Pre-season shooting practice includes testing gear for dependable, silent performance under hunting conditions. Photo by P.J. Reilly.

In the world of bowhunting for deer, it's impossible to forget the successes. Heads and antlers on plaques adorn household walls. Photo albums are stuffed with images of beaming hunters with trophy racks in hand. We keep plenty of things to remind us of the ones that didn't get away.

There are no souvenirs or photos, however, commemorating the many days when things didn't go our way. And in the world of bowhunting, that's most days. Like it or not, our minds tend to keep images of the bad days fresh and current. Sadly, some of those memories are more vivid than the hunts that ended in success.

Though it was nearly two decades ago, I can see on my mental video screen the first buck I ever drew my bow on. I can see it as clearly as the buck I killed last fall.

I had been on stand for about three hours one warm, early October morning, when a fat 4-pointer walked down the ridge I was guarding, feeding on fallen acorns.

As he slowly worked his way toward me, the buck nudged crimson and yellow leaves with his nose, pushing them aside to get to the mast buried underneath. My heart threatened to jump out of my chest as I grabbed my bow off its hook, clipped my mechanical release to the string and prepared myself to draw. When the buck crossed what I figured was the 20-yard mark, I raised my bow and pulled back the string.

SQUUUEEEEEAAAAAKKKK!

The noise that came out of the lower cam was impossibly loud. It was as if my bow had been hooked to an amplifier. Naturally, the buck heard that squeak, looked up at me, bobbed his head once and then turned tail and ran down the mountain.

Game over.

That failed encounter stung for a long time, but it taught me a valuable lesson about bow maintenance. Guess who's now hypersensitive about making sure his cams are clean and noise-free come hunting season?

IT'S ALL UPHILL
There are many factors stacked against bowhunters in their quests to bag deer with stick and string. Wind. A deer's keen nose. A deer's keen eyes. A deer's keen ears. Other hunters. Murphy's Law.

The stars must be perfectly aligned for a bowhunter to get within his or her effective shooting range of a deer. Knowing there are things affecting us that we can do nothing about, doesn't it seem only natural that we should make every effort to prepare for everything we can control?

All bowhunters know the importance of scouting, stand placement, etc., when it comes to tagging a buck in early archery season. We're not going to talk about those things here.

We're going to talk about "gearing up" for bowhunts at the start of the season.