Jim Billman takes aggressive approach toward fishing with compound bow

Retired sheriff's deputy Jim Billman is not the type for sitting idly.

So when it comes to fishing, it's not surprising he lacks the patience for staring at a bobber upon the chance that it might dip below the surface.

He's discarded his rod and reel, and he has no use for hooks and bait. Luring or tricking a fish is no longer in his playbook.

His strategy is an aggressive one: He hunts them down.

On sunny, windless days, Billman can be found on his 20-foot Sea-Ark boat with a compound bow, stalking murky waters in Southeast Missouri and southern Illinois.

Cutline-Body Copy:Jim Billman takes aim while bowfishing near Grand Tower, Illinois. Billman, who has been bowfishing since the age of 5, operates Dirtwater Bow Fishing Charter.Cutline-File Credit:JEFF BREER

And he can be quite successful, regardless of whether the fish are biting or not.

The 52-year-old Billman retired three years ago from his deputy job of 27 years in McKendree County, Illinois, located near the border of Wisconsin, and moved to Cape Girardeau County.

Introduced to bowfishing at the age of 5, he now resides in a hotbed area for bowfishing in his retirement. The Mississippi River, Ohio River and Big Muddy and their many tributaries and other backwater areas, coupled with seasonal warm temperatures, lead to a wide menu of "rough" fish not found in other areas of the country that can legally be taken by bow.

"Down here, this area, it's like a smorgasbord of bowfishing," Billman says. "You've got longnose gar, shortnose gar, buffalo, silver carp, bighead carp, common carp, grass carp. You've got pretty much seven species of fish that you can go after. There's no limit on any of them. You can fill your boat."

Bowfishing is a sport he took up with his two brothers in a creek behind their house while growing up in northern Illinois. They speared almost exclusively common carp.

Cutline-Body Copy:Jim Billman displays a gar he landed while bowfishing near Grand Tower, Illinois. Billman, who has been bowfishing since the age of 5, operates Dirtwater Bow Fishing Charter.Cutline-File Credit:JEFF BREER

"The three of us would go out and bowfish all day long, literally," Billman says. "I still did regular fishing, and have for years, probably up until seven or eight years. I haven't picked up a rod and reel since. I just bowfish, period."

He said he was introduced to this general area when his family began to vacation and camp at Lake Muryphysboro State Park, near Murphysboro, Illinois, when he was around 8 years old.

"At that point I loved it down here," Billman says.

And when he got his driver's license, he would head south to "camp and hang out."

The area was what he termed an "outdoor mecca," especially for bowfishing.

Jim Billman displays the catch from a bowfishing expedition near Grand Tower, Illinois. Billman, who has been bowfishing since the age of 5, operates Dirtwater Bow Fishing Charter.JEFF BREER ~ jbreer@semissourian.com

He bought a house in 2008 in Alto Pass, Illinois, and planned to retire there but sold it in 2012 because of the higher property taxes on the east side of the Mississippi.

"When I retired in 2014, I said, 'I'm coming back down somewhere around here," Billman says.

He looked at Tennessee but ultimately settled on Missouri, and more specifically Cape Girardeau.

"I never really hung around Cape much even though I was here all the time," Billman says. "I came down over here and started driving around and I said, 'You know, this is pretty nice over here. People are decent. I like it,' and started looking, and this is where I located. But I wanted to be close enough to be doing exactly this, jump over the river and I still have Shawnee National Forest and all the bowfishing and everything over here that I'm familiar with."

A handyman skilled at welding aluminum, he bought his boat in 2012 with the intention of outfitting it for bowfishing, which he has. He erected a platform and rails on the bow, and added a second-tier platform to provide a bird's-eye view of the water.

A gar is pulled in after being struck by an arrow shot by Jim Billman on a bowfishing expedition near Grand Tower, Illinois.JEFF BREER ~ jbreer@semissourian.com

He opened Dirtwater Bow Fishing Charter two years ago, and has been turning people onto the sport in groups of two to four at a time.

He'll supply compound bows and fiberglass arrows, attached with about 25 yards of line. After a quick lesson covering safety and technique, the hunt is on.

"I've actually taken guys bowfishing that have never done it and talked to them a couple years later, and they said, 'I haven't picked up a rod and reel since. This is all I want to do -- bowfish. They just gave it up. They're like, 'This is way more fun.'"

There is a learning curve to the sport, mainly due to refraction, which gives a skewed vision of the position of the fish. Due to the altered perception, aim must be taken below the fish.

"I tell them, 'Act like that's a fish right under that fish, and that's the one you're aiming at,'" Billman says.

The clearer the water, the tougher the refraction is to figure out, which makes dirty water the best. In order to see a fish, they must be closer to the surface.

"If it's clear water it's hard to judge how deep they are," Billman says. "You've got to shoot and miss and figure out, 'Wow, they're deeper than they look.' I've got the dirty-water thing down. I know how deep you are. I got that one."

Like any kind of fishing, conditions come into play. While bowfishing can take place year round, the fish are generally deep in warmer water in the winter months, which makes spotting fish difficult, if not impossible. With warmer weather, fish begin to rise. Billman says the season generally lasts from mid-April to mid-September, with the peak times ranging from late June through August.

The sunnier and warmer the weather, the more the fish make their way into shallows for feeding and spawning. Calm to low winds and sunshine are vital along with polarized sunglasses, with the combination allowing for visibility below the surface.

"Like any fishing, It can be a good day, it can be a bad day," Billman says.

In addition to running his guide service, Billman also competes in bowfishing tournaments, where there is camaraderie among competitors.

"Bowfishing guys all tend to share information," Billman says. "We all go out. There's that many of these fish. The tournaments we go to are a lot of fun because everyone gets along."

Bighead carp can reach weights upwards of 80 pounds.

"A good day, you're going to hit some bighead carp," Billman says. "They're big. They're the hardest to come by. They're the most skittish of any of the carp. Even though there is a lot of them, there are fewer of them than, say, the silver carp.

Billman also likes to share his love of the sport with youngsters. He's participated in a bowfishing clinic with the Missouri Department of Conservation in the past, and will do so again on June 9 at the Duck Creek Conservation Area.