I breathe in. I draw back. The tick-tick-tick of my pulse sounds in my ear. Shhp! Thwack!
There's a little bit of satisfaction I get each time I put my arrow in the center dot on my already-worn block target. Hitting at about 20 yards is about all I do well at this early stage when it comes to firing the bow, but each good shot builds my confidence and puts me closer to September -- and time in the stand.
Having purchased my bow late April, I'd say I'm about as green as a spike buck when it comes to bow hunting and archery. I'm drowning in a sea of catalogues full of arrows, accessories, camo and cover scents, trying to separate the gimmicks from the must-haves. I know the answer to part of the game will be having an accurate shot, but the majority of the challenge will remain a mystery until this fall, when I pit my tracking and stealth against the deer I pursue.
At 6'2" and 190 pounds, I'm not the smallest package. With overactive sweat glands, I'm not the most scent-free object in the woods. With my caffeine addiction, the resulting super-fidgetiness and my apparent inability to sit still 15 feet up in a tree, I'll be amazed if the deer don't spot me from 100 yards away. All of these factors are the primary challenges I will have to overcome if I want to be successful.
But, for now, I spend at least four days a week in the backyard, shooting 30 to 50 arrows, hoping to be ready for bow season this fall. Throughout target practice, I pretend the stationary foam block is a living, breathing creature and my draw must be smooth, quiet and held firm until the pin lines up with the target.
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The weather over the last two months also has helped prepare me for fall hunting, because the varied and often chilly patterns that have blasted the upper Midwest have been less like May and June and more like September and October.
One morning, as I stared down the arrow block at 30 yards, mist fell around me, my hands turned red and the mercury read 33 degrees on the garage thermometer. The very next afternoon, it was 68 degrees and I was nearly carried off by a horde of vulture-sized mosquitoes. Their ceaseless buzzing in the humid air reminded me to add "not swatting on stand" to the list of early-fall challenges I will face in the woods. If anything, the unstable weather during these practice sessions has given me a glimpse of the variety of conditions I will face.
Reading, shooting and asking questions of local bow hunters have become summer activities as regular as fishing and boating. Friends and referrals are quick to dole out advice regarding practice exercises, camo patterns and finding the right stand. The bow-hunting community at large has been very welcoming, in part because of the apparent need to share the rush that is so often described by each person I talk to or chat with on the Internet.
"When you take your first shot at a deer under your stand, you'll see what I mean," said one bow hunter with nearly 30 seasons under his belt.
"I still remember the way my heart pounded when I arrowed my first," he continued.
This weekend, I took a quick trip into the woods behind my father-in-law's house to the clearing I cleaned up last fall. The wild raspberries and strawberries were already beginning to spring up and the clover was spreading out amid the grasses that pulled in the rays of sun so uncommon this spring. In the middle of the opening, a depressed patch of grass was a sure sign that a deer had bedded down in that area recently. My heart rate elevated at the sight and I wondered aloud to the swaying aspens if its pounding would give me away this fall when a deer walked out in front of me in my first season of bow hunting ... in our outdoors.
Eveleth's Nick Simonson is an avid multi-species angler and a hunter. He has been writing a weekly column for more than eight years, but is making his debut in the Budgeteer News this summer. Find out more about Nick at www.nicksimonson.com .
