I’m delighted to be joined in the latest episode by Darren of Dal archery, based here in the UK. Be warned we completely nerd out on all things arrow building, including different wood options for traditional archers, along with everything archery, from how he first started in archery to coaching. but especially building wooden arrows.
We talk for over two and half hours on the podcast about his passion for archery, including what he shoots and the appeal of English longbow. Detailing how his passion for the hobby has developed over years to now encompass Dal Archery, his business which he has been running since 2019 supply quality arrow shafts to the community.
To be completely honest I think we could have probably carried on talking for a couple of more hours but Dal need to get back to spinning his latest batch of arrow shafts.
You can listen to the episode via Amazon music or on Spotify
Episode 143 is now live and in it cover quite a few different topics. As always it is on Spotify and Amazon music
If you are on any archery forums you will probably have heard the various reports about Quicks Archery going to administration. Now I’m not 100% clear on the situation here as some are saying it is still trading while others are saying it has closed. Either way it’s a shame, as we bought our beginners bows from Quicks, when they had a shop just off the M69.
The other big news concerns the government’s proposals concerning Crossbows and how the government have plans to stop the sale of new crossbows and potentially bring in licencing for current owners. There has been so much chatter on various groups that it is getting hard to find the complete details.
There is a lot of concern that this might start the process of outlawing or restricting other types of bows.
Any loss of life is tragic and yes there have been deaths associated with crossbows but, when you look at the figures for knife crime which last year saw over 200 fatalities in 2025, and over 260 in 2024 I feel this new legitration is a sledgehammer to crack a walnut.
In other news, the NFAS results are out and all the proposals have been accepted into the rules except the altered scoring for Pro ring, which is a shame as I quite liked that one as it made a distinction between the inner kill and pro ring.
Briar Rose Club shoot date is out and it is the 19th of July. The good news is we have people already booked on, I think over 20 so far. The dates in July so if you aren’t attending the Welsh Champs up in North Wales why not pop along. It’s open to all nfas archers and all styles, sadly no dogs though. It would have been nice to avoid the same weekend as the Welsh champs but this was the only date our land owner agreed too due to other events on site.
I’ve been trying out the Skylon edge 6.2 arrows and huge thanks to Steve at the club helping me tune in a barebow set up. I think I need to replace the rest though as the current ones not quite long enough. I’m using the Kinetic Honoric limbs on my old Samick vision riser. Also need some 100 grain points as I thought I had some but only 80 grains in the right size thread.
Here are some links to podcasts I mentioned
Merlin Archery adventures podcast which is a new adventure for Merlin and Jim , there are 2 episodes out currently
The other one is Rich over at Archery Geek Outdoors
That’s all for now, enjoy your archery and thanks for supporting this site.
I’ve recorded this episode of the podcast as a video on my thoughts on the National Field Archery Society championship faces (NFAS). It seemed more logical to record a video when talking about target faces than just having it as an audio podcast.
For those that don’t know NFAS produce a selection of target faces specifically designed for the big game round used at clubs across the country and at the National Championships in September.
It is available on Spotify, Amazon, Music and YouTube, the latter being shown below.
In the video I cover the positive and negative points of the targets faces, along with my thoughts specifically on the mess version we use at our club. We have been using these styles of faces for a couple of years and in our experience they work pretty well, especially in wet conditions but there are a couple of negative areas where they could be improved. There is one downside you need to consider and that being, the faces are printed on a white mech fabric and can suffer from being shot out, with the threads breaking. I show a couple of examples in the video.
There are currently 80 target faces, 20 per group, which means you could set 2 full 40 target courses and not repeat a face. We’ve used quite a few of the Group 1 target faces on our open shoots and they have been very well received. I especially like the Tiger and Golden Eagle faces, though the African lion I struggle will as it melts into the background.
You can order these directly from the NFAS website, where in the downloads section you will find the order form. https://nfas.net/downloads
Let me know what you think of the faces. Does your club use them?
Overall I think the quality of the images is great, with it being nice to see some NFAS specific faces. There has obviously been a lot of work involved in putting these together.
The mess works well for us at the club as it out last the equivalent paper face. Like all target faces they will get shot out over time, especially if you have a number of good archers nailing the centre time and time again.
Personally I would like to the scoring lines to be marked in a darker colour, so they are more easily seen as the light grey doesn’t work well on many of the faces.
In the video I mentioned a top tip I recorded in a YouTube short a while back, when it comes to securing the mess faces to target bosses.
If you have any questions or queries you can drop me an email on or a message via the website contact me page.
If you have time please check out my YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/@offthearrowshelf) . Hopefully you will enjoy the content, and if you do, please hit the Like button and consider subscribing to the channel.
Most of all remember to enjoy your shooting and as always thanks for listening, watching and supporting.
My Archery Experiences 