Button Busting With the Recurve

mmgsozarks
6 days ago
7 min read

Seven weeks into Missouri’s Archery Whitetail season, the grind continues.

By Michael Collins Nov 3, 2025

Hanging from the saddle. Photo credit: Michael Collins

The deer are moving, and so are the hunters!

I’ve always leaned more towards hunting private land. Because of a great friend, I’m able to go on his family’s property and live out my wildest deer hunting dreams. It’s a great place to go, and hanging out with all the deer camp buddies is just as much fun as the hunting itself. The only real catch is this place is several hours from my door, and my itch to hunt lately has needed satisfying more and more. Luckily for me, there is plenty of Missouri Department of Conservation and National Forest Service land not far from my door.

Instead of regular bow hunting or using a crossbow like in years past, I picked up a Bear Kodiak Hunter Recurve bow and have been primarily hunting with that. They call it the “struggle stick” for a reason. When hunting with a stick and string, the highs are high and the lows are quite low. It’s an emotional rollercoaster that you have very little control of. The things that you can control are done so on your own intuition and skill. There are skillful wins, and lucky ones. There are also plenty of losses and hard lessons learned.

“If you consider an unsuccessful hunt to be a waste of time, then the true meaning of the chase eludes you all together.”

— Fred Bear

40lb Bear Kodiak Hunter. Photo credit: Michael Collins

My Whitetail public land journey started in 2024. I put in for an urban hunting program in Jefferson City with low expectations and got drawn. It was late October when the program opened (this was the pilot year), and I was eager to get out. What I didn’t realize is that while I knew how to kill deer, I wasn’t as great of a hunter as I thought I was. Things had to change if I was to find success.

I had been seriously hunting deer for about 10 years at this point. All on private land. Land where friends have been running game cameras, setting stands, and hunting for many years. When I got the invite to the group, I didn’t need to do any work, other than roll up and hunt. Fast forward to now, and things have hardly changed. We all hunt the same spots, watch deer come out into the same areas, and have an overall great understanding of the area. For some, it’s everything you could want. For me, it’s a retreat. There really isn’t that much work in it, and while I love going and am forever thankful of the opportunity, adventure has been calling and I feel the need to answer.

Old stand found on public land. Photo credit: Michael Collins

Going where the deer go

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gone squirrel hunting on public land, and had deer just walk right up on me. It proves that you can literally go walk into the woods, sit down anywhere, and have the chance at seeing deer. Now if I’m targeting deer, that obviously isn’t the right way to go about it. I need learned skills that take time to grasp and perfect. I need to scout, and identify sign. I need to be able to locate pinch points and food sources, and I need to be able to pick the right tree to set up in, or ground blind. Dare I mention thermals? These are all skills that prior to the 2024 season, I did not have a great grasp on.

My Introduction to Traditional Bow Hunting

After that first season in the city, and having learned a few of the above mentioned skills through trial and error, I felt like I needed something more immersive. I didn’t want to just learn anymore. I was overcome with an untamable desire to go all the way in. In mid January of 2025, I got my 40lb Bear Recurve in the mail, and hit the ground running.

My goal was to hunt that bow for the 2025 season, and I was a long way away from being able to ethically do that back in January. I set up a training schedule for myself, and started shooting every single day. Even at only 40lbs, my muscles were not ready for this kind of training. I started shooting only a few arrows a day. A few became a dozen, and a dozen became at least one 30 minute session 6-7 times a week. I was very serious and still practice like that, hold some of those days for actual hunting. By September, I was cautiously optimistic that I had what it takes to get the job done.

Practice makes perfect. Photo credit: Michael Collins

Highs and Lows

Since the season opened, I have had some great opportunities come up with the recurve in hand. Some have panned out, while others did not. My “set up identification” skills have gotten much better, and because of that I have been getting deer to come in very close. With a recurve bow,this is very important as most consider 20-25 yards to be a max distance. I honestly prefer much closer than that, although sometimes the closer they are, the harder they can be to hit. Funny how that goes.

My first recurve deer of the season, taken on a city property. Photo credit: Michael Collins

Recent success

One of my greatest moments yet with my recurve bow happened this past Saturday, and it’s the inspiration for this blog post.

Freezer filler. Photo credit: Michael Collins

I spend a fair bit of time on OnX. It’s a crazy good app for scouting not just for hunting, but fishing and outdoor adventures in general. Sometimes, I just sit there and look around like back when Google Maps was new. While scouting for smallmouth recently, I came across a piece of public land that really piqued my curiosity. The terrain features looked awesome, and the area I was looking at appeared to be perfect for a North or North E/W wind. After weeks of looking at it on a screen, and some “lows” from other recent hunting trips, I threw my hands in the air and said “Why not?!”.

I hiked up a literal mountain. Over 250’ of elevation gain in a very short distance. I felt like a billy goat, as sheer as some of those slopes were. After reaching the top, I looked around and realized I had happened into an amazing area. Multiple oaks with acorns just dumping. I was set up at the top of a bluff and deer coming through had to come within 40 yards (or less) of me to get by. After a couple hours, I was getting cold. The north wind I had planned for was cutting through my clothes and I was thinking about getting down. Not out of the woods, but at least on the ground to hunker down and warm up a little.

Just as I was about to make my move, a doe and button buck came down the ridge. They were filling up on acorns and to my amazement, the doe was not being chased. At 35 yards, the doe knew something was up and dipped out down the ridge. I had totally lost sight of the button buck. Fast forward 30 minutes and here he comes, be lining for the oak tree that was littering the forest floor with nuts. He had followed the doe below my line of sight, and circled around to come back up. Traditional bow hunting is all about taking the opportunity you were given.

Many people frown on shooting button bucks. Sure, they may turn into a trophy one day. Or maybe they turn into freezer meat, and the world moves on. It’s not that serious folks. Missouri is absolutely stacked with a whopping 1.4 million deer in the state.

When this button buck walked out under that oak tree, I was thrilled. Sure it wasn’t a big buck, but it was a manageable sized deer for me to drag down the mountain by myself, and it was giving me some pretty good broadside shots. He ate for about 10 minutes. I had to sit totally still (in the cold wind) at a weird angle with a bow in hand ready to draw at a moment's notice. Punishing.

It was quite the mental game too. At my home range, I have the ability to shoot out to 30 yards as a max distance. Typically that’s my max anywhere, and I never dreamt that I would take that shot on a deer. The deer was at 32 yards, quartered away, and was not going to get any closer by the way things were looking. I had a moment with myself and decided that I could do this. I have practiced, I have prepared, and the only thing stopping me was that negative little voice of no confidence in the back of my head.

In what felt like an instant, I shut down that stupid little voice, lined up, drew, took a moment to make sure my form was perfect, and let my arrow fly.

In target practice, the time between letting go of the string and the arrow hitting its target is unnoticeable. When I took that 32 yard shot at that deer, it felt like a whole day was going by. How do you even feel emotions in the blink of an eye like that?! Only bow hunters know I suppose. Just before impact the deer turned to an even harder quartering away stance, but it mattered not. The arrow still found its mark, blew through the heart, and completely passed through the deer. It was shot at 32 yards, ran about 50, and died about 40 yards from where I shot it.

We all get satisfaction out of different things. Maybe you finally completed a project, you cooked that tricky meal to perfection, or maybe you pointed an arrow at a deer from slightly outside your comfort range, and used it to ethically take said deer. That’s the type of satisfaction that I will forever chase. It’s not easy, it’s not trophy hunting, and it’s not set up and ready to go. If you want this sort of satisfaction, you have to put the time in, learn the skills, and make it happen. It won’t be easy, but the feelings I have about it right now are worth all the blood, sweat, and tears.

Thank you for checking out my blog post! It’s not fishing related at all, but I’ve been developing a passion for outdoor writing and hunting is what I’m up to right now!

If you are interested in booking a fishing trip in the Gorgeous Missouri Ozarks, I would love to be your guide! I work on the Niangua River, Gasconade River, Meramec River, and a few other smaller waterways in the area.

If you liked this story and want to hear more about my hunting/fishing adventures, check out my most recent appearance on the Driftwood Outdoors Podcast.