: Brian,

: Sorry to hear you've given up the sport, those are some pretty impressive
: archery credentials yer sporting there!!

You should see the boxes of dust collectors...er...I mean trophies...in my attic!

: I shoot a 20 year old Martin Cougar Magnum with an 82# draw weight and about
: 20% letoff. All my friends have moved up to slick new equipment and
: snicker at my old bow but it just seems like part of me.

That's what really matters. Since I'm primarily a finger shooter, I've never been fond of high let-off bows. Unfortunately, the vast majority of offerings on the market are designed for release shooters and they all want to be able to take a nap while at full draw. If you like your old gear, stick with it.

: The only trouble
: I ever had with it was about 6 years ago in the late season I called in a
: large bull moose, I had one too many sweaters on and could only reach
: about 3/4 draw, I just started to laugh out-loud, I'd been bowhunting for
: 20 years and make a rookie mistake like that.

Funny you should mention that, as the first article I wrote for Bowhunting World was about dressing for cold weather shooting. It was geared toward 3D competition, but the principles were still valid for hunting.

: The moose didn't see the
: humor in the situation and made a hasty departure. Hamburger Helper
: doesn't tase all that bad.

Yeah, but moose meat is much better for you!

: Between kayaks I'd like to build a nice, easy to shoot recurve. One of the
: contributors on this board, David Hanson, put me onto some interesting bow
: building sites.

Now that I've spent some time woodworking, that's occured to me as well. There's a local guy who's been building longbows for 15-20 years and I've been tempted to give him a shout. I'm not a longbow kind of guy, but a recurve would be sweet, or even a set of wood/glass/carbon limbs for one of my compound bows. Then again, I have too many other projects as it is.

: I always find it interesting to find out more about the contributors to this
: board, hey, it beats watching sitcoms

It's pretty amazing what you find here.

: Hope building and paddling kayaks is kinder to your back and shoulders.

It's actually GOOD for them. What a concept!

: Take care.

You, too.

Brian