Crossbow hunting has been steadily gaining popularity in recent years

This Project Grant award of $140,000 from the U.S. Department of the Interior Fish and Wildlife Service under the Multistate Conservation Grant Program (CFDA 15.628) will fund research to better understand the characteristics, preferences, and motivations of crossbow hunters. The project will involve scientific survey data collection with bowhunters, including sufficient samples of crossbow users and non-crossbow bowhunters, across three states in each of the four major regions of the Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies. The Archery Trade Association, Inc. is the prime awardee, with Responsive Management as a sub-recipient. The research findings will be used to develop a webinar that explains the significance of the crossbow market and the important characteristics of this user group. This information will benefit state fish and wildlife agencies by allowing them to develop crossbow-specific recruitment, retention, and reactivation (R3) strategies to increase hunting participation and improve agency connection with crossbow and general bowhunters.

Yet while ample research exists looking at the overall market of bowhunters in the united states, relatively little focuses specifically on crossbow users. In order to implement successful R3 strategies, the unique market of crossbow hunters must be understood. Crossbow hunting is particularly important to understand given that crossbows are often favored by older huntersit is possible that the aging population of the united states may be helping to drive interest in and use of crossbows (according to the U.S. Census bureau, in 2020, 1 in 6 people in the united states were 65 years old or older). While a number of states restrict crossbow use to hunters over a certain age, many other states permit general use of crossbows by all hunters. IT is therefore possible that crossbows may be favored by some novice or first-time hunters, making them especially important from a recruitment perspective. In order to better understand these topics and plan purposeful recruitment, retention, reactivation (R3) efforts specific to crossbow hunters, new research is needed to understand how crossbow users compare with other bowhunters. Such comparisons require data collection from both crossbow users and bowhunters who use non-crossbow equipment such as compound bows, recurve bows, and longbows. The proposed project entails scientific survey data collection with bowhuntersincluding sufficient samples of crossbow users as well as non-crossbow bowhuntersin three states from each of the four major regions of the association of fish and wildlife agencies (afwa). Results and implications of the research will benefit all 49 states that allow some type of crossbow hunting (oregon is the only state that currently does not allow hunting with a crossbow). In addition to determining the current rate of crossbow use among bowhunters, the survey will look at the characteristics of crossbow hunters, their expenditures, preferences, motivations, and the factors that contribute to their retention in hunting. The research will be used to develop a webinar by the archery trade association (ATA) and responsive management that explains the significance of the crossbow market and the most important characteristics of this group. The resulting information will benefit state agencies by allowing them to develop crossbow-specific R3 strategies. Refined R3 strategies specific to crossbow users will help drive hunting participation and improve the agency connection to crossbow hunters and general bowhunters. The ATA and responsive management have a strong foundation on which to build the new research: in 1999, ATA and responsive management collaborated on one of the first nationwide bowhunting participation studies in 2017, the two partners designed and implemented a major market study to determine bowhunters avidity, the species they hunt, their opinions on bowhunting compared to other outdoor activities, and their use and purchasing of bows and archery equipment (responsive management has partnered with ATA on other archery and bowhunting participation studies over the years as well). These studies have been invaluable resources to the R3 community, helping to inform R3 strategies specific to the bowhunter market. There is now a need for a similar study specific to crossbow users. Responsive management is a subrecipient under this project.