Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting whats more expensive... rifle or bow hunting?

Doing both

Touché

Lol!

My bow hunting costs less than my rifle hunting as long as I don’t lose/break too many arrows/heads/strings/etc during the off season. I still use the same bow that was given to me 8 years ago. But it seems to me that archery equipment eventually wears out and requires you to buy a new bow, where as rifles and scopes- if you buy quality- will last multiple lifetimes. Archery also seems to require more gadgets most of which wear out or get lost more often like I mentioned.

Bow hunting. You have to hunt a lot more hours to score.

Rifles for sure mostly because I have a boatload. I do archery but with a 40+ year old Bear recurve. Have a 7 year old vine maple stick bow as a backup.

If you started with NO rifles or bows, and no hunting clothes. Archery by a lot. Mainly due to clothing costs of the very very long season (here in KY at least) as it will start with temps in the 90s in September and ends in January with very cold, windy weather. Rifle hunting for deer has essentially just one set of gear needed, the only continued cost is ammo. Plus it's harder to by a bow in general (first time), you pretty much need a shop to get it fitted to your DL etc., If rifle season lasted as long as bow season, likely no one would bow hunt (that's my personal thoughts)

Personally I have a very nice bow, and have zero interest in upgraded or getting another. I have several nice rifles, and every day I'm looking at other rifles. So for me, firearms is far more expensive

This is a pretty tough question. I have had as many as three bows at one time (only one currently), as I have a decent range in my basement, shoot often, and really enjoy it. I also have almost 300 acres of private land I can hunt out my back door here at the edge of the suburbs of a northern PA city that is loaded with critters. I only archery hunt this property for safety reasons. We have about 9 total weeks of archery season hunting opportunity here where I live in Pennsylvania. I have been really lucky to get to spend a fair amount of time archery hunting in northern Kansas (own a house there now) and really enjoy that area and the wildlife. I upgrade my archery set up every 5-8 years or so and mostly buy good quality used bows and components. I have been shooting Mathews bows for about 15 years now. I have found you can save a small fortune this way as my best friend and hunting partner upgrades most of his stuff each year. Treestands, climbing gear, and all of the gadgets and stuff you buy for archery hunting also add up, but can last a long time if you take stands down after use, maintain, and store them properly. So I get a lot of mileage and enjoyment out of my archery hunting and the equipment I use at somewhat reasonable cost.

I also love to rifle hunt, and have a safe full of nice stuff that mostly sits as our rifle season here in PA is limited to two weeks. I have been lucky to rifle hunt may other places and most recently enjoyed Nebraska's rifle season a couple weeks back.

I honestly am glad I have bought the rifles, scopes and gear I did many years ago as I am probably set for life to hunt anything. As mentioned in posts above, my only yearly cost is ammo and I occasionally buy, sell, or trade for a used rifle here or on other sites. This stuff holds its value pretty well also.

John

I just shot #4 deer this year with my crossbow. All four on the same arrow. Three of the four on the same broadhead that I resharpened each time. This last deer bent up the blades well enough that I replaced them at about $6. anot With arrows running $20 each, plus a lighted nock, plus a $15 broadhead it can get expensive quick. I have $600 into the crossbow and about $700 into the Zeiss Duralyt on top of it. My rifles and the scopes on them usually run a little more total, but shooting is a lot cheaper. Shooting 4 deer/year with either tends to make things even out well enough when the grocery bill is balanced against the cost of the gear. I used to put in an awful lot of range time but mostly that gets written off as entertainment.

Even shooting 4 deer per year I will not live long enough to use up all my broadheads, all my arrows and all my bullets and powder, so it doesn't matter to me which costs more or less.

At $10 a pound for bacon or walleye or decent meat, when almost all my protein comes from wild game or home made bacon, I eat much better and probably now spend a lot less doing so. I know that fresh and properly cared for fish are much better than what I can buy. I know that home made bacon is an order of magnitude better. I dislike store bought burger and more, and know for sure that I have bought less than five pounds of it in the last five years. My wife is of the same opinion so I guess it works out much better whatever I choose to kill my meat with.

My outlook has been substantialy different with archery season. I generally have a opportunity to fill my tag in the 1st or 2nd time in the archery stand. I do not care to finish the season before the Rut is in full swing unless I can take a really nice one. Even then I am dissapointed to finish up the season early. Just love being out there.

Archery, and it ain't even close.

Agreed........Hb

i hunted with a gun made in 1965 that i paid 300 bucks for a few years ago. given proper care, that gun will still be fully functional in 100 years. try that with a bow