Ozbow

Have had some great developments for the magazine of late. First of all, the second run of distribution will commence next Wednesday and though I am not sure of the exact locations as yet, the mag will be going to most of the places where it sold out the first time around. So if you missed it the first time, there is now a chance to get one. Numbers are limited though, so I do not know how many will be in each place.

Secondly Oz Hunting and Bows has kindly given me a Samick Devastator with arrows, quiver glove and whatever else it takes to get you shooting, to give away in the mag. The winner of the bow will be drawn and to enter you will have to send in a coupon from the magazine, which we will put together.

Thirdly now, Jim Belcher, of Belcher Bows in the USA, will be sending out a custom longbow to be reviewed alongside the Samick and a new remodelled Newell Defiant. This will be a great review that will pit an American made bow, made out of American timbers, against an Aussie made bow crafted out of Aussie timbers. Both bows will be 55lbs and we will also throw the Samick in the mix just to give a perspective between a factory produced bow against a couple of custom bows.

Now here is some incentive. The Belcher bow will be awarded to the best article that appears in this years magazine. I will pick the top ten or so articles and then put a poll up on the site to allow everybody to vote on their favourite article. This will eliminate any favouritism and allow a story to win on its own credit.

Submissions for articles will be closing in early April. Remember also that Trophy Bowhunts will be giving away a Chital hunt and this too will be drawn from coupons that can be sent in. Thank you to all who have and are supporting the magazine.

Ant,

That info sure is good incentive to get people to write an article. All the best with laying up the next mag.

Jeff

Mate, really glad about this. Just wanted to ask you what happened about the prizes in the inaugural issue? By the time it came out the closing dates in the comps for them had already been and gone!

The Vortex binocular comp was extended for another few months before being drawn at the end of September 08 and won by someone who's name I can't remember. The Trophy Bowhunts semi-guided hunt has been rolled over to this year and a winner will be drawn from the combined entries of the first and second editions.

Paul wrote: The Trophy Bowhunts semi-guided hunt has been rolled over to this year and a winner will be drawn from the combined entries of the first and second editions.

Why ?

We rolled it over as I have got quite a few entries (Well over 200) and I wouldn't like to just throw out entries when people have taken the time to send them in. So when people get the next edition they will be able to have 2 entries in the comp. Also any further entries from the first edition will still be honoured in the 2009 draw. Originals only.

Cheers
Mick

Thanks Paul and Mick for helping clear things up. Unfortunately in the last mag, it went to the printers at the end of May and it did not end up in the shops until the start of August, due to all the things that went into starting the mag up. As a result, there really was too short a space for someone to be able to make it to the Trophy Bowhunts prize last year, so yes the entries will count for this year also. This year the prize will be a magic chital hunt with Mick of Trophy Bowhunts. Your entries from last year will count and this year we will open up the draw for a bit longer to allow for more people to enter. Getting the first mag off the ground was a real headache and the red tape and hoops to jump through were unbelieveable. This year will be a much smoother run I hope.

By the way, the bow from Jim Belcher has arrived and I will get some pics up soon for you guys to get a look at it. It is a custom longhorn and it is a beautiful piece of work. There is still time to get a submission in and if you would to contact me my email is bowhunteraustralia@gmail.com Thank you and sorry for any inconveinience

Just wanting to let you all know that the 2009 edition of Bowhunter Australia is finally off to the printers. We have been holding off on any announcements as it has been a massive beast to put together this year.

This year has been fantastic and we would like to thank Tony Stoyanovski who has really stepped up to the plate in helping me with some of the artwork load and also to John Taylor who volunteered his time to help Ant edit the wording of the articles. Without these guys help, the mag would not come to fruition or be anywhere near the standard that you will see when it comes out.

Speaking of it coming out, due to the turn around from the printers and the fact that it won't be back until near on christmas, the mag will not be in the shops until somewhere around the second week of January. Very sorry not to have it out by christmas, as hoped for, but hopefully it will be worth the wait.

Also the mag this time around will be a whopping 288 pages and there will be many familiar faces from the website and some great overseas writers. I also have to thank all the writers as the articles really are tremendous and without them, again, there would be no mag.

Another big announcement that we would like to make at this point is the fact that the mag will be going to two editions a year. Due to the massive response from all the writers, when we went to finalise the format of this edition, we got to around 320 pages and realised that we still had another 120+ pages to go. This would have pushed production and postage costs into astronomical proportions, so what was decided was that we would cut down to to 292 pages and then have one out in 6 to 9 months time that will be around the original 228 pages that the first edition was. The good news is that the next one is not far off being done, though a few articles will be required to fill it, but it will good to be ahead of time for once. Not sure of the timing of the two editions per year, but we are leaning towards a September and March release to coincide with hunting seasons and to stay away from christmas.

So there you go folks. Thank you all for your patience, especially some of the guys who got their articles to us a long time ago, and from here lets hope we go from strength in getting bowhunting out there to the masses with another Australian publication that will be on our shelves alongside our other fine bowhunting and hunting publications.


Cover photo: Howie Griffin

I bought the mag in a News Agent in town here yesterday. It sure is a big chunk of a mag and it looks very well laid out. No wonder it took so much work to compile. I have really only had time to have a flick through it so far but the quality looks great.

Jeff

Another excellent edition of the mag.

The best yet. A top effort.

I've got my copy now and rain is expected for the next couple of days, a good excuse to just kick back and do some heavy reading. A large number of good authors with their stories to tell. Some old (longbow Ted) some young (Dale) just to name a couple. Its been good reading thus far................Bill

Sincere thanks for the feedback gents.

Glad to hear you're enjoying it.