Spring 2026

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Ladder Stand!

OLDEST CONTINUOUS BOWHUNTER IN IOWA?

By Dave Weekley My first experience with a stick and string was at a Boy Scouts Camp in the Cedar Rapids area. In 1956 I was seventeen and had gotten my first driver’s license and my first set of wheels. It was also the year I purchased my first deer tag. In 1953 the Iowa Conservation Commission established Iowa’s first archery deer season. I believe two hunters received tags, good for a short one-week season. The first few years I did more duck hunting than deer hunting. In 1961 I moved from Cedar Rapids to Cedar Falls. Cedar Falls had a decent deer population and my duck hunting

career was over. The deer herd around Cedar Falls, was around what we now call George Wyth State Park. In 1963 I harvested my first deer, a mature doe. I have bought deer tags every year since 1956, except for my time in the military. I still hunt with my recurve and I’m still in love with shooting it and bowhunting. I have hunted five Midwest states and two western states. The pictures below are the buck I took last year and receiving an Expert Bowhunter Award at the IBA Spring Banquet. The award was for harvesting two bucks and a doe in a three-year period.

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