Lighted Sights Now Accepted by Pope & Young

After decades of saying no, the Pope & Young Club has finally told bowhunters around North America what they've been waiting to hear for many years: "Let there be light!"

The announcement came on Thursday, Aug. 15, 2024 when the P&Y Club issued a statement that concerned the long awaited news that the Club will now allow for record book admission for North American big game animals taken by bowhunters utilizing lighted bow sights, a practice that was previously against the Club’s rules.

"The Pope and Young Club, America’s leading bowhunting organization, had a recent bylaws change to allow animals taken with a bow-attached sight equipped with a light to illuminate pin(s) (battery operated) to be eligible for entry into the records program," stated the Club. "Previously, any trophy whereby an electronic (battery operated) sight light that was attached to the bow was not allowed. This change maintains the prohibition against the use of any forward projecting light intended to illuminate a target in any way. The policy change is retroactive allowing any animal, whether previously measured or not, and that was ineligible due to the previous policy, to now be eligible for entry into the records program."

Justin Spring, who was the longtime Director of Big Game Records for the Boone & Crockett Club until it was announced in September 2023 that he had moved into the Executive Director’s chair for the Pope & Young Club, noted that the Club takes its roles in the bowhunting world seriously and doesn't apologize for taking such rule changes with plenty of caution.

“When it comes to technology, Pope and Young has always been the ethical voice for bowhunting," said Spring in the P&Y news release about the rules change. "However, it’s also very important that we show and educate bowhunters about these technologies and how they are not all inherently bad in every case."

While there could be other rule changes coming in the future for the champion of North America’s bowhunting heritage, along with its role as a major wildlife conservation organization and official repository for bowhunting records, don't expect any of that to happen without a careful and deliberate process.

“Hunting should be conducted under Fair Chase conditions and we should continue educating bowhunters with discussions involving technological advancements and their proper use," noted Spring.

For a little backstory, it is worth noting that for years now, some bowhunters have challenged P&Y's unwillingness to allow change on the lighted bow sight issue as technology advanced forward and portions of the bowhunting community have aged and needed a little extra help at first and last light.

The organization stayed true to its DNA, however, ancestral roots that harken back to the Pope & Young Club being born in a time when Dr. Saxton Pope, Art Young, and Ishi hunted whitetails and other North American big game animals with traditional archery equipment only.

With the Club being officially founded during the era of bowhunting icon Fred Bear's heyday in the woods, the Club was birthed on January 27, 1961 in Seattle, Wash. when Glenn St. Charles was elected temporary chairman. The rules that were set early on in the organization's history by St. Charles, Bear, and others focused on entry into the P&Y Record Book reflecting the hunting ethics and values that were prevalent at the time.

While there has been change to the Club's rules over time, that change has been slower than some would like, as Pope & Young officials remained true to the Club's DNA. The slowness to move ahead with the rapid speed of archery industry change has not been without controversy either as some have characterized such reluctance as an Old Guard vs. New School battle.

For North Texas bow shop owner Orvie Cantrell, Jr., who has operated his Big O's Archery Shop an hour north of Dallas in Sherman, Texas since the mid-1980s, the issue of lighted bow sights was settled by his customers many years ago in a county (Grayson County) that is archery only when it comes to hunting whitetails.

So settled, in fact, that his answer to my question of how he and others took last week's P&Y rule change news was emphatic.

Especially when I queried how many of his customers use lighted sights on their bows that come out of the shop that he started nearly four decades ago with his late father, Orvie Cantrell, Sr.

"ALL of them (use lighted bow sights)," chuckled Cantrell, Jr. "Or at least most of them."

As Orvie Jr. reflected on the topic, he noted that while the bow lines he carries — now Mathews, Bowtech, Hoyt, Bear, and a few others — have changed over time, his customers have really never wavered on the topic of lighted bow sights.

"I couldn't tell you for sure when I started selling them, but I think it was at least 30+ years ago," said Cantrell, Jr. "It seems like it was from the very start of my shop or very close to it. And remember, those first ones were pretty crude and unreliable.”

In Cantrell's mind, this most recent P&Y bylaw change is a much better idea, one that keeps up with the times and advancements of the bowhunting industry for sure, but a rule change that he is also in favor of as both a bowhunter and as a bow shop owner who sells products in a place where bowhunting is a way of life.

"I see lighted sights as a means to make more ethical shots," said Cantrell, Jr. "It doesn’t make the equipment perform any better. And I don’t see it as any different than a scope on a rifle. It may extend the time a bowhunter can see to make a shot, but as long as it is within the legal shooting hours set by wildlife authorities, I think it’s fine."

And now, after years of debate on that topic, the Pope & Young Club agrees with Cantrell and many others, paving the pathway forward for bowhunters to enter record book North American big game animals in future years thanks to bow sights that now light the way.

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