Pennsylvania Game News - May 2011 - 51

power rifle. He was a flintlock man and to him that was all muzzleloader hunting should be about. A winter black powder season devotee, he didn’t care to hunt with his flintlock in the fall. I respect that, but he should also respect that I do like to hunt the October season, with a gun that has aiming and reloading systems with which I’m more comfortable. Whatever way we choose to fill — or try to fill — our antlerless deer tags is a personal decision. It’s okay to have an almost religious fervor about our favored way to hunt and even try to convert. But we shouldn’t seek to repress. Our squabble ended with an agreement to disagree. We have too much else in common. We both shoot traditional bows; he a longbow and me a recurve. I’m pleased that at my local archery club those with high-tech compound bows share the sport so well with those using stick-and-string bows, and vice versa. This tolerance, even encouragement, extends to crossbows. One of the most avid traditional archers there shot an outdoor 3D round the other day with his crossbow. He uses it as an alternate way to bowhunt, another means of experiencing the “witchery of archery,” as a 19th century book that sparked interest in the sport termed it. I’m thinking about getting a crossbow myself. When crossbows were first proposed for Pennsylvania’s archery deer seasons, I heard concern about how they would fit in. Would archers abandon the handpulled bow and leave in droves for the gun-stocked, pre-cocked crossbow? Would an inordinate number of archery kills,

especially bucks, go to crossbows, possibly endangering bowhunting’s special seasons? What is being discovered is something I thought all along, that whether an archer is using a compound, stick-and-string or crossbow, the hunt is still a bowhunt, with shots at close distances and the game as sharp-eyed, sharp-nosed and skittish as ever. Hunting in any form is never easy, and bowhunting in any form makes a successful kill even harder. Why squabble about it? We do, though. What we hunt with, and when and how long are determined by two factors. One is an assessment of game population objectives and the efficiency of various hunting arms, including bows, to meet those goals. The second consideration is social, providing a variety of recreational hunting opportunities. The decisions of the Game Commission on how to meld the two aspects set our hunting experience and choices each year. Is there a cure for sportsmen’s squabbling? Of course not. Squabbling isn’t a malady. Squabbling is natural to the human animal. As an emotional impulse, it can be controlled, curbed, maybe even directed toward the positive. Why not bat around alternative ways to hunt, debate what we like or don’t like about them, shake up the status quo and hope something better settles out? We can also use the logical part of our brain and acknowledge that “to each his own” remains a good maxim to live, as well as hunt, by. As for myself, I’ve decided that I will play my own game, do the types of the hunting that personally please me most, and let the rest go their own way. 

Cover Painting by Dwight KirKlanD
HE GOBBLED a few times on the roost but now he’s on the ground and headed away from your set-up. You thought you had him figured out and expected he’d fly right down to your decoy. Now you’ve got bigger problems, as he’s got hens with him. Welcome to spring gobbler hunting. You can try to find another gobbler, but there’s a chance if you call sparingly he’ll come looking for the other “hen” once those hens leave him later in the morning. Keep your eyes open and don’t move; he just might sneak in without making a sound.

may 2011

Pennsylvania Game News - May 2011

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Pennsylvania Game News - May 2011