This past weekend I had my greatest scare while bowhunting and trying to find advice on how to avoid the situation in the future. My style of bowhunting is dependent on mobility, 90%+ of my hunts are run and gun style. I have a muddy stand and stick combo that is usually used alongside my muddy harness. The harness has a linesman belt which I use hanging stands but narly trees with many limbs requires unhooking between steps. Sunday morning while hanging a stand in light rain I ran into this situation with near disaster consequences. I was between 20-24' hanging my sticks, the tree split so I had to switch sticks unattached. My left foot slipped off the step, the step grabbed my pant leg tearing it to my knee. My pants hooking the step while falling backwards now had me falling head first towards the ground. As I braced for impact the linesman belt that was unattached to the tree but strapped to my waist caught on a lower stick saving either my life or at minimum serious injury. So what can be done in run and gun sets?
Only thing to prevent that is a second lead lines man rope...leave the first attached until you attach the second above the branch/split. Glad your OK.
This is what I was thinking of giving a try, my other thought was to somehow attach to the last attached stick.
Quit acting like a monkey and think about what you are doing! Think about this if you were to be less lucky. Hunt like a Pro...Bro!
You said it was raining. Why did you slip in the first place? Was it (for lack of a better word) carelessness, or was it possibly your boots? Did you boots lose grip on the stick because it was wet? I use the HSS lifeline. Very quick and easy Prusik knot and will go 30'. Doesn't necessarily help with run & gun, but maybe just changing up the setup routine a bit will keep you safer. Scary how many incidents we've heard of this year alone with near disastrous outcomes. Glad you're ok.
