Joe Sala, senior editor-in-chief of The Rambler and member of the Cathedral Prep hockey team, is also an outdoorsman. He is a hunter and a fisherman, or more generally someone who enjoys the outdoors. The young hunter’s favorite prey is the whitetail deer, but he also enjoys hunting rabbits. When it comes to fishing, Joe says he prefers bass fishing and perch fishing.
These hobbies and activities were something he grew up with sharing with his father, and Joe still continues to enjoy the activities to this day. Joe’s favored season for whitetail is archery. Archery as a hunting form is much much more difficult than traditional rifle, as an archer’s range is limited to a certain yardage and as such has to have a large amount of patience to be able to bag the animal.
When asked whether he prefers a treestand or grounded hunting, Joe said, “I prefer a treestand. It’s easier to see and you can get a better shot that way.” However, when questioned about his preferred type of bow, he replied saying that he mainly uses a crossbow, a controversial choice as many hunters have differing opinions over whether a crossbow should be used during archery season, due to their rather gun-like qualities in comparison to the traditional bow and arrow style that is predominantly used. Joe added, “Yes, it’s easier to use a crossbow over a compound bow due to the draw strength.”
He shared an interesting experience he had during one particular hunting trip, “One time when I was hunting with one of my friends, I hit a deer. I think it was a six point,” he said. “It ran and we decided to follow the blood trail. We got up from our spot and moved down the ravine to where I hit it and started following the blood trail. We searched for four hours and turned up nothing. It was disappointing, but it was still fun all in all.”
This story hits quite close to home with many hunters as deer are a relatively sturdy animal, even after being shot or other sustaining critical injuries they can survive to run for yards or even miles. In fact, if you don’t kill a deer with the initial shot you are likely to lose it as it will escape, and you may not be able to hunt down it’s corpse, making for an interesting situation.
More interesting yet is the way Joe hunts rabbits. Unlike traditional rabbit hunting, Joe and his hunting friends kick up the rabbits themselves instead of using a dog to kick them up and run them. “It’s fun,” he responded, “But you have to be careful [because] you never know when you’ll kick one up.”