Recently I was listening to the old merle haggard song "Are the good times really over for good".

For some reason my mind flipped back to when I was around 19 yrs old.

It was archery season in Northern PA, I was up at hunting camp. I had left after work Fri evening and drove to camp. I would be staying up the whole following week until Sun.

The pre dawn had been cold and very frosty but by mid morning the sun had peeked out and thawed things out. Now as I sat here eating my lunch on the back side of dead horse mt. A snow squall had kicked up and trout run mt across from me disappeared in a haze of snow and wind which rattled the leaves on the beech saplings around me. I took my hand and wiped the snow from my Bear grizzly recurve.

By mid afternoon the sun peeked out again and the light dusting left by the short squalls had disappeared.

I hunted those mts all week alternately still hunting and stand hunting. I was seeing deer, but nothing that offered a shot. The views are tremendous in that area of the tiadaghton state forest. And every day I stopped and soaked in panoramic views from the top of a mt and gazed upon mts as far as the eye can see. The air and the mts have a certain freshness not tainted by society and created by an Almighty creator.

The only sounds are the rattle of the beech leaves that cling tenaciously to there branches despite the efforts of an oncoming winter, and the ever present whisper of white pine.

Finally about mid week a small buck offered a shot. I was crouched beneath a beech which had branches that hung down and offered a natural blind. He was a small forkie. I'd like to say I killed him, but I didn't, I sent a ceder shaft tipped with a hilbre broadhead right under him.

That night I was laying in camp the fireplace was crackling, it was warm in the camp..to warm. I was laying on the couch dead tired from early mornings and miles in the mts. An old transistor radio was sitting on top of the refrigerator and softly playing Waylon Jennings luchenbach texas.

I remember vividly how content I was. Yet not realizing that in a blink of an eye I would travel through life raise five children have 3 grandchildren and be recalling this via internet now.

"Are the good times really over for good" ?.....not yet....but its sure nice to go back every now and then.

Luchenbach texas lol I just obtained that song! Great memory shade! Man that would be hard for me to narrow it down to one memory hunting has offered up so many memories. Traditional gear it would be killing my nicest buck 3 seasons ago in my first year of hunting with traditional equipment. Great post I look toward to hearing from others!

Darn autocorrect should have said I look forward to hearing from others. Lol

There's been so many one found memory was my first buck with a bow in fall 1982 I was 12yrs old and we shot all the time I had a bear take down in 45# and all my arrows had field tips but I would to go deer hunting Soo bad but I didn't have any broadheads but my older brother was already allowed to bowhunt with broadheads for he's 5yrs older the I but this one evening after school he had football practice and I noticed his handsome quiver full of arrows in his bow when I came in from school it was beautiful fall evening and we lived on a farm though all dad had was a few horses but still good hunting on our place anyway I thought I'll just borrow one of my brother's arrows and put it back yeah well I grabbed my bow and his arrow tipped with shinny new razor head and started sneaking up a narrow gas line right of way and it started drizzling rain I hadn't went more then maybe 150yards from home when I spot a deer feed the edge and I sneaked up close and drew my bow and put it on him he kicked and took off and I walked up to where he was there blood but no arrow so I wasn't a smart hunter back then so I started tracking and I'm sure I pushed him alittle I remember really wanting to find that arrow bad so to not get the crap knock out of me by big brother it was raining now and getting dark I return home that evening the first thing my brother noticed was he arrow missing and then dad got involved and I told them yeah I borrowed it but I shot a buck and of course they thought I just trying to save my hide , anyways the next morning was Sat and dad woke me up early and said we are going rabbit hunting and we are going where you said you shot that deer I was all kinda happy and I showed him where it happened and which way the deer went us three fanned out and started looking and the beagles was already on a rabbit but low and behold my brother found his arrow and yelled DAD I found my arrow and its bloody!!! Another several yards there was my big buck he was a 4pt and everyone seemed to forget about me stealing the arrow and iv had broadheads of my own every year since ,, but my Bowhunting memory has to be all of the rolled in to one !

My first morning bowhunting for whitetails,...I was 12,...Necedah Wildlife Refuge in WI,...September 1957,...10 yard shot at a 6 - 8 point,...missed,...I was hooked for life! Have not missed a WI bow season ever since,...this year will be my 61 st. bowhunting season. (even during six years in USMC I came home to hunt, arranged my leave for October) Semper Fi, and good luck to all this year!

For me it's normally about the firsts for others. I mentor a lot and love the smiles from the kids when they succeed. Unfortunately they don't use trad gear so I'll keep it at that. Years ago when my kids were little I bought a PSA. The kids for a birthday "gave" me the rest of the money for the bow. Instead of my name is says Black Widow for Autumn and Skye's dad. (My kids names) Anyway I fully believe in practicing with equipment yet each day my older daughter would get home and asked if I shot a deer with her bow. I decided I best try. So behind the house I went, about to tie the bow to the haul line when here come buncha does. It's legal and a big one stops with its vitals centered in a tree v. Perfect. I shoot her and after crashing off she expires. Autumn asks where the horns are? Ugh. A few days pass and I'm skinning bears, anyone who has skinned bears know the grease on em kinda smells. Had 45 mins but the farm down the road just cut corn and deer oughta be in the cut. I run down stinking like bear grease but you never know. I jack up and pull up my bow. It's 4:23. Only a very little bit til dark. I look up and there's a rack buck so I shoot him. He runs out and falls over. Look at my watch and it's still 4:23. While not an exact moment a cool time with a special trad bow, taking two deer with maybe a minute of hunt time. I can no longer draw these limbs but I'll never get rid of them.

Casekiska, maybe there's something about Necedah, first bowhunt opening day Sept 1965. An older friend brought me down from Mpls to his old stomping grounds. Missed 3 shots that morning and like you was hooked for life! This is my 53rd year and going strong!

Keep those memories coming! Great thread shade!

Any of my bow and arrow rabbit hunts with my old friend Warren Geisler, back in the 1970's. Warren has since passed to the next adventure, but those days were the best for camaraderie and times afield. No bow kill will ever replace those times.

My best bowhunting memories were every minute I spent bowhunting ,shooting, and being with my brother. Sadly my brother passed away on April 9, 2002. This picture was taken in 1994. It was the only time me and my brother killed bucks on the same day, an hour apart.

Sorry but don't have any best because there are to many and to many record books to signal out any best animal really for me. Id like to say my lion or my caribou but they are only just 2 animals then what do I say about all my others.

Guess I was spoiled but then I figured I was blessed and been thankful enough to go on many trips when I was younger.

Now as an old man I still get blessed enough to get out there.

When I reflect there were many animals that I didn't get that had a chance at that are as equal as the ones I got to me even the wounded ones I still remember like it was yesterday.

I guess its all in how we look at things and remember them for what they were worth to us even the rough experiences we went through if you had any of them to remember.

1987, 14 years old sitting in an old weathered wooden stand that had been built many years before. Hearing the crunching leaves and seeing a buck coming down the trail. My heart would pound and I'd have a feeling like no other, even the smallest of buck was exciting to see back then. I didn't think about it then, but most deer I would see, I hadn't seen before and every neighbor hadn't named the deer as it stood under their feeder in a picture. Every deer seemed like a trophy to a kid 'hunting' a deer. Those were the best days of my hunting life even if I didn't fill a tag.

back in the 60s hunting with my dad.

When my kids took their first deer.. trumps anything I have ever harvested. My heart was pounding out of my chest. My son took a moment and told me to calm down. Great thread.

1981

16 years old

First solo hunt without my father. He let me drive our '73 Jeep CJ5 to Laurel Springs, NC where he had first taken me hunting when I was 12 or so.

36 archery seasons ago I took my first deer ever on Dean Pruitt's dairy farm, Elk Knob Hunt Club, down Meadowfork Rd in Laurel Springs, NC. I took a snapshot map of the area where I hunted. The land has long since been sold. The old dairy barn is just visible on the right side of the curved roadway. My father first took me to this place when I was 12 or so.

The farm was very rural and the road graveled. There was a small spring coming out of the side of the hill and an apple tree grew at the mouth of the spring, shown here as 1x. I had stuffed my BDU camo pants with three apples in each side pocket. The apples were softball sized and only three would fit the pockets. As I headed back to the dairy barn where I had parked I looked in the distance and spotted a deer feeding on the pasture grass near two large white pines marked on this map as 2x. I started jogging to try to get closer but the apples were wagging in my pockets like a hamster's jaws stuffed full. I dumped the apples in the open pasture for a return later to re-collect them. My path, as shown by the yellow trail, was mostly hidden from the deer because of the terrain. As I worked my way to the deer, after about 30 minutes of a combination of running and crawling, I edged to within 20 yards of her as she fed facing uphill and to my right. I was able to get a shot at her as a slight upward breeze blew, bending the broomstraw that helped conceal my approach and eventual draw. I released the arrow to see and hear the impact. A low grunt of the doe had her spin to her left and run downhill. I gave chase out of my cover to hopefully see her as she ran across the open field to the woods on the opposite side of the pastured valley. Instead of seeing her run into the woods, I saw her about 30 yards into the pasture on her side taking her last breaths. I sat down, both overwhelmed at my success, and in heavy somberness at having taken the life of such a great woods creature. She fell at 3x.

I never did go back for the apples and someone has long since cut down the apple tree, or it fell to a natural demise. No whoops. No high fives. No video. Just fond memories I only have. I would like to walk there just one more time.

The old doe possibly would not have lasted the winter she was so frail with age. Her teeth were worn down smooth to the gum line from front to back. Her neck was long and skinny. She had no fat on her to help her through a cold approaching winter. She was eating on grass, likely because she couldn't eat anything tougher. That memory and that deer live on in my mind. I hope to always remember each one. They deserve it.

My best bow hunting memories were all of the hunts that I had with my sweetheart. The first was in 1958 and every year for the next 55 years. She's gone now but I have the memories.

Wonderful photo, Ron.

LET'S KEEP GOING!!!

Some great memories!

The same year I wrote about in my opening post. I was seeing a pretty nice 7 pt from a ground blind I had constructed. But it seemed he was always just a bit to far for a good shot, or the wind was wrong and I couldn't hunt the spot. But I was pretty confident that I'd eventually kill him.

My youngest brother was 13 at the time and he pestered me relentlessly to take him along hunting.

I was married at the age of 19, so I no longer lived at home. One evening after work I drove to my parents, and said... "come on boy, get your stuff together I'm taking you hunting tonight"

Driving to my spot I thought to myself..."i'll sit the boy in one of my other blinds". They were all good spots...but they were not the best spot. I knew in my heart the 7 pt stand was THEE! best spot.

My conscience worked on me pretty hard on the way there, and so I succumbed to brotherly love and put him in the 7 pt stand.

About an hr into the hunt I heard the boy coming out the ridge sounding like a herd of elephants and whistling like he'd just lost his best hunting dog. I muttered to myself..."I'm gonna skin that boy alive" I cut down the ridge and rounded the boy up before he spooked every deer in the county.

Long as I live I will never forget the look on his face..."I got him! I got him! I got the big 7 pt you were telling me about.

He shot him at about 13 steps and The arrow hit just a bit to far back, we crawled on our hands and knees looking for blood, and decided to back out and give him time. Dad found him early the next morning.

That buck hangs on my brothers wall to this day. Every time I look at that buck I think back and am so glad my conscience put him in the 7pt stand.

Another fond memory is a big old apple tree. It was back in the day before tree stands, my brothers and I all archery hunted it by climbing up in it and sitting on a limb. Quite a few deer were shot from it (and quite a few missed)

For those of you that have been to the Ski sawmill traditional shoot. The "Old apple tree" was up the road a bit on the same side as the ski resort almost back against the mt. My parents and two brothers live close by ski sawmill.

You've got some good stories Shade Mt, keep em coming.

I love the way you write Steve. I read this to my wife. She knows how much up love that north woods like you do. Pine creek gorge, my favorite place to be. I hunt it every fall. Sometimes deer but mostly bear. Great grandpa started going up from Lancaster county on 1942.

Bowhunting memories.... Now I'm 27 but I've shot 19 deer with a bow. My favorite hunt was one I missed. Potter county 2014, I hunted out of a friends camp in NY state but hunted near Genesee,PA. I saw 14 buck in the days of hunting and missed three buck with my recurve. It was a blast. I won't go into details but the deer were very responsive to calling. Couple of the boys shot does.

So many great memories.... One was taking my oldest son to Colorado for 2 weeks to elk hunt and fly fish. He missed first two weeks of school his senior year to go. He's a junior in college in fishery/biology program so I'm pretty sure missing a few weeks of high school didn't hurt him. We didn't get an elk but caught a lot of fish.

Three days of hunting I ment to say

I was elk hunting one afternoon late after a big rain and knew I was into elk quickly by the fresh elk tracks in the mud. After about 20 minutes, I spotted the small herd containing one 6x6 and about 8 to 10 cows. I had the wind right, blowing gently down the mountain, and they were making elk vocals and moving my way. Then they got agitated and ran down past me and stopped at about 35 yards. Almost immediately they got my wind and ran back up the hill, then turned and ran back down towards me. I had an arrow mocked and almost had a shot opportunity on the bull, when again they ran up the mountain. Seemed to me they were acting very unusual. I started moving up after them and set up to attempt some cow calls. After several minutes of occasionally chirping and mewing, I noticed the tall grass In amongst the aspen/pines moving towards me. I turned to face the very brisk movement of grass, when a fairly large mountain lion stepped out 5 yards directly in front of me. We looked at each other for a few seconds when he turned 90 degrees and just sauntered away with his long tail swishing back and forth. I think the cat may have influenced the elk behavior and he probably thought he was going to get an easy meal, hearing my calls. Got my attention I'll tell ya. Probably my most vivid Bowhunter memory. Newt

The first year I "seriously" archery hunted my sister got married opening day. I got home from the reception with a couple hrs to hunt. I shot my first archery deer that evening. A wide forkhorn, I watched him fall in sight. I ran the whole way home. It was the best thing that could have happened,I was already hooked but that made it so rewarding. I picked peaches all summer to but a bow that fall.

As I enter my 40th year of bow hunting I also have tons of favorites, most were made with a wheel bow but when I think back over it I always go back to a summer day in 77 when my neighbor approached me, handed me a bright yellow recurve and said your getting to big for that toy bow(a 15# all glass bow that I still have to this day)your playing with. I spent the rest of summer and early fall shooting every chance I got. In them days you couldn’t hunt until you turned 12 in Pa. and with my B-day being in mid December I couldn’t go until the after christmas season.

So on my dad’s day off sometime between christmas and new years of 1977 I went on my 1st ever hunt were I got to carry a weapon. To this day I remember the hike up that hill in western Pa. the giant oaks at the top of it and the big fox squirrel who climbed up on the top of a fence post to look at some kid dressed like a pumpkin. My dad looked at me and smiled, I pulled back that old yellow banana let it go and killed that squirrel. What makes it so special is that 40 yrs later it remains as the only living thing I’ve ever killed with a stick bow.

I switched to wheels the following summer and spent the next 33 yrs making memories with them. I came back to the recurve 5yrs ago but now I’m at the stage of life were if I get one I get one and if I don’t it’s all good

Mike

I started bowhunting in 1974 with a Browning Nomad Stalker I 50#. A favorite memory was one day when hunting with that bow (didn't own a treestand then, or probably even know they existed) I climbed up in a tree that had a low fork and some limbs that made it climbable. It was right behind a small food plot (on a public WMA, no one had food plots on private land that I knew of back then) and also right by a small but swiftly flowing little creek. Stood up in the fork of that tree for a couple of hours, then as the light faded I heard hooves on the rocks and looked up to see a small buck walking down the creek in the water. I got all ready, but he passed by on the wrong side of my tree and I couldn't get turned on my perch. Had to watch him walk away but it was so memorable because I got so close, and for the first time was convinced I might could really kill a deer with a bow. Took me a few more years to actually kill one, but it was a landmark day for me.

My best evening was when I killed my biggest buck to date out of a brushy ground blind on a public management area with an osage selfbow and wood arrow I made.

I set a trap where a steep white oak studded hollow formed a natural funnel and the buck walked into my trap, 10 yard shot, I heard him crash about 100 yards away.

Congratulations Eric, that's a great accomplishment

That's a tough one Ron. Years ago at Elm Hall my wife and I had a fire at our trailer across from the club house. Your wife came over to my Chris and introduced herself and sat down next to the fire. They had quite a visit and spoke like they had known each other for a long time.

My oldest daughter was about 5. During Bow Season she went hunting with me and took her little bow. We sat on the side of a hill and were watching a group of doe about 100 yds away. She looked at me and asked if she could take a shot. I Said "go ahead." She drew back and let her arrow go....it went about 20ft. She then looked at me and said..."I missed."

I once shot a caribou at 3 yards. I was so close I got sprayed in the face with the blood.

TMBB

Jon, that was Nancy she loved people, especially archery people. The love of archery and bowhunting was something we shared and I have many fond memories.

Mine was with my son . . . it was his second season hunting with a bow, it was just before his 13th birthday . . . it was with a compound . . . Both of us were in the tree (two Longwolf stands hung side by side), buck came out with about 15 minutes of light left; we were only about 12 feet up and I remember whispering several times - shoot him, shoot him - while he was trying to get his bow drawn (he was shooting 38lbs.). He finally did and his arrow hit right were I was looking for it to hit! A four yard shot!!

Nothing like when you get to watch your kids get it done!That was back in 2003; now he has his own family and serves our country in the Army!

Michael

Forgot to mention - this was his first deer with any weapon . . .

Michael

My fondest memories go back to when I was between about 10 and 13 yrs old. I lived on the southern edge of Los Angeles and we had no wilderness, just big fields and oil fields. Most of the big fields were not much more than a square mile before a road cut through them. We had plenty of Jack Rabbits and cottontails and a few pheasant. I hunted nearly everyday from dawn till dusk and after school till dark. I mixed my hunting with catching lizards, snakes and frogs. Fondest memories I have.

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