Colum Cille 3D 2025
I was excited to be back at Ballywalter for a couple of reasons, one of which was because of the new species of pheasant introduced to the estate. This species is known as Reeve’s Pheasant and comes from China. And…
Tag archery
War of the Feathers – Part 5
X It was too much to hope that the Xellcarrians would have let them have the rest of the afternoon, Evander lamented. Then again, there was more desperation behind them than General Aedion had let on. On the horizon, like…
Between Bow and Being: Plato, Aristotle, and the Archer’s Path
“ There is no fault nor detriment / in facing bare the cruelty of world…” — We’ll Go Asleep Imagine, now, not just a tool or a sport, but a whisper that’s survived since we first dared to shape the…
When the French came to town…
29th April saw a contingent of six archers from The Les Archers Béarnais club in France travel to Ireland for a whistle-stop archery tour of the South East. By saying it was a whistle-stop tour, I mean over the course…...
This Whisper Of Cobwebs…
Hello Crackers, my friends and Archery fans, are you all good? I hope so, I truly do, and I have some good news for myself—yes I do—as I have managed to book my place at the national champs in Dunbrody,…...
An Arrow for the Earl
strange heat it was, the summer of 1399. The kind of heat that presses down on the land and makes the air thick with waiting. You could feel it in the quiet of the fields and the low murmur of…...
War of the Feathers – Part 4
V It was the same horse that had thrown Evander from its saddle not long ago. But that hardly mattered to him as he spurred it on, past the dead splayed across the battlefield, after the rider. He didn’t need…
War of the Feathers – Part 3
Day 2 I It had been too long a night. For General Casey Aiza his restlessness was now searing into something more tangible, a solid force he could finally apply. Still, it was bittersweet in a way. Since he was…
Bluebell Shoot 2025
It is now summer, which in Ireland means the weather likes to behave in more of a bipolar manner. Summer in Ireland is different from the other two seasons – I’m convinced we don’t really get Spring, just a mildish…
The Wounds That Never Heal
A meditation on hurt, ritual, and the intimate violence of archery “Then the English archers stept forth one pace and let fly their arrows so wholly [together] and so thick, that it seemed snow. When the Genoways felt the arrows…...
The Reapers Are the Angels: What If?
“You walk and you walk and you carry what you can and you leave the rest behind.” It stays with you, that line, doesn’t it? Like the feel of a worn stone in your pocket, or the ache in your…...
The Case for Greater Archery
This is an updated version of an article I published a few years ago, about how badly the Olympics and World Archery need to diversify the representation of shooting styles. Given the inclusion of compound, I felt it was appropriate to not only republish it but update it too.
War of the Feathers – Part 2
IV “I always wanted to do a landscape of the Mayne Lighthouse,” Ebrill said, relief in her voice as they clattered down the steps of the lighthouse’s base into the refreshingly cool, salty air. Evander enjoyed the taste and smell…
Archers Of Ennis (Onwards and upwards)
Introduction – who we are… We are a dedicated community built on shared passion, friendly competition, and a genuine love for the art of archery – Archers of Ennis isn’t just a place to hone our skills. It’s become the…
The tyrany of Coaching
Well archers, readers, today we embark on a journey of what if… It’s a heretical endeavour, filled with blasphemy and a provocation calculated—yes, calculated—to infuriate you. This is not a careless insult nor a drunken rant penned between ends. No,…...
Rituals of the Unseen
There are mornings when the world feels like a screen that forgot to sleep—flickering, expectant, always asking. In such light, where every silence must be earned and every stillness risks interruption, the soul reaches for older shapes. Not solutions. Not…...
The Bow Remembers: On the Ethics of Recoil
The essay that follows—perhaps a touch long for an online piece—is, in truth, a chapter from The Arrow Knows No Master, a book I’ve been quietly shaping since February of last year. It’s composed of individual essays—mostly reflective, occasionally philosophical—on…
Charles the Bold and the Gamble of Archers
I came across him not in a book, but in a footnote misquoted in the margin of another. It was a binding so cracked it seemed to wheeze when opened, part of a bundle I’d been lent by a Flemish…...
No Comfort Zone For Next 24 Targets
As the fictious, famed Chaos Theorist and open shirt enthusiast, Dr Ian Malcom, once said, “Hang on, this is going to be bad.” 3D Archery is not like Field Archery, and very far removed from Target Archery. Each of the…
Justice, of a Sort
Aeker Murdock had been invited to a major archery event held in the Kingdom of Xellcarr. As the archery guild’s Master of Crows, he was often called upon to guest inspect private, or national, competitions. His title, a hangover from…