I read an article in an old TBM last night. The author stated that only about 2 to 4 % of all traditional bow hunters were successful. When I read that I was kind of floored. I guess because most of what I have seen over the past several years tells a different story. I have about 6 friends that I hang around with regularly that hunt with trad gear. Out of 6 guys, everyone has taken at least one deer already and a few have taken multiple deer. Does that stat in TBM seem a little low? I wonder where he got his numbers? What do you guys think? Am I way off base here?
I'm interested to hear from some others too. I remember a stat once that said only 10 percent of hunters actually harvest deer???But thats a totally different story,,
Average for traditional is the same as for other equipment. About 12% nationally.
I have read that it's arouind 7% for all hunters in Maine---if I remember correctly. Totally believable to me. Tough to see a deer in the daytime here. That's why for decades gun hunters here engaged in well organized drives.
I've seen 2 deer here while afield this year. One I came across whil still hunting and the other was skulking in the brush at the edge of a field just before dark.
I would guess the success rate for traditional archers in Maine is down around 2%--but that IS a guess.
How old was the article? I remember back in the 70's when I first started hunting I saw FAR fewer deer then what I consider 'normal' now. Back then, one area we hunted I was lucky if I saw a deer off in the distance during the course of a weekend. Now I am wondering what's going on if I don't have 8-10 of them that walk directly below my tree each time I go out. 90% of the time I go out I pass up shots. I just like being out there. I could have filled all my tags the first weekend but then what would I do? This year is my first with trad gear since the early 80's and I connected on the only shot I have taken.
I'd say that is a little low. In our Province wide Trad Club we have about 50+ members and I know that at least 8 - 10 guys get critters every year.
Lets let them believe those numbers. Otherwise they will think that we are actually a management tool. ;)
Two thoughts....I would say deer populations are as high as they've ever been, and the success rates would certainly follow that trend. The second thought is the pool of hunters you're looking at, for example, I shoot at a trad club every Thursday..this group of men shoot at least once a week year around and are always improving their technique. This group averages about 30% success in any given deer season and we have all been hunting trad for at least 10 years. Any one of us would say the first 3 or 4 years hunting trad was more luck than know how. I would hazard to guess there's a big number of trad hunters that hunt 1 to 3 seasons and then give up having had no success either in getting a shot or recovering the animal.
jbb, I think the issue was about 2 years old. Maybe I mis-under stood the statistic he was trying to get across.
I am with you on the passes. I have passed up 15 to 20 bucks this year and no telling how many does. I have taken 3 shots this year and connected all three times. One of the other points that he made was compounders and smoke pole users had higher success rates. From my point of view. I have had more opportunities for success because I have had to become a better hunter in order to use my weapon of choice. In other words, I have to get closer, be more stealthy, practice shooting more ect. than the previous lot mentioned. I guess if anything I have been way more successful than when I gun hunted or hunted with a compound. I guess its just another way of viewing things.
I wonder how they measure success rates, anyway. Consider deer for example: is a person 'successful' if they tag one deer in a season? Or if I have 5 tags and fill 1, am I 20% successful?
Well, I'm 0 deer for 2 seasons with my trad gear.
It has nothing to do with the gear. I hunt in an area with low deer population and I just haven't seen many deer to shoot.
There are many factors that could define success or failure that have nothing to do with the gear a hunter uses to take game.
Stat's can be misleading, esp without knowing how the data was gathered and the parameters for processing the data. Even then it can be misleading. :confused:
Some guys I know are hunting for one deer that they have seen and pass up shots on others that could have been taken. Success rates are deceiving IMHO.
Every time I go into the woods my success rate is 100%. :archer:
eagle24, great answer! Last year I saw 2 deer in 3 months. This year I saw 2 and arrowed one of them which was my first ever. I live in NH. Jawge
You can do anything with statistics. Don't forget 'we' are talking about guys that hang out on bowhunter sites, shoot regularly and hunt often, and post even more! LOL.
We likely comprise a tiny percentage of the total bow hunting population; and yeah our numbers will be way different from the general pool.
Yeah, I think there are a lot of casual hunters out there that maybe buy some tags and maybe hunt a weekend or two, or maybe not.
QuoteOriginally posted by Bjorn:
We likely comprise a tiny percentage of the total bow hunting population; and yeah our numbers will be way different from the general pool.
Good point. If I take myself and 4 best trad buddies, we will be 80 to 100% almost every year. Course we are hunting in a state that harvests almost 1/2 million deer annually.
eagle24 that's a good point. we have a pretty good population here in NC too. I guess the more deer you have the better your chances are of harvesting an animal.
I think Mark Twain said:
" There are three kinds of lies. Lies, damn lies and statistics".
I agree with Eagle24. The one statistic I have not seen described is that of the 10-12% success rate, probably half or more of that success is by the same hunters every year. While the remainder is by a larger group of hunters who are occasionally successful.
That statistic is probably correct. I think it seems unbelievable because most of us are heavily involved in bowhunting as are the people we associate with. There are far more "casual bowhunters" out there than there are committed.
The rates vary from state to state. Nebraska is #1 with a 29% success rate. The national average is 11% I was one point high. Graduates of the NBEF course are around 25%. Those numbers carry over into traditional because those who hunt with this equipment tend to be even more committed to hunting.
I don't know where the numbers for the article came from and haven't seen it yet, but I am basing mine on national, state and university studies and statistics. Many of which were used in the WHA battle. Recovery and wounding rates are very similar across the various weapons also. Firearm hunters do have a higher success rate average though not as much higher as one might think.
Leave this one on the PowWow please.
Thanks.
Here is another point to ponder regarding stats. As far as I know, nobody compiling those stats knows I am a traditional bowhunter, nor do they know about any of the deer I have killed.
I am looking at the 2003 Missouri archery statistics right now, it looks like 101,821 permits were sold and 33,526 deer were officially counted. That comes out to about 33% success if you are going by deer / permits sold.
Vermonster-
Are those percentages for all bowhunters combined or just trad bowhunters?
If there is a 25% success rate for NBEF graduates, what percent of those successful are traditional bowhunters? Assuming 10% of those successful were traditional bowhunters, that would give you an overall traditional success rate of 2.5% for those who graduate NBEF. Of course, that doesn't take into account the actual number of traditional archers who graduated vs the number who were successful.
That is the problem with statistics, it just depends on how you do the math. Overall, looking at everyone's statistics and taking the average, an accurate number is probably somewhere between 2%-7% for traditional bowhunters.
It would be interesting to do a survey among this site comparing the success rate with years of experience, amount of practice, and time afield.
The percentage of actual Traditional hunters are even with compound in every study I've ever seen that takes equipment into account. There are approximately 3,000,000 licensed bowhunters in the USA, Traditional equipment hunters make up less than 1% of that total. best of my knowledge. Traditional hunters take the same percentage of animals withing there ranks but are a minute drop in the bucket overall because we are such a small number. I like studies based on individual hunters not tags filled, those tend to be misleading due to the multiple kill hunters.
Vermonster-
If that's accurate, it means close to half of all those who hunt traditional in the country are members of Trad Gang!!!
jbb,
Great info. I emailed the Missouri deer biologist a few years ago asking what the success % for deer with Archery was.
The first year I bought a bow tag (1987) the bowhunter success rate was 8 or 9%. 20 years later there are more bowhunters and over a million deer in the state. GREAT days....
This is my second deer season trad, I'm doing just as well if not better with trad as i was with the wheelie bow. Three deer last season one so far this season. If you put in the time with trad it's as good as the other gear IMHO.
Vermonster13,
I may be wrong, but I belive that those who take the IBEP are 25% more successful than those who don't. I don't think that 1 in 4 of IBEP grads. are successful.
In the mid 90's ,at a large Traditional southern shoot, a poll was taken when you paid your dues if you deer hunted and if you took a deer that season..........Guys ...I think it was over 50% said they got a deer. But that was N.Ga and them boys get after deer for food, clothing and sinew!!
Here in Georgia, there are very few trad guys who don't take a deer. I have no idea what the percentages are but I can pretty much kill a deer everyday right here in the backyard. Most of Georgia is just as rural so I would think the 50% Joey was talking about has to be pretty accurate.
ON THE OTHER HAND...at the same shoot Joey mentioned, we also looked at the scores of the shooters and while the winners shot in the 85% range, over half of those who turned in score cards shot under 30% on a 20 target round.
Definitely regional and certainly varies by game pursued. Would elk success rates be the same as whitetails? No way! Here in Maryland our bowhunting (all) success rate was over 50%!
I would expect traditional success rates to be similar to compound. Basically the same factors (skill, access, time afield, etc.) in the population just a smaller amount of general participants.
The more I think about it, I agree with one statement someone made in an earlier post, something about "casual bowhunters". As far as the stats go, I'll bet there a lot of guys that only bow hunt a few times a year and do not take it very seriously. We have a few of these guys in our archery club. If they are thrown in to the stats it could skew the numbers quite a bit. Out of the five guys I hang around with, everyone takes a deer every year. Now these guys spend a great amount of time scouting, practicing, hangings stands/moving stands, talking about different hunting strategies. We basically eat sleep and live bow hunting. (Most of these guys hunt with trad gear 90% of the time) They really put the time - and the results show it year after year.
QuoteOriginally posted by Biggie Hoffman:
... I can pretty much kill a deer everyday right here in the backyard. ...
Can I book a hunt in your backyard? :biglaugh: :biglaugh:
Having a statistic show a low success rate in not always a bad thing. Having one show a high success rate is not always a good thing. It just depends on what you want to use the statistic for. That is why statistics show very little about the truth.
If I look at just my group, we are 80%-100% year after year, as is the case with many here. However, if I include all the people I know who have hunted trad, or who occassionally hunt trad, my group suddenly becomes a very small number.
If my statistic is based on all who "hunt" or "have hunted" with traditional archery equipment, the success rate will be small.
If my statistic is based on all who "primarily hunt" with traditional archery equipment, the success rate will be quite a bit higher.