{"id":1361,"date":"2019-06-17T17:54:49","date_gmt":"2019-06-17T17:54:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.crosshairscommunity.com\/?p=1361"},"modified":"2019-06-17T17:54:49","modified_gmt":"2019-06-17T17:54:49","slug":"bowfishing-growing-number-enjoy-cruising-for-carp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crosshairscommunity.com\/?p=1361","title":{"rendered":"Bowfishing: Growing number enjoy cruising for carp"},"content":{"rendered":"
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One of the best things about bowfishing, according to Neil Harp, is what you can see in just one night\u2019s time.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cJust last Friday, I saw multiple species of fish, including eels, and have come across turtles, ducks, raccoons, deer, frogs and much more along the banks,\u201d he said. \u201cBowfishing allows you to be in the outdoors with a bow in the offseason of deer hunting.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Bowfishing popularity has climbed in the region, as a growing number of anglers take their boats down the Susquehanna River during summer nights hoping to harvest monster carps or catfish.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cft is a fast-paced sport, which is really appealing to the adventurers in the region,\u201d said Judy Weaver of Weaver\u2019s Archery in Kreamer. \u201cYou\u2019re fishing at night, using flashlights, and when the light comes across a large carp, it will quickly try to get away. You have like 10 seconds to take the shot.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

ft gets even more exciting, she said, when you come across a large school of carp in one setting.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cYou can find a bunch together, and then it is a lot of quick, repetitive shooting,\u201d she said. \u201cYou only have a small window until they all disperse.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Weaver\u2019s Archery holds a series of bowfishing tournaments, usually during the months of May, June and July.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe best times usually start later in the spring months and then into the summer when the water levels drop and the fish aren\u2019t as active,\u201d said Weaver.<\/span><\/p>\n

A regular Pennsylvania fishing license is required, but equipment to get started doesn\u2019t need to cost a whole lot, Weaver added.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cYou can use a cheap yard sale bow and just add the special reel and arrows as needed,\u201d she said. \u201cYou can get into it for under $100, but there are more expensive rigs that can range from $500-600.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Boats aren’t a necessity, she said.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThe carp usually come close to shore where they feed, and I know people who do this from the river or creek banks,\u201d Weaver said. \u201cThere are a lot of islands in the river, and it is nice to have a boat to get to them and fish around them, but this is a sport where you don\u2019t need to be in the deeper, fast-moving water.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Carp can grow quite large \u2014 the biggest so far this year at a Weaver\u2019s Archery event was 40 pounds \u2014 and can be eaten, although they don\u2019t offer a lot of quality meat.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re a scavenger fish,\u201d Weaver said. \u201cWe have a farmer that composts them, saying they\u2019re great fertilizer.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Harp admitted he never lets any<\/span>\u00a0of his carp go to waste.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201c1 provide them to trappers who use them in their baits, dog food facilities take them and people use them for fertilizer \u2014 and some eat them,\u201d he said. \u201cI love that more people are getting into this, but I\u2019m a little leery of people going out and shooting as many as they want, if it was me, I\u2019d put some sort of limit on it like hunting for squirrels or rabbits.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Weaver has seen a variety of people coming in for bowfishing supplies lately.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThere are always new people getting into it, and they come in looking for new set-ups,\u201d she said. \u201cThis is a sport where people don\u2019t really upgrade a lot. You\u2019re using the bows in the water, and they\u2019re not kept in the nicest conditions. People do come in for new arrows \u2014 they continually dull their points.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

For more information about Weaver Archery\u2019s bowfishing tournaments (the last one is scheduled for July 12-13), visit www.weaversarchery. com.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the best things about bowfishing, according to Neil Harp, is what you can see in just one night\u2019s<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1362,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1019,1021,1017,1020,1018],"class_list":["post-1361","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-outdoors","tag-angling","tag-bow","tag-bowfishing","tag-carp","tag-weavers-archery"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crosshairscommunity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1361","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crosshairscommunity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crosshairscommunity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crosshairscommunity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crosshairscommunity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1361"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crosshairscommunity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1361\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1363,"href":"https:\/\/www.crosshairscommunity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1361\/revisions\/1363"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crosshairscommunity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1362"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crosshairscommunity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1361"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crosshairscommunity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1361"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crosshairscommunity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1361"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}