Dennis Anderson: For this traditional archer, bow hunting is a shot back in time

MINNEAPOLIS — When Ron Roettger fired an arrow at a black bear some years ago, the animal never knew what hit him. That’s because Roettger was downwind from his unsuspecting quarry when he drew back his longbow and loosed a homemade arrow.

Distance from archer to bruin: 3 yards.

Roettger, 64, of Star Prairie, Wis., about an hour northeast of the Twin Cities, has been shooting traditional style bows since his 12th birthday, when his dad took him to a J.C. Penney outlet and for $20 bought the youngster a Ben Pearson Colt with a 45-pound draw weight.

“As a kid I had a little fiberglass bow that I shot in our backyard,’’ Roettger said. “I’ve always been fascinated with archery.’'

Not just any archery, as it turns out. But what generally is called traditional-style archery, or the use of bows and arrows that resemble the kinds Native Americans used, and before them Indigenous people dating back thousands of years.

No longer in widespread use, recurves and longbows — the two styles generally included in the definition of “traditional’' bows — gave way beginning in the 1960s to the far more popular compound bows.

Not only are compound bows easier for relatively inexperienced archers to shoot accurately at fairly long distances, the bows’ pulley systems enable hunters to hold compound bows at full draw for long moments while waiting for unobstructed shots at game.

Traditional bows, by contrast, are shot “instinctively,’’ meaning bowstrings are drawn back and released almost in one motion. Additionally, unlike compound bows, traditional bows have no sights.

“The keys to shooting a traditional bow include having tuned equipment and a lot of practice so you develop muscle memory,’’ said Roettger, a longtime hunting educator instructor. “Unlike strings on compound bows, which are drawn back and released with mechanical releases, traditional bowstrings are drawn back with fingers, and the anchor point — the place where the drawstring and fingers are held against the archer’s chin or face — has to be the same every time.’’

Relatively few in number, traditional archers often find kindred spirits online, where the Traditional Archery Society and Traditional Bowhunters maintain sites on Facebook.

Throwbacks in many ways, traditional archers are vastly outnumbered not only by compound-bow archers but also by those who deploy crossbows. Last year, nearly 60,000 deer were killed in Wisconsin with crossbows, whose mechanics more closely resemble rifles than traditional style bows.(Forty-three percent of the 24,000 archery-killed deer in Minnesota in 2023 were taken by crossbows.)

Though Roettger has won traditional archery tournaments by hitting targets at 65 yards, he never takes a hunting shot longer than 17 yards.

“And preferably less than that, say 12 to 15 yards,’’ he said. “I step off possible shots before I get into my stand.’’

Roettger has killed 37 deer with a longbow, including a monster he shot Nov. 9 that green scored 139 1/2, second for him only to a whitetail he felled in 2015 that scored 140 1/4.

Proud as he is of his marksmanship — Roettger has been a constant presence at summertime weekly league shoots at Willow River Rod and Gun in New Richmond, Wis., for 40 years — hunting skills, he says, are more important to his success as a traditional archer.

That’s because he needs to get close to animals before he’ll shoot.

“To me, getting close is never about fancy gear or expensive camouflage,’’ he said. “It’s about hunting the wind and sitting still. I also don’t hunt from a very high stand. I don’t have a fear of heights, but I have a healthy respect for them. I won’t put a stand higher than 8 feet in a tree. And I don’t use trail cameras. I prefer to look for trails and read deer sign myself.’’

Roettger’s nod to tradition extends beyond his choice of equipment.

On every opening day of the Wisconsin archery deer season, he sits in the same stand, armed with the same Ben Pearson bow his dad bought him decades ago.

“I know I won’t shoot anything with that bow, but maintaining that tradition is important to me,’’ he said.

He also believes in using public lands when he can. A few years ago, he concluded a decade-long saga in which he hunted 10 different game animals in 10 different states.

“In each state, I hunted and camped by myself on public land,’’ he said. “I wanted to do it all with the same longbow I’ve been using since 1997, and with my own homemade arrows. I didn’t have to kill something in each of the states. That wasn’t the point. I just wanted to try.’’

The adventure took him to states as far from Wisconsin as Arizona and as near as Minnesota. He never did get close enough to an elk to take a shot, and he struck out on antelope, too.

“I did shoot mule deer and of course whitetails,’’ he said.

On Nov. 9, Roettger had only been in his stand for 45 minutes when the big buck he would fell ambled into view. He had been keeping his right hand warm because as he ages, arthritis makes pulling back his bowstring with his fingers more of a chore than it once was.

“I had an arrow nocked, but when I saw the buck out of the corner of an eye, I couldn’t stand up to shoot because he would have seen the movement,’’ Roettger said. “So I shot sitting down when he was 12 yards from me.’’

On a recent evening, Roettger was in his archery workshop, which is part of the garage of the Star Prairie home he shares with his wife, Rita Keating. The shop’s walls are decorated with antlers and on a workbench were arrows in various stages of construction.

“I try to shoot 500 grain [weight] arrows made of cedar,’’ he said. “I’ve shot other arrows, including some made of sitka spruce. But I like the smell of cedar. For broadheads I shoot 160 grain three-bladed Woodsmans.’’

When Roettger was younger, he could pull back a 60-pound longbow and hold it at full draw for a minute.

Those days are gone.

“I think I can still shoot my 60-pound longbow for another year, and probably a 50-pound bow for another five years after that,’’ he said. “If I’m lucky and I keep my arm strong, I should be able to hunt with a longbow into my mid-70s, and hopefully even into my late 70s.’’