Barebow Hunter: The Atypical Tree Hugger

Hello,

Let me first introduce myself. My name is Harmon Carson. I am from a speck of earth in northwest Louisiana known as Elm Grove. I grew up on a farm 20 miles from the nearest suburbia; completely surrounded by woods, and bayous, and all the flora and fauna a country-hearted boy could stand to grow up on. Needless to say, I became an avid outdoorsman at an early age.

My dad taught me to hunt very early on and I took to it like a stank on a boar hog. It wasn’t long before I was reeking havoc on any and all local wildlife. Unlike most boys of my age who were getting arthritis in their thumbs by age 9 due to video gaming, I spent more time in the woods than I did at my own home. My poor mother can attest to this fact from days of my leaving close to daybreak with fishing pole in one hand and a trusted gun in the other hand, not to be seen for hours on end until she worriedly would honk the car horn for me to come home and check in. During these long days alone in the woods, I became ever increasingly more knowledgeable of local animal life and behavior. I did this, much out of curiosity of the simplicity of life in the wild, and also out of a desire to become a better hunter/woodsman. If I knew animals, I could know where to find them, how to outsmart them, and how to do this well.

I shall take a small break here to introduce a role model that impacted my life early on and who, to this day, I still find myself longing to become more like. This is not the typical “hero” of a father, or grand dad that most young boys want to be (not to say that my own father and grandpa, did not and do not hold such standing with me, for they certainly do) however, this hero was introduced to me through Walt Disney…This hero’s name is Robin Hood. I remember being enchanted by the wiley, cunning archer who always outfoxed and overcame those who opposed him through sheer skill of stick and string and through a simplistic common sense knowledge that came from experience alone. I wanted to be this guy. I wanted to be Robin Hood. I remember in my boyhood fantasies, disappearing into the woods before my house (my own personal Sherwood Forest) searching for the perfect sapling that would soon be cut down, whittled and fashioned to become my mystical bow. The string, of course, was stolen from among my mother’s sewing kit. Once I had my trusty bow in hand and a quiver of arrows I had devised from young tree branches, I was ready for battle. I conquered every hay bale army and woodpile castle I came across. Yes, I was the embodiment of Robin Hood. Fierce, skillful, cunning….

This boyhood desire to become a skillful archer like the Sherwood Prince, quickly escalated as I was given a real bow and arrows from my dad. To be honest, I do not remember when I was first given a bow. I only remember having/shooting a bow for as far back as I can remember. In fact, there are pictures of me at age 3 sleeping with a bow in my hands. Were my parents too lenient in this? Nonsense. They were making dreams come true. My skill as an archer and passion for the sport grew every day, and I changed from one bow to the next I as I progressively became stronger and outgrew the bows of my childhood. When I turned 12, I was given a compound bow with which I could hunt. I practiced, as usual, religiously.. But not with the imagination of my former self, with visions of charging armies and armored castles to defeat. I envisioned the white-tailed deer I had spent so much time studying in all of my early woodland adventures. Here.. at age 12.. I became a bowhunter..a different type of “tree hugger”.

Most southern bowhunters hunt from tree stands hung hidden among the branches of a tree, 20ft off the ground, to give ample natural camouflage to disguise the waiting hunter. I was no different. I learned to hunt from a tree in the beginning. Determining the best ambush location after studying the game and surrounding area. Sitting in wait, far above the forest floor, in a stand that hugged the trunk of a giant oak and anticipating what wildlife would be observed whether deer, squirrel, turkey, or wild hog. After a very few encounters while on the bow stand, I learned a valuable and intriguing concept.. Bowhunters are not merely spectators of the world given to us by our Lord and Maker. We are partakers in the dance He has choreographed among flora and fauna. Bow hunting is an intimate sport, in which skill, cunning, knowledge, and a very healthy respect come together to portray a beautiful masterpiece we have all been granted a chance to be apart of. In my long hours high in the gnarly, twisted limbs of ancient oaks, I came to a realization that bowhunters are a blessed group.. privy to subtle nuances Mother Nature has to offer, if we will only take the time to observe, drink up, and enjoy.

My dad has been hunting Colorado for over 30yrs and I have been privileged to tag along nearly every year since the age of two. These annual hunting trips were our family vacation. You must be 12yrs old to legally bowhunt in Colorado, so until I reached that golden age, I spent the days hunting flies, and grasshoppers with my slingshot and blowgun, all the while anticipating dad’s return to camp that hopefully led to me following a bloodtrail with him through the mountains to an arrowed mule deer. My first bowhunt at the age of 12 was for mule deer in Colorado. I killed my first deer, a Louisiana whitetail, at the age of 13 and by 15 I already had numerous deer and a young bull elk under my belt with a bow. The last year I ever carried a gun to the woods for big game was the year I turned 16. Eight years of hunting strictly with my compound bow ensued, but the desire to get back to my Robin Hood roots became ever stronger. I made the switch to hunt with a traditional barebow in the 2011. My first year hunting with a recurve I killed a mule deer buck in Colorado and came back to the bayou state where I killed a nice whitetail buck, a doe, and a hog. I would tell anyone who’s looking to start hunting with a barebow, to first learn the bow, but do not neglect learning your target animal. My success with tradgear came due to the years prior where I spent studying the animals and learning to hunt them on their terms with a compound bow. Regardless of your tool, you must learn to hunt and to do that you must learn the animals.

Over the years, I did learn animals..and learned them well. Today, I still spend every spare minute I can squeeze out of a day, deep in the woods trying to learn everything there is to be offered by the world around me. This desire in me for wild places and wild animals has pushed me to hunt in numerous states chasing an array of different species. These long, silent, peaceful hours spent in the most natural theater offered to man, open up a world of creativity, pleasures, thoughts, and inward reflections that few people take time to enjoy and even fewer will take the time to share. With my contributions to this blog, I hope to change that. With each penned, or in this case.. typed word, I hope to open a whole new world and offer a glimpse of views on things that will hopefully be different than the average man brings before you. I hope to bring you creativity, thoughts, and reflections from the heart of a bowhunter.