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