PRACTICING THOSE UGLY SHOTS

Everything is perfect. It’s opening morning of the archery season and
you’re in your stand well before daylight. You’ve scouted out your hunting
area and have pinpointed a couple shooter bucks in the vicinity. You’ve
been practicing with your bow all summer and your sights and shooting form
are perfectly tuned. You’ve cleared several shooting lanes and have your
yardage memorized. The wind direction is ideal. You have successfully
identified and overcome all variables in your hunt.

Or have you?

One BIG variable that we have to deal with in hunting whitetails are the
whitetails themselves.

For a period of eight years, I was an umpire with the Amateur Softball
Association. Thinking to start us out on easy games, new umpires were
assigned to youth female leagues….I’m talking 8 to 10 year-old girls here.
As a player and new umpire, you should be able to anticipate how a play is
going to unfold even before it takes place. With one out and a runner on
first, a ground ball hit to the shortstop SHOULD be flipped to the second
baseman who SHOULD be covering the bag who SHOULD in turn throw to first
for what SHOULD be the third out. Being able to anticipate the play allows
an umpire to be in the proper position to make all the calls in a single
umpire game.

But I’ll tell you what….those youth female softball teams ate me up. The
ball was seldom thrown to the base you’d expect. A grounder to the third
baseman with runners on first and second could literally be thrown to any
base…and sometimes to no base at all. Runners would run or not run to the
next base depending on how they felt at that moment. I would see right
fielders covering second base on an infield hit. And there were usually
four or five defensive players trying to make a play on the ball at the
same time. I would find myself desperately trying to be in the right place
at the right time to make the right call.

Deer are like those youth softball players…..they don’t always do what you
expect them to do so being in the right place at the right time to make the
right shot becomes a challenge.

That perfect hunting scenario I previously mentioned can be thrown all out
of whack if that buck decides to come near your stand from a direction or
angle you did not expect. And in order to get a good shot at him, you must
now stoop down slightly to aim under a branch, twist your body around
because he came in from behind you, or my most uncomfortable situation….he
comes in from my right side and I’m a right-handed shooter.

We have to be prepared to make these kinds of ugly and awkward shots BEFORE
they are presented to us in real-life hunting situations. And the only way
to do that is to practice them at home in our backyard during the summer.

Too often, archers practice on level ground and flat-footed. You will be
surprised at how few deer you will shoot at on level ground and
flat-footed.

We can’t possibly eliminate all the variables when hunting
whitetails….thank goodness! But practicing those unorthodox shots from
nearly impossible positions will give you greater confidence to make them
when that buck shows up in a location you didn’t expect.

The Perfect Plan

I remember my high school basketball coach hastily drawing out a special
play on his clipboard as we huddled around him during a time-out. His X’s
and O’s were placed exactly where he wanted them and his lines of movement,
screens, and ball passing arrows were precise. These “special” plays
usually occurred towards the end of the game with mere seconds remaining
and the outcome still in question.

And things weren’t calm in that little huddle.

The crowd was screaming, the cheerleaders were pumping everyone up, the
coach was yelling to be heard and to make his point, and we were sweating,
trying to catch our breath, and remember our assignments. Did I mention the
cheerleaders?

On paper, that plan seemed to be the perfect play. All we had to do was
execute it.

However, there is a lot that can go wrong between the conception of a plan
and the execution of it. Sometimes, the play worked to perfection. But
sometimes, things didn’t work out so well. And it usually stemmed from the
fact that the defensive players were never where they were supposed to be.
They were never shown that clipboard.

As archery hunters, our goal is to place ourselves within comfortable bow
range of an unsuspecting deer. We pour over maps, scout feeding and bedding
areas, look for funnels along travel routes, and practice long hours with
our equipment. When we find just the right setup, we think we have a
perfect plan. Now all we have to do is execute it. The problem is….the deer
are not privy to our plans….they haven’t seen our clipboard.

We’ve all experienced having deer come from a direction that we were
totally not prepared for. A number of years ago, I was in a stand and had
ranged three-quarters of the area around me. I didn’t bother with the one
quadrant because I KNEW the deer were not going to come in from that
direction. Wanna take a guess on what direction they DID came from?

We all should have a game plan in place well before we hit the woods. But
don’t plan things so narrowly that you have no room to make adjustments.
For example, I already know the exact tree I’ll be hunting out of on
opening day. However, if the wind isn’t just right that morning, I already
have alternate stand locations ready to go.

The perfect plan should not be set in stone. Rather, it should be a
“template” or “flowchart” that provides several options for varying
circumstances. As Captain Barbosa said about the pirate’s code in “Pirates
of the Caribbean”…”they’re more like guidelines”.

But having those “guidelines” when crunch-time arrives will give you the
confidence that your plan is a good one and that you will be successful.