Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 534: Foundations - Building a Better Bow, Part 2

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Ep. 534: Foundations - Building a Better Bow, Part 2 · Wired To Hunt Podcast

0:01
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide
0:05
Speaker 1: to the fundamentals of better deer hunting, and now your host,
0:11
Speaker 1: Tony Peterson. Hey everyone, welcome to the wire to Hunt
0:15
Speaker 1: Foundations podcast, which is brought to you by First Light.
0:18
Speaker 1: Today's episode is all about choosing bow accessories, or more specifically, rests, quivers,
0:25
Speaker 1: and stabilizers. Today's topic could be a real snooze fest, folks,
0:39
Speaker 1: so I'm gonna try to keep it as lively as possible.
0:42
Speaker 1: Last week I talked about sites and peep sites, which
0:46
Speaker 1: demands some thought if you want to shoot as well
0:48
Speaker 1: as possible in the woods, and I know you do.
0:51
Speaker 1: Today I'm sort of picking up the scraps to talk
0:54
Speaker 1: about arrow rests, quivers, and stabilizers. These accessories might not
0:59
Speaker 1: seem all that important, and honestly they aren't, except I
1:02
Speaker 1: don't know, sometimes they are. Sometimes the choices we make
1:05
Speaker 1: around these accessories can cost us dear. This is most
1:08
Speaker 1: relevant when we talk about rests, which is what I'm
1:11
Speaker 1: gonna start with. Let's say you started bow hunting. I
1:25
Speaker 1: don't know, in the last decade, you probably only really
1:29
Speaker 1: know about two kinds of rest options drop away style
1:33
Speaker 1: or fall away style, I guess, and a whisker biscuit
1:36
Speaker 1: type of shoot through style. You probably really haven't seen
1:40
Speaker 1: a whole lot of plunge ar rests or any of
1:41
Speaker 1: the other variations of tight to the riser accuracy robbing
1:45
Speaker 1: rest that we had a few decades ago. That's a
1:48
Speaker 1: good thing, actually, unless you're interested in traditional archery, but
1:52
Speaker 1: that's fodder for a different episode. To rest you're likely
1:55
Speaker 1: to see mounted on modern compounds really only fit into
1:58
Speaker 1: the two categories I mentioned. Now, if you start to
2:01
Speaker 1: break those categories down, you realize there are quite a
2:03
Speaker 1: few different variations of each, particularly when it comes to
2:07
Speaker 1: drop away or fall away rests, and these are my
2:10
Speaker 1: favorite for many reasons. But first off, the reason that
2:15
Speaker 1: this style has come to dominate the market in recent
2:17
Speaker 1: years and has won me over is because they are
2:20
Speaker 1: the most accurate, commercially available models out there. The design
2:24
Speaker 1: of a fall away is one that it promotes the
2:27
Speaker 1: least amount of overall contact with your arrow while also
2:30
Speaker 1: guiding the arrow for as long as possible through the
2:32
Speaker 1: shot cycle. See I told you this could be a
2:35
Speaker 1: snooze fest. These rests function mostly through a dropper that
2:39
Speaker 1: is attached to a cable on your bow or maybe
2:42
Speaker 1: your limbs, and when you draw it either raises the
2:45
Speaker 1: rest and sets it in place for the shot or
2:47
Speaker 1: engages the rest that you've already locked into place, so
2:50
Speaker 1: it's ready to go. Now. If your arrest is timed correctly,
2:54
Speaker 1: you'll just take aim, shoot, and while it happens much
2:56
Speaker 1: too fast to see that rest, the part that holds
3:00
Speaker 1: the arrow is going to guide the arrow for much
3:03
Speaker 1: of its length while the string pushes it toward the
3:05
Speaker 1: target or the deer. As your veins get dangerously close
3:08
Speaker 1: to contacting the rest, it drops out of the path
3:11
Speaker 1: and sends your arrow down range without any negative influence. Simple, right, Well,
3:16
Speaker 1: if you don't have it timed correctly, then you might
3:19
Speaker 1: see some wonky arrow flight. You don't want your veins
3:23
Speaker 1: contacting anything, and if they are, you're losing out on accuracy.
3:27
Speaker 1: I don't want to get into too much detail here
3:30
Speaker 1: because I can already envision listeners heads clunking against their
3:33
Speaker 1: work desks, or I don't know the steering wheel of
3:35
Speaker 1: their trucks they spontaneously go to sleep. But I'll say this,
3:39
Speaker 1: try to at least understand what your rest needs to
3:41
Speaker 1: do in order to function properly. A basic understanding of
3:44
Speaker 1: that is important. If you see any tail whips or
3:47
Speaker 1: spiraling during your shot, likely culprit is your rest. Now.
3:52
Speaker 1: It might have something to do with the center shot
3:54
Speaker 1: issue or the timing of your rest, or it might
3:57
Speaker 1: have something to do with your arrow choice. But the
3:59
Speaker 1: rest is a good place to start, and regardless, it's
4:02
Speaker 1: bad news if you have any wonkiness in aero flight,
4:04
Speaker 1: because you know you're sacrificing some accuracy and penetration. Now,
4:09
Speaker 1: all cautionary warnings aside. I love drop away rest and
4:13
Speaker 1: scratch that. I love a full contain at rest that
4:17
Speaker 1: falls away, which means when I'm hunting, my arrow can't
4:20
Speaker 1: go anywhere, even if I fall out of my tree
4:23
Speaker 1: or I decide, like Mark Kenyon occasionally does, to skip
4:26
Speaker 1: or do cartwheels on the way to my stand. This
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Speaker 1: kind of rest ensures that whether I'm shooting behind me
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Speaker 1: from a stand at a weird angle, or I'm crawling
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Speaker 1: through the grass to stock a prairie dwelling white tail,
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Speaker 1: my arrow is always ready to go, and I don't
4:40
Speaker 1: have to worry about holding it with my index finger,
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Speaker 1: even though I impulsively, compulsively do the launcher arms or
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Speaker 1: the prongy looking thing that holds your arrow that should
4:51
Speaker 1: be quiet. Too contained doesn't necessarily mean quiet, And if
4:57
Speaker 1: there is any way for your rest to bounce off
4:59
Speaker 1: a hard plastic arm or the little containment ring or
5:02
Speaker 1: the riser, it's no good. You might also see that
5:06
Speaker 1: these rests can be limb driven, which means the cable
5:09
Speaker 1: that activates the whole thing is not attached to your
5:11
Speaker 1: downward bus cable, but to the limb itself. Now, I've
5:15
Speaker 1: had people who are much smarter than me say that
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Speaker 1: this is the most accurate option out there, and I
5:20
Speaker 1: have no reason to not believe them. And I've used
5:23
Speaker 1: these rests and they were fantastic. But there's one thing
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Speaker 1: I didn't like. I didn't like them when I took
5:29
Speaker 1: my white tail bow on a mule deer antelope hunt,
5:32
Speaker 1: because in a situation where I'm guaranteed to crawl around
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Speaker 1: a lot, I don't like having that much cable on
5:38
Speaker 1: the side of my boat. It's ripe to get caught
5:41
Speaker 1: on brush and just creates the potential for an infield issue.
5:44
Speaker 1: I don't like that. Now, keep in mind that never
5:47
Speaker 1: actually happened to me, but it is possible. It's also
5:51
Speaker 1: possible if you hunt out a stands and blinds exclusively,
5:54
Speaker 1: that that might not ever be a concern of yours.
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Speaker 1: With whatever style you choose, keep in mind that over
6:00
Speaker 1: time things can change. If the cables of your bow
6:04
Speaker 1: stretch a little over the years, the timing of your
6:06
Speaker 1: rest could change, and that's bad. The springs and internal
6:10
Speaker 1: workings of arrest can wear out as well, which is
6:12
Speaker 1: something I had to happened to me a few years ago.
6:15
Speaker 1: It really wasn't all that noticeable in my backyard when
6:17
Speaker 1: I was shooting in August, but became pretty obvious later
6:21
Speaker 1: in the season when it got really cold. These drop
6:23
Speaker 1: away follow eight style rests. They have moving parts, and
6:27
Speaker 1: we all know moving parts can fail. Those moving parts
6:30
Speaker 1: can also cause noise, which is something to think about.
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Speaker 1: Your rest Slamming into your bowshelf when you shoot will
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Speaker 1: make some noise if that's how you have it set up.
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Speaker 1: A little mole skin or a rubber pad will help
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Speaker 1: you there, but also make sure that you're not getting
6:43
Speaker 1: any bounce back with your launcher arm. If you are,
6:46
Speaker 1: it'll interfere with your veins and cause yep, you guessed
6:49
Speaker 1: it a bit of wonkiness in your arrow flight. Now
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Speaker 1: I'm focusing mostly on what can go wrong. Modern rests
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Speaker 1: are amazing and will mostly fun action amazingly well, provided
7:02
Speaker 1: you set them up correctly and you keep tabs on them.
7:04
Speaker 1: Over the years, I really think as far as helping
7:07
Speaker 1: most folks level up their accuracy, drop away rests have
7:11
Speaker 1: been a silent hero for years now. Of course, not
7:15
Speaker 1: everyone wants moving parts and the price tag that often
7:18
Speaker 1: comes with a drop away rest. This leaves the static
7:21
Speaker 1: shoot through style, which is usually called a whisker biscuit.
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Speaker 1: Even though that's a brand name, it's also the most
7:28
Speaker 1: popular in the category by far, so the brand name
7:31
Speaker 1: has become ubiquitous for the category, kind of like band aid. Now.
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Speaker 1: I don't like this style, but that's just me. I
7:39
Speaker 1: think they are a great option for a lot of people,
7:41
Speaker 1: particularly for white tail hunters. Not only are these rests
7:45
Speaker 1: super easy to tune, they're genuinely very quiet and extremely
7:49
Speaker 1: unlikely to fail. They're also usually pretty cheap, so it's
7:53
Speaker 1: not to love. Well. You're guaranteed to have vain contact
7:58
Speaker 1: on every shot as your aero pass us through the
8:00
Speaker 1: whiskers for the I don't know, sub forty yard crowd.
8:04
Speaker 1: It's probably not really much of an issue. You can
8:06
Speaker 1: shoot tight groups with these rests, but that contact comes
8:11
Speaker 1: with some potential for less than perfect aeroflight and also
8:15
Speaker 1: the continual degradation of vain integrity if you shoot enough. Now,
8:20
Speaker 1: this can come into play in years and years and
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Speaker 1: years of practice, especially if you're not shooting new arrows
8:26
Speaker 1: every year. Now you're also over enough shots wearing out
8:31
Speaker 1: the integrity of the whiskers as well. I don't like
8:34
Speaker 1: that personally, but you might, and that's perfectly fine. If
8:39
Speaker 1: you don't shoot thousands of practice shots a year, or
8:42
Speaker 1: you're just a minimalist at heart, A biscuit style rest
8:46
Speaker 1: could be just what the doctor ordered. It also, i
8:49
Speaker 1: might add, is an excellent option for new shooters now.
8:53
Speaker 1: I bought my daughters their first compound bowl last Christmas,
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Speaker 1: and you can bet your ass it has a whisker
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Speaker 1: biscuit on it. I want them to think about their
9:01
Speaker 1: form and how they aim, and that's it. I don't
9:05
Speaker 1: want them to have to think about anything else, so
9:07
Speaker 1: that rest style is an excellent option for them. Now.
9:12
Speaker 1: I don't even want to say this, but I will.
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Speaker 1: If you're going rest shopping. Understand that price is roughly
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Speaker 1: correlated to quality. Those whisker biscuit style rests are cheap ish,
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Speaker 1: and that's great, But if you're looking at drop away
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Speaker 1: or fallaway rests, a forty version is not going to
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Speaker 1: be the same thing as a hundred and fifty dollar model.
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Speaker 1: There will be a sacrifice there in materials and build
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Speaker 1: quality most likely. And one thing you do not want
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Speaker 1: to have fail is your rest because that sucks a lot.
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Speaker 1: Now you might think, well, shoot, how am I supposed
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Speaker 1: to afford a high end rest and all the other
9:46
Speaker 1: accessories I need in my boat? Now this is gonna
9:49
Speaker 1: be wildly unpopular, but you could save money by not
9:53
Speaker 1: buying something like I don't know a stabilizer. If you
9:56
Speaker 1: pay attention to my hunting rigs, and I highly doubt
9:58
Speaker 1: you do, you see that I rarely run a stabilizer
10:02
Speaker 1: on my hunting bows. And here's why. A stabilizer, in
10:06
Speaker 1: its truest form, it's designed to help you stabilize the bow.
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Speaker 1: Consistency from shot to shot is what makes great archers.
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Speaker 1: And one way to encourage that is to hang a
10:16
Speaker 1: bunch of weight off the front of your riser to
10:18
Speaker 1: counter the weight behind it and on the sides. When
10:21
Speaker 1: you turn on the Olympics or some other high level
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Speaker 1: archery contests, you can see how seriously pro shooters take
10:26
Speaker 1: their stabilizers. They'll have front mounted stabilizers of very specific
10:30
Speaker 1: weights and rear mounted stabilizers of very specific weights. You
10:34
Speaker 1: occasionally also see a Western bow hunter with smaller versions
10:38
Speaker 1: of each, but most whitetail hunters have a short light
10:42
Speaker 1: stabilizer that looks nothing like the PROS version. It also
10:46
Speaker 1: functions nothing like the PROS version because it's not long
10:50
Speaker 1: enough or not heavy enough. Both Our hunting versions of
10:54
Speaker 1: stabilizers are almost entirely meant to damp and shot vibration.
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Speaker 1: This is worth it for some folks because who doesn't
11:02
Speaker 1: want to whisper quiet bow? If you hunt kg white tails,
11:07
Speaker 1: shot noises a factor. A foeign stabilizer that weighs six
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Speaker 1: ounces isn't really going to help you balance your bow
11:13
Speaker 1: a whole lot and make you a better shooter, but
11:16
Speaker 1: it could definitely soak up some of the vibration during
11:18
Speaker 1: your shot and keep the sound down. That's a benefit,
11:21
Speaker 1: and it's not nothing. But as far as accuracy, I
11:25
Speaker 1: don't know, man And if you don't believe that it's
11:29
Speaker 1: pretty easy to test out shoot some groups with a
11:32
Speaker 1: stabilizer on shoot some groups to the stabilizer off shoot
11:36
Speaker 1: as far as you'd like, if possible, well beyond your
11:39
Speaker 1: normal white tail shooting ranges. Maybe you'll see a difference
11:42
Speaker 1: in the tightness of your groups, but you probably won't.
11:45
Speaker 1: In fact, if it's windy, you might actually see a
11:47
Speaker 1: little bit better groups without the stabilizer at twenty or
11:50
Speaker 1: thirty yards. I bet good money that almost every white
11:53
Speaker 1: tail hunter on the planet won't notice a bit of
11:55
Speaker 1: difference in accuracy after having removed a hunting stabilizer. Now,
12:00
Speaker 1: I know you're thinking that stabilizers have to make a
12:02
Speaker 1: difference because everyone uses them. I know Mark thinks that
12:05
Speaker 1: because I had this conversation with him once and he
12:07
Speaker 1: looked at me like I just told him that I
12:09
Speaker 1: thought maybe I might give up bow hunting to try
12:11
Speaker 1: a new career in cage fighting. But you can test
12:14
Speaker 1: this out and see for yourself. So look at hunting
12:17
Speaker 1: stabilizers this way. They probably really aren't doing you much
12:20
Speaker 1: good for accuracy, but that's okay. If you want the
12:23
Speaker 1: benefits of a quieter bow, they are here for you,
12:27
Speaker 1: and they might just offer a psychological boost, which is
12:29
Speaker 1: good enough for some folks. Now, this last category of
12:33
Speaker 1: accessories is one worth thinking about. Quivers. This one is
12:37
Speaker 1: kind of an afterthought for most white tail hunters, but
12:40
Speaker 1: it really shouldn't be. There are quite a few considerations
12:43
Speaker 1: with quivers, and that starts with how many arrows they
12:46
Speaker 1: can hold. Now, I'll never forget hunting elk. With my
12:49
Speaker 1: buddy Jayson Bosserman, who happens to be a fellow outdoor writer,
12:53
Speaker 1: we were taking a coffee break on the side of
12:55
Speaker 1: a mountain in southern Colorado, waiting for divine intervention to
12:58
Speaker 1: make the elk do something. Besides how I did not bugle.
13:01
Speaker 1: When I looked down at his bow, he had three
13:04
Speaker 1: arrows in a three arrow quiver. That was it. I
13:08
Speaker 1: looked at my bow and I had twice as many arrows.
13:11
Speaker 1: If that tells you anything about his confidence versus mine, Oh,
13:14
Speaker 1: there you go. I've had some colossal meltdowns in the woods,
13:18
Speaker 1: and I've emptied full quivers without much to show for
13:21
Speaker 1: it but a bunch of embarrassment. While it has been
13:23
Speaker 1: a while since that has happened, those situations leave a
13:26
Speaker 1: mark on you. You You don't forget him. Most of mine
13:30
Speaker 1: involves some level of fall turkeys and deer, or just
13:33
Speaker 1: spring turkeys. But either way, emptying your magazine, so to speak,
13:36
Speaker 1: isn't a great feeling, so I opt for being able
13:39
Speaker 1: to carry a decent amount of AMMO. Three arrows would
13:42
Speaker 1: probably cover me for seven percent of every hunt I'll
13:45
Speaker 1: ever go on for the rest of my life. But
13:48
Speaker 1: that little sliver of a chance that it won't doesn't
13:51
Speaker 1: make me feel so good, so I go a little
13:54
Speaker 1: bigger just in case. This also allows for more options
13:58
Speaker 1: if for some reason you want to have an arrow
14:00
Speaker 1: with you that is fitted with a field point or
14:01
Speaker 1: a small game head, or if for some reason, which
14:05
Speaker 1: some people do, you wanted to carry both fixed and
14:07
Speaker 1: mechanical broadheads. But here's the thing. The more arrows you
14:12
Speaker 1: hang on the side of your bow, and the more
14:14
Speaker 1: materials needed to create a quiver that can hold them,
14:18
Speaker 1: it means more weight, and more weight on the side
14:20
Speaker 1: of your bow means the chance to can't your rig
14:23
Speaker 1: ever so slightly if you shoot with your quiver on.
14:26
Speaker 1: And if you do, consider that, and consider opting for
14:29
Speaker 1: either a one or a two piece option that mounts
14:31
Speaker 1: tight to your riser to help preserve some balance. Now,
14:35
Speaker 1: on that note, I personally always choose a one piece
14:39
Speaker 1: quiver for a simple reason. I like taking it off
14:42
Speaker 1: my boat. When I started out, this wasn't an option,
14:46
Speaker 1: and we didn't even think about it. We just always
14:48
Speaker 1: shot with a quiver on our bows. When it finally
14:51
Speaker 1: became an option, I couldn't believe how much more I
14:53
Speaker 1: like target shooting and hunting without a quiver on my bow. Now,
14:58
Speaker 1: if this doesn't seem like a big deal a again,
15:00
Speaker 1: go back outside, put a fully loaded quiver on your bow,
15:04
Speaker 1: and go shoot when the wind is blowing like I
15:06
Speaker 1: don't know, thirty mile, shoot around at whatever distance you want,
15:11
Speaker 1: and then take your quiver off. Shoot another round. You'll
15:15
Speaker 1: notice a difference in accuracy, I bet, and you'll notice
15:18
Speaker 1: how much different it is to hold your bow steady
15:21
Speaker 1: quiver on versus quiver off. In a white tailed woods.
15:25
Speaker 1: You might not experience those conditions very often, not like
15:28
Speaker 1: you will I don't know stalking mule deer on the planes,
15:31
Speaker 1: for example, but they do happen. They often happen during
15:35
Speaker 1: pre and post frontal conditions, like the kind of weather
15:38
Speaker 1: that sometimes gets deer out and really moving. How easily
15:42
Speaker 1: and silently a quiver can be removed is an important consideration.
15:47
Speaker 1: How tight the arrow grippers are is as well. This
15:50
Speaker 1: is a hard one to test in the store when
15:51
Speaker 1: you're looking at a whole bunch of quivers, but it's important,
15:54
Speaker 1: particularly if you shoot micro diameter arrows. Most quivers can
15:58
Speaker 1: handle them, but not all of him handle them very well.
16:01
Speaker 1: And believe me, you don't want to quiver where your
16:03
Speaker 1: arrows will slip out and fall only to be caught
16:05
Speaker 1: by the broadhead. This is not good. You also don't
16:09
Speaker 1: want your arrows grips so tight that they are pain
16:11
Speaker 1: to get out, because when you miss or hit a
16:13
Speaker 1: deer poorly and you have an opportunity for a follow
16:16
Speaker 1: up shot, you don't want to have to wrestle with
16:19
Speaker 1: your quiver, which will be loosely hanging off a gear hook.
16:22
Speaker 1: Most likely, you want to quiver that holds an arrow
16:25
Speaker 1: tight enough so it don't come loose while you're hunting,
16:28
Speaker 1: but not so tight that you have to get two
16:30
Speaker 1: hands fully involved to free your next arrow. Also, as
16:34
Speaker 1: a parting thought that pertains to every accessory choice in
16:37
Speaker 1: modern bows in general, it's a good idea to understand,
16:41
Speaker 1: at least at a base level, how these things function.
16:44
Speaker 1: This way, if you need to do an infield fix
16:47
Speaker 1: on something, you might be able to do that. I
16:50
Speaker 1: carry a set of Alan wrenches in my truck all
16:52
Speaker 1: season long, just in case something comes loose or I
16:54
Speaker 1: need to swap an accessory out one of the primary spots.
16:58
Speaker 1: Will you experience some shot noise when you least expect
17:01
Speaker 1: it is with loose bolts and screws. This can also
17:04
Speaker 1: lead to bigger issues like busted draw stops when you're
17:07
Speaker 1: aiming at a nice buck, slurping some pond water on
17:09
Speaker 1: public land in South Dakota, and for a totally random example,
17:15
Speaker 1: tighten up those bolts have a chance to work on
17:17
Speaker 1: your bow if you need to in the field. Just
17:19
Speaker 1: a little bit, just those simple fixes and understand your
17:22
Speaker 1: accessory choice, and you'll be way better off. Okay, that's
17:27
Speaker 1: what I got for you this week. We ate our
17:30
Speaker 1: vegetables the last two weeks and we were responsible bow hunters.
17:33
Speaker 1: Next week, I'm going to start talking about putting those
17:36
Speaker 1: accessories to good use throughout the summer and mixing a
17:39
Speaker 1: little bit of good stuff for the gun hunters in
17:41
Speaker 1: the audience as always thank you so much for listening
17:45
Speaker 1: to the Wire to Hunt Foundations podcast, which is brought
17:48
Speaker 1: to you by First Light. I'm your host, Tony Peterson.
17:51
Speaker 1: If you want to read some of my articles or
17:52
Speaker 1: articles from quite a few really talented white tail hunters,
17:56
Speaker 1: head on over to them eater dot com, slash wired,
17:59
Speaker 1: and if that's not enough, go to our wire to
18:02
Speaker 1: Hunt YouTube channel and check out the how to videos
18:05
Speaker 1: we drop every single week. M