Scooter

OK guys... Being from the northeast I never needed anything longer than a 40yd pin... That meant the 3 pin sight that came on my bow was good enough. Well, I'm in AZ now- and to get a shot at 40 yards would be a blessing! I shifted my 3 pins around so that I'm good out to 55, but I am capable, confident and want to shoot longer than that. I saw a good deal online and I now have a 5 pin sight. My question is: What yardage do you set your pins at to gain maximum distance without leaving too much of a yardage gap requiring hold over/under??? I was thinking of setting them at 25, 35, 45, 55, and 70... What do you think???

Aka, you're probably on big water up north... Right?

Federal Law says that no Federal Government entity/agency can establish a record of legally owned firearms... (FOPA 1986) States reserve the right to do what they want to with Gun laws- so as long as your serial # was not transferred and kept by any Federal agencies, it can stay in the report. Like many others have said- it's grey area whether or not PC was established to run the number. I think that if one of my guns was stolen, and it was found through a check during a traffic stop- I would be pretty happy that the cops were doing such a thorough investigation. I would just politely make sure the officer was aware that it was illegal to transfer my serial # to any Federal registry though...

This scenario almost happened to me this year on my September Archery hunt up in 22... Although help wasn't that far away from where the truck was, the blind was really far away from the truck over some nasty steep hilly rocky country! I was pulling the tent stakes off of the corners of the blind and a rattler lashed out at my hand as I was reaching down. No warning. All I heard was the strike hiss. He missed somehow and I jumped about 18 feet in the air (it seemed). It then started to come out of the juniper after me as I was backing (stumbling and swearing) away so I had to do what I had to do. I kept thinking afterwards that I really didn't think about the escape/resuce plan and that would become part of any hunt I go on in the future.

The M77 hawkeye is just a gun that you buy on the spot if you get a good deal. Forgot to ask if you are a reloader or not... If so the 25-06 will serve you pretty well, but it is a niche caliber designed for deer sized game

I have yet to see a human being who has the money and time to get those stupid 55gr 30-06 sabots to work.

Great deer gun, and it will kill varmints deader than dead- but the hides will probably suffer from that .257 round cooking 3000+. As for 600-700 yards??? Yes, it will travel that far and have enough oomph to knock a deer down- but I don't know enough about handloading for that specific caliber to tell you for sure. All I can tell you is that there are lots of environmental factors working against a relatively light bullet in the 25-06. It was originally designed to get a better BC with mild recoil over the 30-06. That being said- the availability of .257 75gr bullets sounds like a very attractive option for handling coyote-sized critters pushing 3200fps. Then you could go bigger with a 117gr for the deer...

Got 'em!!! Great job!

while we're on the subject... does anyone else's wounds burn bad after you get stuck or am I just allergic to plant-based puncture wounds???

I ususally wear something orange. If I know there's other hunters in the area, I put on a hat and a vest. Not a big bright upland-type vest, just a cheap one I picked up years ago... My goal is to have fun and come home safe every time.

Been lost before- luckily it was back home in Western New York and you can't walk far enough in any single direction and not run into civilization of some sort. I just walked in a straight line (or so I thought) and ended up on a road, got picked up by a guy on a tractor hauling hay and he drove me back to where I started which turned out to be about 2 miles away!

yeah shin daggers suck. There's tons of it where I hunt Javi's

hmmm. I vote that this is nothing but an elaborate ruse. That lady sounds nothing like somebody who's from Fargo, ND. Plus, months ago this story came out from a newspaper article- from a different place than this caller was from. This example is fake- but I agree that the world is in trouble because this could actually be real given the IQ of some people these days. Please... AZGFD- Please amend the rules so that we hunters can use bait for a new season on the clinically-diagnosed extremely stupid people out there.

Went to a spot that was historically good and didn't get any to come in. My home made E-caller wasn't working so I had to use the Flextone Mimic. Got a whole bunch of 'yotes worked up but they were really far away and not interested in closing the gap.

Lots of stories from local hikers, runners, and mountain bikers of some active critters lately... I decided I'm gonna drag out the call and guns tomorrow morning just to try and thin out the pack. Wish me luck!

"All the advances in hunting technology over the years has been ours. The deer's knowledge is the same as it always has been." -Average American Great post, and you're right- we will never all agree unanimously on issues like baiting. The excerpt from your post that I copied and pasted above is one I would like to discuss. A deer's knowledge is not at all what it has always been. Because we humans advance in technology we humans have increased a deer's knowledge ten-fold. How many times have hunters been busted in a treestand because the deer are looking up? That's something they learned from our technology. Why do they go nocturnal? They are reacting to our presence in the woods. Why do we have to brush in our ground blinds so well? Why do we have to conceal our scent to get close? Deer have a superior "technological" advantage to begin with. They see better, hear better, have the ultimate nose, they're faster than us, they withstand inclimate weather and temperatures better than us, they have better camoflage than us, and they move most times without making a sound. You can use all the modern technology in the world and still eat tag soup every year. The minute that a certain human technology guarantees 100% success on deer is the day that a law should be passed. Now... Do I use bait? Nope. But I would not like to see those that do on their own private property lose that ability. The compromise in my mind would be to eliminate baiting strictly on public property. Private Property is a place where a bait ban would seem like a severe overreach.

So I posted a few days ago about a new 5 pin sight that I mounted on my bow. Seems like a minor change, and shouldn't make too many waves right? Well it wouldn't have if I didn't get the "tinkering bug" and change out to a tubeless peep sight, installed slip-jax and re-fletched all of my arrows with Quik-Spins... Now I feel like I'm starting with a brand new bow that I have very little confidence in! What's worse is that I can see some torque problems in the arrow flight that were not present before I made the changes. Nothing like re-teaching yourself basic form... To top it all off, I shot the 2013 PSE X-Force DNA at my local shop on demo day and I can see just how much slower my 2009 Browning Verado really is... and it's practically BRAND NEW!!! If I had the money I would have ordered the PSE because it was beautiful!

Heading out again tomorrow morning... I will probably try to get into more of the fawn bleat sequences in hopes of drawing in a lion.

Keep your chin up brother... Anyone tells you they've never missed is either lying or insane.

so it would seem that flipping this idea of banning bait 180 degrees and requiring that all hunters use bait you would get the same result... would it not? more bait/water/salt = less congregation of animals.

Just try to stay away from washes- so many reasons to do that it ain't funny. Lots of 2 and 4 legged creatures like to move along them.

Against my better judgement I put in for Bear, Turkey and Javelina down here... Kinda hoping I pull a Bear tag.

What bullet are you running and how much damage?

Careful, a lot of the older bucks roam under half square mile all summer and fall and then they book outta there for the rut Often time you will see those 3 year old and older bucks bed down under the same tree 2 or 3 times a week I haven't seen it personally, but I believe it... Heck, seems deer always bed somewhere other than the places I'm looking since I got here!

With deer like these, it's difficult to just find one spot and stick to it. They roam pretty free until the rut. That's when they get easier to pattern is what I hear- but I still haven't connected