I have hunted with compound bows and crossbows for well over a decade now and love the thrill of being close to the game I am hunting. There is an adrenaline rush that comes with clearly seeing the whites of the eyes of the animal you are hunting without binoculars or a high-powered scope and the rush of that feeling is what keeps me coming back for more year after year, again and again.
Let’s face it, there are a ton of broadhead companies and seem to be new companies popping up every year that claim their broadhead brands are the champion of the field. Call me a traditionalist but I believe in finding something that works, tuning what works best, and then simply rinse and repeat.
I have written extensively on mechanical, fixed and hybrid broadheads as well as done numerous videos and podcasts on what you need to consider in making your next trip to the field a tag-punching and freezer-filling success. I play to win in life and hunting is no exception.
From 2008 to 2015 I hunted a few urban areas that were densely populated but out of the city limits and the challenge when I first started this journey to of urban and suburban “neighborhood hunting” was to make a clean and ethical shot and for the deer not to run more than 100 yards before it expired. I won’t mention any brand names of other broadheads but I tried a few that failed miserably in my beginning days of my urban bowhunting career.
My bowhunting buddy and professional Texas hunting guide Jake Davis told me to try Grim Reaper mechanicals along my journey after me telling him my stories of watching deer run off into woodlots with other brands of broadheads, never to be recovered, due to poor terminal performance. I will remember that first Grim Reaper kill that very next season with reverence for many decades to come.
I literally watched the whitetail doe I shot run less than 50 yards, circle in a stationary spot, and hit the ground like a hammer, dead in her tracks. No need to follow a blood trail on that kind of scenario but there was a short and gruesome trail of red if one needed to do so. I became a believer that day and have since filmed countless videos, written several articles for major magazines and record more than a few podcasts on my successes in the field using Grim Reapers.
I filmed my first hunt in 2012 and felt like a rock star when I filmed my first recovery of a blood trail that looked like a homicide scene. The next year I shot two deer in one sitting and then two hogs in one sitting after that, recovering all 4 animals within mere minutes of the tracking journey. My son Jackson and I have hunted together since he was a very young child and he can recite the equipment I use and why I use it with excitement as a result of his own experiences hunting with the gear we trust as well with Grim Reaper being at the top of that list.
Here are some of those urban hunts on I self-filmed using crossbows and Grim Reapers in action. The third video is one of my all-time favorites as you get to watch both deer haul until they fall on camera in the wide open in the back of a neighborhood development:
There are so many options with archery equipment and gear you can pack in with you to your stand or spot and stalk hunt with these days. The Archery Trade Association (ATA) trade show is full of companies that all claim to have the best of the best in archery and hunting equipment. What has finally changed for the better is that the consumer market has weeded out the trashy products that easily break or have poor performance an durability for the most part – on USA soil at least.
What has also changed is the reliability of durability of mechanical broadheads and the newer “hybrid” technology of combining fail safe fixed blades with the best parts of a mechanical. Grim Reaper mechanicals have no fail-prone parts like O-rings or bands to break or come off when the moment counts the most.
Some will use the analogy of revolvers versus semi-automatic handguns when comparing fixed blade to mechanical. In years past this may have been true but with the technology that goes into mechanicals these days, I trust Grim Reaper mechanical heads on any game animal in North America and beyond for terminal performance as much as the reliability of fixed blades and I have the proof on my walls of my home and office and in my freezer to show for it too. This isn’t just talk, my friends. Video evidence doesn’t lie.
What’s more is that I have talked many times on camera about the fact that you can rebuild a Grim Reaper in many cases after it has been shot through an animal time and time again so long as the main body (ferrule) is not bent or otherwise damaged. Although Grim Reapers are premium broadheads, this is a great overall value point I make with many hunters looking for the best bang for the buck. Rebuild kits cost about half of a new pack of standard or pro-series broadheads and are a great way to make your dollar stretch a little more.
So with a crowded and noisy marketplace of broadhead companies, why do I go back to Grim Reapers time and time again? I think I have made a few points to strengthen my choice in this article but if you need more, here we go:
- I have yet to lose a whitetail deer, wild hog, trophy ram or other Texas-sized exotic (and we have more than a few I have shot here in Texas) in my bowhunting career so long as I have hit them in the vitals. We are talking many dozens of shots, not all of them perfect by any means. Meat in the freezer and photos, videos and taxidermy to prove it. Success in its greatest forms.
- I have watched almost every game animal I have shot with Grim Reapers haul until they fall or could follow a blood trail in a tracking job that even a very novice hunter could follow. “What em’ Drop” and “Shorter Blood Trails, Longer Stories” aren’t just slogans that sound cool after all. We are talking real life experience here.
- I have never had a blade not open or a broadhead fail even partially. If they closed after the shot and you made a solid pass through, that was most likely due to the kinetic energy doing its thing with the magical flight of the arrow or bolt.
- We all want good bowhunting experiences. I have had more successes in bowhunting that I can attribute to the use of Grim Reaper than anything else, hands down.
So, with all of this being written, remember, find what works for you archery and bowhunting and rinse and repeat. Grim Reaper has made me an overall better bowhunter in many ways and one of my life goals is to share my experiences through what I write and record in audio and video with others. When the moment of truth counts the most, have the best equipment with you on the task. For broadheads, it doesn’t get any better than this.
Story by Dustin Vaughn Warncke