About Stalker Recurves

Stalker Custom Recurves finds its home in the redwood country of northern California.  Far from the packed beaches, high rises and snarling traffic to the south, the more relaxed pace to the north lends itself well to a bowyer working his craft.  Bows are built in a custom 4,000 square foot shop just outside my back door; perfect for a short commute and accomodating sudden bursts of inspiration. 

The first thing that struck me when I saw a Stalker Recurve was the beautiful lines the bow carries.  The graceful curves have all been sculpted to give the bow a light feel; both to the eye and in the hand.  There are no awkward, blocky areas on the bow that would distract from the natural beauty of the woods that combine to make up the riser and limbs.  If the bow is a visual feast, then sliding your hand onto the handle is ecstasy.   To me the greatest selling point to the bow is getting it in your hand.  Your hand fits as though the riser was sculpted for it; no searching for the sweet spot, it finds itself effortlessly.  The radiused shelf is carved out a scant inch above the throat of the grip, placing the arrow as close to the top of your hand as possible, making the arrow a virtual extension of your index finger.

As a testament to Charlie’s keen eye and a lot of tinkering, I made few mechanical changes to his latest design.  The first was updating the limb design to allow it to shoot the newer low stretch string materials.  A little extra proprietary reinforcement in the limb tips and the bow now can enjoy the extra performance from Fast Flight, Dyna Flight and a host of other string materials.

The second change I made was slimming down the limbs.  Asthetically, I like the look of a narrower limb over a wider one.  From a performance standpoint, a narrower limb typically will be more efficient as less of the limb’s stored energy is used overcoming its inertia.  The more mass the limbs have, the more energy it takes to get them moving, absorbing valuable kenetic energy that could be used to propel your arrow.  Additionally, as the bow returns to brace height following the shot, a heavier limb will oscillate longer, potentially creating more noise and hand-shock.  The down side to making a narrower limb is manufacturing tolerances have to be much tighter as they are much less forgiving than a limb of a wider design to build.   

Stalker Recurves History

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For some of you salty old shooters, Charlie Bisharat probably needs no introduction.  But for those of you who weren’t shooting a stick back then, or didn’t get the pleasure of meeting or talking with him, I’ll give you some history on how Stalker Recurves came about. 

Charlie Bisharat first got into archery, like many of us, at a young age.  However, it got put on the back burner while he played football at the University of Oregon from ’78-‘81.  An injury, causing the removal of part of his collar bone complicated his re-entry into archery.  The Bear Kodiak he shot was too heavy coming off of his injury, so he picked up a compound and shot that for a couple of years while he rebuilt his strength.  In 1984 as he began to toy with his recurve again, he met Larry Jones.  Shortly after, Larry introduced him to Jim Brackenbury and he quickly ordered a bow.  Fast forward three years.  When Charlie picked up the phone to order his 6th bow from Jim, he told Charlie he was sick of building him bows and if he wanted another, then he was going to have to come up and build it himself.  Jim no sooner hung up the phone and Charlie was pulling out of the driveway.  After 3 days of building bows during the day and bugling at elk in the evenings, Charlie had built three bows and Stalker Recurves was born.  Jim sent Charlie home with a stack of raw materials, a thermostat for an oven and a healthy dose of encouragement to start his own bow business. “There is plenty of room for another good bowyer,” Jim told him.

Tragically, Jim drowned during a drift boat accident on a float trip a few years later.  His funeral was well attended by Charlie and other aspiring bowyers he had mentored; Wes Wallace, Ron Fox, Norm Johnson and others.  Following his funeral, they held a shoot in his honor.  After the loss of his mentor, Charlie kept on refining his design and churning out bows. By the late 90’s, Charlie had built the business up to the point he was almost ready to quit his work in the construction field and take on bow building full time.  About this time he landed a job as a superintendent; good pay, benefits and job security.  With four kids to raise, he was torn, but in the end put his dreams on hold to focus on raising his family.  And so Stalker Recurves sat dormant for almost a decade, collecting, rather than making sawdust. 

I first met Charlie Bisharat and his bow back in ’94 while we were hunting the same lease for blacktailed deer.  We kept in touch and a couple of years later, worked out a trade, a custom made Stalker bow in exchange for a llama pack trip for blacktails and black bear.  Almost 10 years later, I got a call from Charlie asking if I would be interested in buying Stalker Recurves.    

There are few people in life that are able to make a living doing the thing they really love, and fewer yet, those that are able to combine their two greatest passions together and call it their “job”.  When I purchased Stalker Recurves from Charlie Bisharat, I became one of those few people.  My interest in archery and woodworking originated about the same time in my life, when I was five years old.  My skills in both were crude in the beginning, but with persistence and determination; I grew quite proficient.  Following my high school graduation, I began a career as a professional woodworker.  I started with hardwood flooring and soon after branched out into stair building, cabinets and some furniture design and build.  My work interests focused on custom and artistic projects and I built up a good client base that appreciated my sharp eye for detail and demand for quality.  After almost 20 years in the trades, I was feeling the toll it had taken, and I was getting restless.  Rather fortuitously, one day in the spring of ’07 my phone rang.  When Charlie asked me if I was interested in buying the business, I jumped at the opportunity.  Who wouldn’t want to combine two of their greatest passions?

Though I never got a chance to meet Jim Brackenbury, I am proud to work the craft of a bowyer under the shadow of his legacy.  There are few men that are as selfless as he was, willingly giving his hard-earned knowledge and skills to aspiring students.  I think every man wants, in his own way, to leave behind a legacy.  He continues to reach people he never knew.  I know when I turn over a handle I’ve just finished in my hand, I have more than my 20 years of woodworking skill to credit, more than Charlie Bisharat to thank, I remember the man who started so many other men on their way to becoming bowyers and I hope he looks down on my work approvingly.