Chesterfield ordinance on bow and arrows deferred

Rockwood Park currently has a well maintained 12 target outdoor archery course. It is open year round dawn to dusk, free of charge. Bring your own equipment. For beginner level archery lessons, call Kristi, park naturalist, at 804-310-7964. Rockwood Park is located at 3401 Courthouse Road, Chesterfield, VA 23236.

Posted by Richard Knoggin on November 21, 2009 at 4:59 am
again, cominscents you are confusing your passion with facts.
I would write more but it’s 5am and I am leaving to go hunting

Really? I offer nothing but facts, so I assime your answer is tongue in cheek. The statistics I share are from the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries. I beleive there is a good arguement for either side in this, and most other issues. The realities are that someday, someone, will be killed by a bowhunter in a neighborhood. It may not be Salibury and it may not be for twenty years. Or it could be tomorrow. Statistics are much more reliable than hyperbole. The same applies that a bowhunter will save a life someday. I simply suggest that nobody knows the numbers. But statistically, both will happen. Just as it is statistically predicted by safety engineers how many people will die on a major construction project. My point is simple, people can throw all kinds of “info” out there that is, as you call it, simply passion speaking. The facts are there. A bow hunter can’t keep his arrows off adjoing properties. If you dispute this why not suggest a substantial fine for any arrow found off the hunters property? How about an amount equal to the value of a human life (1,000,000?). That way the hunters risk is more equal to the unsuspecting neighbors. Would you support such an amendment. And if not, Why not? Because there is a very real but denied risk that the arrow will occasionaly go where it wasn’t supposed to. It’s called putting your money where your mouth is.

So many hunters keep talking about arrows not travelling far because, as any bowhunter knows, they never shoot anything over 30 yds. First that is pure_____. Second, does the arrow just drop to the ground next to the deer it missed? The distance to your target does not determine the distance an arrow travels, and you know that. Or do you never miss. Yeah right. The arrow will continue to sail until it hits a solid object, the ground, a tree, a house, a… And please don’t tell me bow hunters only hunt from up in a tree. That is simply not true. The technique is necessary when hunting in deep woods because rural deer are very alert and you simply can’t sneek up close enough to get a shot with a bow. The tame deer in Salisbury simply do not run when they spot an individual. There will certinly be the yahoo sitting on his back porch, drinking a beer, and, “well darned if that deer didn’t just walk right up to me”. Honestly now, tell me it ain’t so. If hunters want the public image to change then support law enforcement efforts to stop the bubba’s out there. THat includes higher licensing fees to pay for them. And much higher penalties for those caught. And turn them in. Almost every hunter out ther knows someone that trespasses while hunting, baits the deer, huntsts after dark, drinks alcohol while hunting, sends their dogs across property without permission to flush deer… If you want your right to hunt to stay on the books you better remind yourselves why it was passed. Because ther is a large anti hunting crowd that is only getting bigger. And self policing is the only way to make a difference. I accept hunting as your right. Don’t change my mind.

There used to be an archery range at Rockwood Park. Alot of people go here to exercise and have fun.  Has anyone been hit with an arrow yet? Well, I haven’t been there in more than 20 years, so I don’t know what kind of people do frequent the place.  Would this new law ban bows from all venues???

I just have to post here- I am sure that the majority of hunters are mature, responsible people but there are enough of the idiotic kind to screw it up for everyone else. So when you look around and spot the idiotic kind, you have to ask yourself- “Would I want this clown hunting with a bow around MY house?“ I think not. I live in a rural are of Henrico on a 3.5 acre lot and I was walking around the other day and low and behold- there was a crossbow bolt embedded into the FRONT OF MY HOUSE!! Where my wife, my four month old son and I live. Four feet away from the window to the room my Mother sleeps in when she stays with us. The police and the game warden both told me that the angle proves without a doubt that it was shot from the road or the 86 year old man’s house across the road. So that tells me that some IDIOT was out spotlighting one night, shot at a deer and missed and drove off. The other neighbor next door walked out one morning and there were two dead deer laying in her front yard, left by IDIOTS. We had one rotting on my property last week and another one this week—IDIOTS. These clowns are not the types of people that should be hunting anywhere, much less in a neighborhood. They clearly have no responsibility, no consideration for other’s lives or property and are lacking in maturity yet the people in power feel obligated to protect their percieved God given right to hunt wherever they choose. It’s almost as though they are scared to death to pass any kind of law that can be looked at as anti-hunting. One solution I offer to this problem is to create a special county permit that is expensive to obtain and only people with these can hunt on land where there are neighborhoods or within a certain distance to a house. With severe fines for not having one. Then, if you have a deer causing property damage you or the neighborhood can still pay someone to come in and thin the deer. County makes money, problem deer can be eliminated in ares where they aren’t wanted by responsible people and the idiots will move on becasue idiots don’t like expensive permits and they really don’t like expensive fines. They’ll probably end up at my house—TAKE COVER HONEY!!!