If you’re a bowhunter, you’ve no doubt pulled your bow out of the closet a couple weeks before the season to shoot a few times just to see if you’re still sighted in. You may feel like you’re ready, but are you?
“I don’t think so,” said archery shop owner Brad Ripp. “My belief is that practice is a lot more than that. It’s about shooting your bow and performing those steps so many times that they’re ingrained and it’s no longer a thought process. It becomes second nature.”
In an effort to give local archers a place to practice with their bows, Ripp’s shop, Louisiana Outdoors in Pearl River, offers a Thursday night shoot that cost $10 to shoot as long as you want to. Half that goes toward prize money, and the other half goes into buying targets.
“We also have the Techno Hunt,” Ripp added. “This is a computer-simulated hunting environment where you shoot your own equipment with borrowed blunt tips at a canvas screen. When the arrow hits, the frame freezes and you’re scored on where you hit.”
The interesting thing about using the Techno Hunt to stay in tune with your gear is that the video animals are actually moving. So rather than seeing brown and letting an arrow fly, it forces you to wait for the right shot.
For more information, visit www.louisiana-outdoors.com or call 985-863-5263.
Editor’s Note: This story appears as part of a feature in Louisiana Sportsman’s September issue now on newsstands. To ensure you don’t miss any information-packed issues of the magazine, click here to have each issue delivered right to your mail box.
