event happened during those first few formative years of my bowhunting career. I had learned a valuable lesson from my "rookie" blunder, and I promised myself I wouldn't make the same mistake again. In analyzing the reasons for my underestimating the range, and the resulting miss, I considered several factors. One was my comfort level in using my 20-yard pin and holding it just a little bit high on the vitals to compensate for the presumed additional 5 yards. It was the pin I used almost exclusively during extensive practice sessions, so perhaps my range estimation was impacted a bit by wishful thinking. But more critically, I believe I was fooled by the hefty size of the buck. He was much bigger than your average buck, so I thought he was about 12 yards closer than he really was. It's the same mistake that has plagued bowhunters since the invention of the stick and string: underestimate the range and you miss low; overestimate and your arrow flies over the animal's back. Bowhunting lore is rife with such legendary misses. This problem is particularly common among bowhunters conditioned to exclusively targeting white-tailed deer, who then hunt other big game such as elk, caribou or pronghorn antelope. I've lost count of how many stories I've heard of misses on elk and caribou where the arrow dropped beneath the animal. "It was so much bigger than a whitetail; it looked a lot closer. I thought it was 15 or 20 yards away. Turned out to be more Jacob Dingel It would be a shame to miss your shot at the buck of a lifetime, because you didn't sort out the distance before you released your arrow. Gadgets and practice both can help. 56 GAME NEWS