. after a moment he see's the blood and starts looking around, he quickly spots me and says great shot.

That's the spirit. Shouldn't have waited so long, lol.

I thought we had a pretty good representation of turkeys killed this year. Not an easy task with the bow but some posted several. About all there is out there to post right now is catfish, carp and gators. I think we have had some of those too. You better believe I will post a pic and have a story for every hunting weekend or trip I will be on this year. It is my 1st year back to traditional bow hunting since 95 or so. I will probably rifle hunt a few times but mostly in the swamp with the recurve is where I will be. Warm up the thermocell.

In my observation, various sites attract different types. Some indeed do seem to lean more towards punching paper and arguments over "Mine's better than yours".

Others consist largely of hard core hunters. No brag, no boast, just cool efficient hard core killers.

Others, perhaps, combo both demographics.

I don't necessarily agree with the school of thought that trad shooters don't kill much game. Me...for years, bowhunting WAS how I acquired my venison; generous seasons and good deer populations actually made that rather easy, especially so if one was truely meat hunting. True trophy hunting was a different story. I've killed several bucks topping 200 pounds here in Wisconsin, with my biggest dressing out at 234. However, in all those years only that one would go P & Y at 134".

Times are changing, however. Our CWD efforts have drastically reduced the herd. Acquiring access permission borders on nonexistent...we're nearing the "if you don't own it, you don't hunt it" stage. Where we once had few, if any, predators, we're now over run with coyotes...and wolves are more prevalent every year. Now, we have mountain lions popping up on trail cams and more bear sightings here in south-central state than ever in my life time. I know more and more guys who won't venture forth without a sidearm, and I'm considering that myself.

The "good old days" are over. Me, I'm 62...I've had my run. My 27 year old son lives for bowhunting and I fear he's facing some tough sledding.

I agree with there being less land to hunt I'm 26 will be 27 before deer seadon starts. I'm lucky in the fact I'm the hier to about 540 acres of good deer woods however we have a limit of how many deer per person we can kill so I used to hunt a lot of public land. A lot of which now you have to put in for a draw or a tag though its free they only allow 20 tags but only six bucks can be killed once the quota is reach hunting is ended. However a the state archery record was killed there last year. It scored 176 which in south Arkansas is a huge deer biggest ever killed off our land was 120 I killed 8 years ago and its treated as a monster round here.

You can only tell people how to tune their arrows, what brace to use, what type silencers to use, ect...etc... in so many ways. Every hunt is different depending on whats been hunted and who's hunting and telling it.

It takes a long time to write a story. They are cool though. Maybe I will add one sometime. As far as hunting land and no where to hunt goes. You have to actively look for land. You can't stay home. You have to knock on doors and network with people everywhere. And public land is not bad either. Always remember," yes there are other hunters, maybe one of them will push a deer my way". I've had some good times on public land. Met a lot of good people and learned a lot from them too. Skeet

I kill paper and foam 10 months. Deer for 2 every year. Hunting/killing is more private with me - just shared with a handful.

I love to shoot and mess with bows. But there is nothing I like more than to go deer hunting and hog hunting. Don't care if I see anything while I am hunting as long as I'm in the woods! I find i have some of my best time with God when im alone in the woods. My dreem is to one day go elk hunting. I would love to see an elk in person in the wild. Hunting is what got me into bows!

I frequently take a glance at the topics posted just to see. Right now, only one thread about a hunt, soon to go off the front page, and a ton about 3d shoots and a smattering of others about vendors and such. I know that turkey season is still going on a lot of places, bowfishing is ramping up, and there are always hogs being killed in Texas and the South. Heck, I don't even care if they aren't all hunts where something is killed. I would just like to see more topics about someone's time in the field and the choices they made under certain circumstances. Even during the fall seasons, there are way more threads about other topics than someone's hunt. Even if some think it is boring to hear the same story " got in stand, animal came by, picked a spot, shot it, tracked it, dragged it", what is interesting is what sign they were seeing, why they chose to put that stand there, why they hunted for the given conditions, what were the results, could they have done something differently, etc.. Admittedly, I like it when they give enough detail that you can really envision the layout of the property, but that is a personal issue. Nothing wrong with a lot of the other topics, of course, but more often than not, when I come onto the leatherwall page, after scanning the topics, I surf the net somewhere else until a topic comes along that sounds interesting. I don't mean that in a derogatory way, since we all have different interests. I guess that I am just a little surprised at the lack of hunting stories, and that is why I posted this.

most are too busy checking arrow speed through their chrono, fretting over extreme FOC, trying to figure out how they can worf something even though they have perfectly good bows already, or constructing a write up for a Man-Law when not telling others how they are doing it wrong or why they should not enter woods unless they can drill a gnats ass at 75 yards every time using a sight and elevated rest and whether using a release on a recurve is cheating. LMAO

keep em sharp,

ron herman

The first thing that dawned on me immediately upon opening this thread is that Patrick is awfully good at spinning a yarn himself, thus his longing for other good tales to read makes sense to me. It's just that the market eventually became saturated with mundane hunting stories and even good writers have to find new and creative ways to satisfy the hunger. The plodding, standard story lines are a frustrating dime a dozen, but like Pat, I very much enjoy the reasoning behind the location choice, the strategies employed to get in close and the sights, sounds and even smells of one's surroundings, if the author can pull that off. Really good, yet interesting, descriptive writing, though, is a talent that very few possess. I guess THAT'S why we see so little of it.

I really like pictures of others hunting camps and descriptions

also roves and

equipment set ups at those camps

Like Ron's Shrew crew and Jeffers Canadian camp

some stories,if concise- just have read so many stories over the years (knda get all the same , unless it was you doing it)

Guess needs to be varried- so many others with other ideas

I wrote a quick short story hunt on here a week ago. It only stayed on the first page for a day. If there are no comments made they quickly disappear. If there is active interest shown they will be posted and stay for others to enjoy. Ever notice that you see the same active posters and evidently all the rest of LW readers are just lurkers? This is what kills threads and it is a problem of not having hunting post stay up for all to read.

pdk, there are more hunting stories and how-to on hunting on Bowsite. I visit there for that reason. there are more stickbow shooters on Bowsite than you might realize.

the leatherwall has good info on gear.

As we (me!!!) get older, and the campfires get rarer, the stories kinda fade away.

At our old archery club's summer broadhead league, we shot on an honor system and you had the entire week to get your score in. My partner and I always shot on friday evening. Eventually, a few others joined and we wound up with a friday night rondevous and campfire. These guys were hunters!!! As the beers were cracked open, and the work week faded away, the stories and jokes began.

Combine those days with hunting camps and one gets endless tales and stories...but I never get enough...lol.

I spent a long time hunting and shooting with the same cadre of great people, and would give about anything to return...but, time moves along, and people go with.

Now, it's becoming "internet campfire", and we share those with strangers. Friendships can and do get built, but it's difficult when that "campfire" can encompass the globe. And perhaps the greatest story killer is the disappearance of face to face contact...we can't "tell" em anymore...gotta type em now.

Bowhunting is a low percentage game. Largely it's just about sitting in a good spot waiting. Plus, not many hunters are great story-tellers.

I have thought about this myself. I think this site has evolved over the years from a solid bowhunting context to much higher percentage of method, collecting, and equipment discussions that have distanced the hunting relevance for me. I like this site. The discussions can be entertaining and informative in various aspects of archery. While there are some great hunting experiences posted on this site, I'm inclined to go elsewhere for rich hunting content and stories.

Another relate problem is paragraphs. Look how Rick Allison has structured the paragraphs in his post. They're very easy to read. Think what that would look like with all the same indentation. Then add a hunting story that's going to be a page long.

That is 5 sentences long, no indentation. Here it is again in to paragraphs:

Another relate problem is paragraphs. Look how Rick Allison has structured the paragraphs in his post. They're very easy to read.

Think what that would look like with all the same indentation. Then add a hunting story that's going to be a page long.

The second is much easier to read.

Bowmania

pdk25,

I suspect the reason for few stories has to do with HNP, that is, "hunt and peck" typing skills.

Wild Bill...I'm on a tablet...with fingers that would NEVER quantify me for neurosurgery...I'm a single shot stylus typist...just sayin'...lol

None from me cause I dont like hunting ; )

If a guy has a good hunting story that he can sell to a magazine, why give it away on the internet? bvd

I agree with you Pat. I will say that I do like peoples descriptions of different hunting equipment, bow specs, and bow pictures. But many of these guys hunt and I guess I'm as guilty as any for not posting stories. To be honest to many no it all Neo Trads on this site that are arm chair experts and want to argue about something they really know nothing about. That is the reason so many threads get closed on this site. If you want to see good hunting stories you will have to go to the Bowsite. That is my opinion. So you Neo Tads flame away! :) LOL

I no longer hunt but reading hunting stories reminds me of how much fun I had. Now days, any stories and pictures of wildlife...period, are worth looking at.

Tradmt, At least I spelled Neo Trad right once in that post. Sorry for the typo. I usually try to watch the spelling. I'll work on that!:) Arrowflinger.....

Its one thing not to hunt. But to not like hunting...WTF! Do you eat meat Rockguitarzan ?

Like I've said before...vegetarian is an old Indian word meaning, lousy hunter.

I have zero problems with vegetarians. Its the people that buy meat at the store, then say hunting is wrong that bother me. I have a couple of friends that are vegetarian that have no problem with hunters/meateaters.

I have only taken two animals with trad gear. As stated before I'm relatively new to this. I will do my best this year to bring a good story! Good luck to all who persue the thrill.

One of the trends I have noticed is the regular use of popup blinds and tree stands. There are only so many ways to write about a deer walking by your spot and you shooting it. Real hunting (not waiting in a tent or stand) helps promote real stories. If you get out and learn how to kill deer on the ground via stalking or still hunting, there seem to be plenty of instances that make for a good story. You didn't hear too awful many stories from Fred Bear written about sitting in a tree stand or ground blind.. a few blinds, but not too many compared to spot and stalk or ground hunting. To me it's like watching a modern hunting show.. how many ways can you film shooting a whitetail at 40yards from 25ft up in a tree? I've just noticed way more story worthy experiences when you are on the ground and pursuing game. Most of my tree stand stories that I've written about are centered more around a moral of the story, or a season's long worth of events that lead up to the single shot. Likewise, when I write about spotting a deer and slipping closer and somehow killing it, it just makes for a more original story that has enough excitement taking place in 45 minutes than all season of stand hunting. I personally think the new trend of blinds and stands are suppressing the amount of would-be quality stories.

Ryan, hunting out of treestands or blinds, natural or not, is far from a new thing, but I understand what you mean about it making story telling a little more difficult, but not if you include more details about why you chose the location, etc.. I am not saying every kill or hunt needs to posted, but the shortage of stories is pretty staggering, even from people that I know are hunting by spot and stalk. BTW, I have killed a decent number by both methods, and would not consider one method "real hunting" and the other methods not. In fact, in a lot of ways it is easier to sneak up on a cagey old boar than it is to have it come into a feeder without winding you.

Rick,

I just looked back at your posts to this thread and marveled at the amount of time it took you to write them. How many words per minute do you think you do?

The address below offers free lessons and games for the keyboard. Let me know how you do on the Meteor Typing Blast game.

http://www.freetypinggame.net/score.asp?

I can agree wit you Pdk, I too have killed several from tree stands as well. I do typically look at it more as waiting than hunting, but very effective for success. I'm sure I will always hunt stands at different times, but more so just saying I develop better stories when pursuing game. On the ground for me has typically meant less success, but far more action.

Pat, I am with you. I don't 'internet' like I used to. Only so many ways to tune an arrow.

Hunting stories on the hand I still dig.

Just not so many around these days.

Pity.

One reason is it's not a bowhunting website. If you want a lesson on how to tune an arrow or how to spell and make paragraphs this is the place tho.

pdk25,

Very simple, Because it is a Bowmantic forum....certainly not a bowhunting forum.

'Bowmantic' - I LIKE IT!

LOL!!!

Maybe so, Richie. I notice the same on another site that is supposed to be a bowhunting site, but it is not as obvioius as here. One of the reasons over there, I think, is that if you look at the member numbers, there is disproportionate posting by relatively newer members likely with less experience hunting with trad bows. Maybe the folks that have been doing it longer and being successful just lose interest in posting about their hunts. I don't know. I know that I loved reading about Robert Carter's hunts, even when he didn't bring something home, you would get to see pics of swamp critters and such.

Pdk, allow me to direct your attention to the forum that we all love here in GA. WWW.gon.com. Click on "forum" and then "traditional archery". If you do a search you will find lots of photos, stories, advice.....and no arguing.

Sweet. I will check it out, if an Okie is allowed.

Some times you are worn out and keep things to yourself because of jealousy. If your with others let them tell the storys or show the picture, the picture tells the story you got him or you have something your showing.

There's always a story on a big deer and its not always a good one. Ever wonder why the animals mouth don't have blood in it, you think the animal licked its lips or the shooter wiped it out? Story teller says where the animal was shot and you know differantelly. Believe that and you might believe any other story.LOL

Also sometimes you have a relationship with an animal and its not with the rest of the world. Each killer knows what they want out of an animal when you have them at your mercy when the animal made a fatal mistake and you say differantly.

Storys are just that storys. LOL

That's a good reason not to write storys. There's no story here and someones already telling how the storys are lies. Like I said its just not a bowhunting forum.

Tooltech, my Washington hunting experience was quite the opposite. I could go up into public land on any given day, every time, and never see a soul, even with rigs parked around. Never had any issues with campers or tenters 'blocking' me. There were a lot of hunters set up along the road up, but a half mile into the wilderness, I saw no one. My experience in WA was that most people road-hunt, really. I twice walked ten minutes from the truck, walked into public forest parked right along forest service roads, and shot a 4x4 bull, and an enormous cow elk. I suspect you live near Seattle or Vancouver WA, where that which you mention is more likely. But there is so much opportunity in Western WA, up the gorge, esp. during bow season. There are no gun hunters out then. Not sure of your source of frustration and negative hunting experiences in WA. Sorry to hear that you had that experience. I loved it. Even better than Montana in many instances, where I DID have a few of the types of issues you mentioned (not poaching, but tied-up access). I hike until my butt falls off and never see anyone. I don't have to hike far to see game usually, I just like to. I most like a really long hike/hunt and see nothing shootable, only to get close to home or the truck and then shoot something so I don't have far to pack it out. If I see something way back in, I shoot it and worry about the pack out after its over (ie, I don't worry about it). I have some good packing out stories. I dragged out a spike bull whole over two miles and another time that giant cow (200 yards only that time). But either way, WA, where I hunted, was anything but what you described, and I could tell stories for hours if I didn't feel like I was bragging. Anyone asks, I'm here to tell...

DanaC, I have to disagree, respectfully. Bowhunting is not sitting (in a tree) and waiting anywhere for more than a few minutes, maybe an hour at most. To me that is not hunting at all. Hunting, to me, with any weapon is trying to approach game, or anticipate its approach and remain stealth enough to get a shot, either way, while on its terms, on the ground, moving/stopping, and stalking. Stillhunting as it was meant to be defined. Its the ultimate challenge, esp. with trad bow gear. Treestand shooting is not hunting to me, and I don't ever plan to do it. Rarely have. I've even built treestands and never used them. I have access to at least 7 abandoned but perfectly functional metal treestands now in my immediate area, and I have not used them once in the five years they have been available. Just my opinion, not saying yours is wrong. Stories about standing in a tree or videos of game shot from trees, with the killer /high-fiving the cameraman make me puke...

Well, you may feel that way Calvin, but people have been ambushing game since long before you and I were born, so I think it is definitely hunting. Spot and stalk is preferable, but not always the best method for a given area.

Don't feel like you are bragging. Share your success stories sometime. Someone might learn something from them.

I don't post hunting stories because I usually submit them to other venues. Suppose I could post some pix now and then, but I don't know how to do it, and from the how- tos I've read, it seems like a PIA, even when one knows how to do it. Then again, a lot of folks are quick to criticize, so there's not much incentive for doing so.

Trapper and I shared quite a few stories via PM while I was bored stupid during knee replacemant recovery.

He has some good ones...beats the bejeezes out of mine :^)

Thanks Orion. That is good feedback.

Think Orion made a very good point to ponder

There's so much nitpicking its not worth it.Plus doing it over and over (and YES plenty of us kill game)seems a little bit like like self promotion.

Here is a "hunting" story.

Moonlight Under the Willows

I used to lie awake in bed on humid summer nights, sweating and listening to the night music of locusts and bullfrogs. The windows were always open and the fans on high, due to the heat. After a while I’d call out, “Momma, I’m sweatin’.” “Just lay still and you’ll cool off in a minute, hon,” she’d reply. “But Momma, it’s hot.” “Well, turn around and put your head at the foot of the bed. It’s cooler like that.” I’d turn around and put my head at the foot of the bed, inevitably moving to an area on the sheets where I’d not previously been sweating and presto, the sheets were cool. It’d only take a few moments before I was fast asleep but in those last moments I’d lie in wonder at my mom’s wisdom. Little did I know that those same bullfrogs that sang me to sleep with their baritone calls, in concert with the rhythm of the locusts, would provide entertainment and dinner only a few years later in my life. Jeff and I would sit out by the lake and listen as the evening sky faded to darkness. It always seemed quietest right at twilight, when the lightning bugs came out. Then we’d hear the first lone “ribbit” and soon another and another, a crescendo of sound until the whole lake was filled with a symphony of tones echoing from bank to bank on the little lake. The frogs, the locusts, the katydids of late summer, were a cacophony of noise, music that defined our world. Jeff would lie back on the bank with a slight smile of contentment on his face. I’d follow his lead, and we’d staring at the stars in silence. I never urged him to the lake. When he felt the time was right he’d say, “You ready?” “Yep.” And with that we’d ease into the johnboat and shove off into the lake. Armed with a six-foot pole tipped with a three-pronged gig, a high-beam flashlight and a johnboat, Jeff Sanford and I stalked bullfrogs all over Gordon County. Frog gigging was one of the most exciting late-night activities we participated in, surpassing coon hunting when the lake was thick with frogs. Jeff and I established specific roles and responsibilities when gigging frogs. One of us would sit in the front of the boat with the gig in hand, focusing on the frog and making a clean gig. While not quite as exciting, the other man’s job was to keep the boat at the perfect distance from the bank and shine the light in the frog’s eyes over the shoulder of the gigger. Slowly, we’d ease along the very edge of the lake, under the canopy of the willows, until we saw a big bullfrog sitting at the water’s edge. Most of the time we’d hear them first, and sometimes you’d only see their eyes and nose peeking out of the water. Regardless, once we spotted them and shined the light in their eyes, they were ours for the bagging. The gigger slowly extended the gig until it was within a foot or so from the frog and then he’d thrust it forward, pinning the frog. The prongs have a barb so he won’t slip off once gigged. We’d then retract the gig, pull the frog off, drop him into a burlap bag and resume scanning for the next frog. We loaded many burlap bags with frogs over the years, but quite often we would become distracted by the other slithery nocturnal inhabitants of those little ponds. Since the lakes were loaded with frogs, snakes — the frogs’ natural predators — were abundant. Water moccasins (or cottonmouths) and water snakes were most commonly encountered. We rarely saw a snake on the bank. Only its nose, which is pointier than a frog’s, peeked out of the black water or moss. We knew it was a snake if the nose was pointing straight up in the air and had no width to it. As we maneuvered along the shore, we’d see the nose of a snake peeking out of the water and the initial surge of adrenaline would really begin to flow through our veins. Unfortunately, those old lakes had a lot of algae and the water was as black as oil at night so we’d only see the nose. We had no idea how much snake lay behind the nose until he was gigged, and at that point we were fully committed. When a snake is gigged it instantly wraps its body around the gig pole like a stripe winding around a barber pole. On numerous occasions, while using a six-foot long gig pole a snake wound around the pole and its tail would touch our hands at the end of the pole. It was during this wrapping and thrashing phase that the remaining adrenaline left untapped in our young bodies surged into our bloodstreams. If, for some strange reason, the snake wasn’t cleanly gigged and it came loose, excitement became sheer pandemonium. Jeff and I liked to hang the snakes on the pasture fences that normally surrounded the lakes, like redneck trophy cases, for passersby to admire the next morning. The only catch to it was that we had to keep the snakes until we were finished gigging the lake. Jeff’s method was to throw them in the other end of the boat once they were presumed dead. That was a trickier judgment call that it might appear, since snakes tend to move for hours after they expire. One night Jeff was gigging his lake alone. He had thrown a couple of large snakes in the other end of the boat and was continuing to gig when he heard a noise behind him in the boat. He turned around and shined the light in the back of the boat. One of the snakes was slithering rapidly toward him. Jeff did what any average kid would do — he began to beat the snake to death with the wooden boat paddle. Once the adrenaline began to subside, and the snake was in multiple pieces, Jeff stopped beating. He later told me, “I’m glad I stopped beating that snake before there was a hole in the bottom of the boat. Once my heart rate returned to the south side of 200 I realized that I would have to drift to the shore using what was left of the boat paddle as a toothpick.” After a long night of gigging we’d skin the frogs and bag the legs. Momma battered and fried them for us. A lot of people say frog legs taste like chicken but that’s because they feel the need to tell others what it tastes like yet can’t quite describe it. Frog legs taste like frog legs. They’re excellent. Frog gigging isn’t very common today. Nowadays kids seem to spend more time watching cable television and online gaming, but I’d submit that they too could learn to love frog gigging if someone would take them out on a moonlit night under the willows.

___from "Southern Roots" by Jimmy Blackmon

really nice Jimmy, enjoyed that

brought back long ago memories

This is a stickbow archery site, not a bowhunting site. But the parent of this site, Bowsite.com is a bowhunting site. Plenty of stories there. - lbg

I hope stickbow archers continue to tell their hunting stories and post pics here as well. I do enjoy most of them and even like seeing bucks taken from stands but I don't do it that way. I can't get into excessive celebration esp. hooting and whooping it up, high fiving etc. I guess I just internalize the excitement, contain it, and just shake visibly with the adrenalin but I'm usually alone so who would I celebrate with anyway? I get that rush that is the true driving force behind hunting and fishing. I don't revel in it much outwardly. I do see some vids where the hunter thanks the Creator for his success. That's respectable to me. I used to think 'oh brother' when someone would yell and hollar when they hooked a salmon on Drano Lake or the White Salmon. I can understand their excitement but its kind of a turnoff (at the risk of sounding critical). Stories told here by stickbowmen and women are something I'd like to see more of here since it's decent folks telling them or else they wouldn't take on that kind of hunting challenge.

I understand completely, TrapperKayak. I am not one to hoot and holler either, and find it a little distasteful as well.

Jimmy, that was a great story, and very informative. You have a gift, sir.

longbowguy, I realize this isn't a bowhunting site. That being said, it is a traditional archery site, and a major portion of traditional archery is hunting with traditional equipment, even if not everyone does. I would expect a more commensurate amount of posting, so that is why I posted.

Mike, I can understand your point about the nitpicking, and that has been kinda mentioned a few times. A shame. Regarding self-promotion, I would expect someone to post about everytime the were successful or anything, but if they had an an enjoyable hunt and want to share it with internet friends, why not? People certainly don' have any problem with showing picks of a new bow that they got, arrows they made up, and other things. Gonna have to compile a list of the reasons that were mentioned.

As Steve said... it's a personal ordeal between me and my prey and I just don't feel right going public about it when I kill something. I even tell folks who incessantly ask if I've killed anything, 'no', even when I have. Generally, the only ones who know are those I share the meals with... and they don't always know either.

My hunting stories are like home movies. Good for a campfire.

Thanks for the input, Jeff. I feel very differently about it, but respect your opinion on the subject. Good to know another potential reason.

Babling Bob, this is supposed to be like an internet campfire, lol.

Lol, nice one. That's what I'm talking about.

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