I read one thread on here where someone was talking about a crossbow that they used for hunting, what has been your experience with them? I met this guy in Namibia who uses a crossbow for hunting birds and he was telling me that they worked quite well for that purpose, anyone hunt with the crossbow?
A poachers weapon! ;D in a lot of places you can only legally hunt with one during bow season if you’re handicapped and thus not capable of shooting a bow… not that i really care about whats legal… Havent shot one myself but i know the rate of fire is slower than a bow but its supposed to be super easy to be accurate with one.
Poachers apparently love them because they’re like a silent rifle and they can shoot it at an animal on the side of the road, in a park, or on private property without anyone hearing. Could do the same thing with a bow though it just takes more skill to be good with a bow.
I’ll start out by saying that I have never shot a crossbow so I am open to be corrected if I’m mistaken.
It seems to me that the major advantage of a crossbow over a conventional longbow, recurve or compound is that you can “load” it and draw it and keep it at full draw ready to shoot while you wait for an opportunity. With a conventional bow you must wait until the opportunity presents itself to draw the bow and release. This increases the chances of the prey seeing the movement and escaping before the arrow is released.
Other than that I don’t believe they have a sigificantly greater range or accuracy, the bolts are just as easily deflected by branches or other obstacles and learning to use them safely and accurately is just as important to success.
that was probably me who was hunting with the crossbow.
here are the up’s and downs in my experience:
up’s: they are fun, really easy to use/aim, extremely powerful.
down’s: they are bulky (hard to conceal), it takes too long to reload to get in a second shot effectively, the arrows (or bolts as they are called) are usually 14-16 inches, and with a 150lb firing power, pretty much every time you shoot an arrow and it hits the ground - it is submerged a few feet and pretty much impossible to retrieve. modern crossbows are so powerful it would be hard to build arrows that could withstand such force using natural materials.
i prefer the bow and arrow. not that much harder to learn to use, less powerful, but the arrows are easier to find/make and that is pretty important.
crossbows seem more suited to human combat than hunting non-humans.