Best ground blinds for bowhunting turkeys, ranked on the room to draw

How we picked

We have not set up or hunted from any of these blinds. Every figure comes from the maker's published page and links to it, scored on the blind rubric on our methodology page: setup speed 25%, interior space 25%, concealment and windows 25%, weight and packability 15%, fabric durability 10%.

The difference from our main turkey blind roundup is the eligibility gate. A gun blind needs a window and a rest. A bow blind needs room for a 30 in axle-to-axle bow to swing, clearance for a drawn string, and mesh you can shoot through or a window wide enough to shoot out of. So a blind had to publish a peak or standing height and a shooting width to be ranked here, and the run-and-gun options that are perfectly good with a shotgun are excluded by that gate.

On the bow side, both NWTF writers we read treat the blind as the enabling piece of equipment, not a comfort item. Darron McDougal recommends a blind to conceal the movement of drawing, and Brandon Ray writes that “a well-positioned blind” gives better odds than natural cover.

The four, side by side

Height and interior lead the table because they are the two rows that decide whether you can draw. Every value links to its source.

Why the Prowler 300 wins

The Barronett Prowler 300 is the only blind here Barronett builds around archery, and its numbers show it. The peak is 80 in, which Barronett says lets most archers draw and shoot while standing; the floor is 70 x 70 in with a 90 in hub-to-hub shooting width and 34.1 sq ft of floor; and the eight window openings carry adjustable coverings that orient vertically or horizontally over replaceable shoot-through mesh. The interior is black, the shell is 150 denier polyester with exterior DWR and an interior PU coating, and the whole thing is a published 14 lb with a 1-year limited warranty.

Two details a bowhunter will use. The window coverings turning vertical is what gives you a tall, narrow slot for a standing shot rather than a wide letterbox meant for a rested shotgun. And detachable blaze orange safety panels come in the box, which matters on public ground and is required in some states and seasons.

Its honest weaknesses: the walls are solid, not see-through, so you watch birds through open windows; Barronett does not describe the window adjustment as silent; and the mesh is rated for broadheads only, which means a shotgun shot has to go through an open window. That last point is why this blind is first here and second in the gun-hunting ranking.

The number that matters: peak height

Every blind on this page fits a gun hunter. Only one of them is tall enough that a standing draw is the maker's own claim. The published heights: Prowler 300 at an 80 in peak, and 66 in standing height on the Ameristep Silent Brickhouse Wide Bottom, the Ameristep Care Taker Wide Bottom and the Rhino 180.

Sixty-six inches is not a failure, it is a constraint: it means you are shooting seated, which is how most turkeys are killed with a bow anyway. Seated, what you need is width more than height, because the bow has to rotate. Compare the published shooting widths: 90 in (Prowler 300), 80 in (Silent Brickhouse), 78 in (Care Taker), and 58 in of floor with a 75 in width at the hub on the Rhino 180. That last figure is why the Rhino, an excellent see-through blind, ranks fourth for a bow.

Shoot-through mesh, and what it is rated for

Shoot-through mesh lets you keep a window covered and send an arrow through it. It is genuinely useful for a bow and it is genuinely limited, and both makers here say so:

• Barronett sells the Prowler 300's mesh as replaceable Shoot-Through mesh for broadhead use only.
• Ameristep says in its FAQs that its blind mesh is shoot-through only with a fixed-blade broadhead.

Read those two lines together and the rules are clear. A fixed-blade head goes through mesh. A mechanical head may open on the mesh, which is one reason Ray's large-diameter Magnus Bullhead setup is a shoot-out-the-window proposition rather than a shoot-through-mesh one, and it is a reason to check your own broadhead choice against your blind. And a shotgun never goes through mesh: wad and shot will tear it and wreck the pattern. If the same blind will do double duty for gun seasons, plan on opening a window for the gun.

Mesh also costs you light and clarity. The Rhino 180 takes the other approach, with two full see-through mesh walls Rhino says give head-to-toe 180-degree visibility plus silent-slide windows it describes as designed for bow and gun hunters. Watching a bird work is worth a lot when you are waiting for him to look away; the trade-off is a 58 x 58 in floor. The two philosophies are compared in see-through vs traditional ground blinds.

The chair decides your draw height

A blind and a chair are one system for a bowhunter, and the chair is the part most people get wrong. Sit too low and your top cam hits the roof or your string catches your chest; sit too high and your head is above the window. Two blind chairs in our registry publish the seat heights that matter:

• The Barronett Aluminum XL Blind Chair sits at 18 in, which Barronett calls the “ideal position for clear sight lines within your hub blind,” with a 400 lb rating on a 4 lb frame.
• The ALPS OutdoorZ Rhino MC sits at 18.5 in, rated 375 lb at 5 lb 6 oz, with a short 12 in backrest — and a low backrest is an advantage when a bowstring is coming past your shoulder.

Swivel matters too, though neither of these publishes one. Both chairs are ranked in best turkey hunting chairs. The other job the chair does is silence: Barronett lists padded armrests it says dampen noise when you shift, and a hard chair in a quiet blind is the sound a close gobbler hears.

Setting the blind for a bow shot

The published advice from both NWTF writers converges on the same set-up, and it is worth following exactly:

• Face the shooting window away from the sun. McDougal recommends facing blinds “west, north or south for morning hunts” and “east, north or south” in the afternoon. Ray puts his blind in shade, oriented north or south to keep sun off the equipment.
• Close every window but the one you will shoot from. Both writers say it. A dark interior with one open slot is what hides a draw — and the black ShadowGuard interior on the Ameristep blinds and the black interior on the Prowler 300 are there for the same reason.
• Put the decoys in front of that window, 8 to 10 yards out. Ray sets his about 8 to 10 yards; McDougal says 10 yards or less. Our ranked decoys for the job are in best turkey decoys for bowhunting.
• Clear the floor. Leaves and sticks under a chair are the noise you make at the worst moment.
• Stake it down. Every blind here ships with stakes and tie-downs: 12 steel stakes and 4 tie-downs on the Ameristep blinds, 9 stakes and ropes on the Prowler 300, stakes and ropes on the Rhino. A blind that moves in a gust is a blind a turkey watches.

Turkeys, blinds and brushing in

Turkeys tolerate a blind better than deer do, which is the good news for a bow season. You can usually set one the morning you hunt it. The caveat is the shape: a black box in an open field edge is a new object, and birds that have been hunted will look at it. Two of these blinds publish brush loops or holders — the Silent Brickhouse Wide Bottom lists two camo brush loops, and the Prowler 300 lists none — so on open ground plan to cut cover and lean it against the blind, and set the blind against a background rather than in front of the sky.

Whether you need a blind at all, for gun or bow, is argued in do you need a blind for turkey hunting. For a bow, the honest answer is closer to yes than for any other way of hunting turkeys.

What did not make this list

Two blinds we rank elsewhere are deliberately excluded. The Ameristep Doghouse Run & Gun is 61 in tall with a 55 in shooting width, which is the tightest enclosed blind in our registry — good at 8.6 lb for a gun hunter who walks, wrong for a drawn bow. The 2 lb Ameristep Throwdown is a three-panel stake-out with a 29 in wall and no windows; it hides your lap, not the movement of a draw. Both are in the main blind roundup, where they earn their places.

Buyer's guide: a blind you can shoot a bow from

Measure the bow, then read the spec sheet

Draw height seated and axle-to-axle width, against published peak height and shooting width. An 80 in peak is a standing draw; 66 in is a seated one. There is no substitute for the tape measure.

Match the mesh to your broadhead

Shoot-through mesh is rated for fixed blades by both makers here. If you shoot mechanicals or a large-diameter head, plan on shooting through an open window instead, and set the blind so one window covers your decoys.

Buy the chair with the blind

An 18 in seat is set for hub-blind sight lines. A low turkey chair meant for sitting against a tree will put you under the window, and a tall camp chair will put your head over it.

Count the stakes and check the warranty

Stakes, tie-downs and a carry bag should be in the box — they are on all four of these. The warranties are short: 1 year on the Ameristep blinds (excluding animal and weather damage), 1 year limited on the Prowler 300, and nothing published on the Rhino 180.

Then rehearse the whole thing once

Blind up, chair in, decoys at 10 yards, one window open. Draw, aim at the decoy, let down. Anything that catches, rattles or blocks you will show up in that one rehearsal and never again.