My main concern with archery hunting is the very high possibility 

 of losing an animal. I am not as serious as I should be, as far 

 as practice shooting. I try not to shoot at any animal over 20 

 yds. Therefore I rarely take a shot. I have killed only 1 mule 

 deer doe on a B tag. I have never lost any deer or elk. But the 

 possiblility is there and high. When I have taken a shot and 

 missed, I was lucky enough to miss the animal completly. 

 A slighty miss placed hit and a very poor blood trail or none at 

 all and you will probably lose him. 



I don't want to see an either-or rifle or bow only choice. But 

 it will put only the most responsible archers in the field. 

 I would choose the rifle season. 



Bowhunting is very important to me. But like all types of 

 hunting bowhunting has it's slobs. I would very much like to see 

 a mandintory bowhunter education requirement For All Bowhunters . 

 With no grandfather clause. Because it take time to be a good 

 bowhunter. I would also like to see a preseason cut off date on 

 the sale of archery licenses. 



I dont agree with the idea of kids having to take hunter safty 

 for bow hunting. If they have already taken it for rifle 

 hunting. 



To many spoting game from aircraft. To much poaching. To many 



bow hunters in need of target practice, most do not know the 



limits of the bow. Consequently my range is up to 40 yds. 

 Prefer 30 yds. 



The one most important step the FW & Parks division should take 

 to ensure the future of archery in Montana is to requrie rigid 

 performance requirements for all ages of archery before 

 licensure. This would either controll the numbers of archers, or 

 at least ensure their competency in the field. A large portion 

 of the complaints against archery comes from reports of wounded 

 and unrecovered game, often from archers themselves. This 

 appears to be due to incomplete preparedness on the part of the 

 archer. These people should not be issued licenses. The only 

 way to prevent some of these occurences is to reuqire archers to 

 prove high levels of skill w/ their weapon and hope that their 

 ethics also have reached a high standard. 



I feel that there should be a competency course for both rifle 

 and bowhunters . This would decrease the number of wounded 

 animals and weed out individuals who aren't serious. 



I was appalled at the number of rifle hunters shooting deer and 

 not following them. I tracked several for people opening day 

 near Hysham. One man shot 4 deer and didn't find any of them. I 

 reported it to the Fish and Game. If you are getting at archers 

 wounding elk, I have heard of it happening, all but one case was 



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