 "Yes. Yes it was." |
Posted on 11/12/2018 7:54:52 AM PST by Gamecock
That Browning was so heavy it was only good for sitting in a blind duck or goose hunting. I preferred the Winchester 16 gauge Model 12. When my dad passed I inherited the Winchester 30/30 , the Winchester 22 pump and the Winchester 16 gauge. Sadly, they were all lost in a tragic boating accident some years ago.
Growing up in Western NY my personal favorite was my friends Ithaca 12 gauge. He had a buck barrel and a long barrel for bird hunting. It was the best gun for deer hunting. Light, short and very accurate with deer slugs and that buck barrel. You can not hunt deer with a rifle in that part of NY.
Oh, look.
A noob has come to lecture us on sport.
Good job, noob.
“LOL. I see you know little about squirrel behavior or hunting.”
LOL Just goes to show you that all the nuts aren’t in the trees nor all the squirrels are in the forest.
“Shooting up, into a tree where many squirrels are found, one has to be concerned how far that .22 will travel if one misses the shot. Not so much with bird shot.”
Bird shot??????
“1. Squirrels are high up in trees. Firing upward with a rifle causes the bullet to go several miles towards someone else.”
I want one of those sling shots that will shoot a bullet several miles. My .22 won’t.
A .22 Long Rifle round has a maximum range of about a mile and a half, they will travel a surprisingly long way and you do no want to be standing where it comes down. Shotguns, 12 gauge or otherwise, are generally the preferred firearm for squirrel and rabbit hunting. Growing up in a family of squirrel hunters shotguns were used over .22’s about 5:1. .22’s were usually only used when hunting squirrels with a dog because the squirrel would hug the tree when the dog treed making them a stationary target. When I was a kid I killed tons of them using a 20 gauge but that was more because I was young and the 20 kicked less than the 12, most of the adults were using a 12 gauge. The choke in the shotgun generally dictated what size shot was used. In my 20 gauge with a full choke I usually used #6 shot but my dad’s 12 gauge with a modified choke usually got #4.
Nobody wears hunter orange squirrel hunting, squirrels have excellent eyesight and will bust you instantly in orange. Orange isn’t required in any state that I know of unless it’s during deer season.
In accidents like this, the man firing the gun should be banned from owning or handling a gun ever again.
“...Bird shot??????” [Rannug, post 44]
Not sure if it’s official nomenclature … refers to the smaller shot sizes typically used for bird and small game hunting.
Buckshot refers to the larger sizes, used more often in the past for deer (buck) hunting. Dates all the way back to Colonial times, when most population lived on the east coast or close to it. Hunting ranges were commonly very short, due to density of cover.
A composite load for military muskets was developed during the American War of Independence: one large ball of nominal 0.630 inch diameter, plus three smaller balls 1/4 to 3/8 inch in diameter. Nicknamed the “buck-and-ball” load, its issue was mandated for guard duty later in the war, by the high command of the Continental Army. Not much chance of anything sticking, nor blowing the barrel by overpressure: bore diameter of the standard-issue musket was 0.690 inch, courtesy of the French, who sold about 100,000 older muskets to the fledgling US government.
Americans were quite taken by those muskets, using them as a pattern for the entire remainder of the military-arm muzzle loading period - more or less. Equipped with dual-throated hammer and three barrel bands, they were a little lighter, handier, and easier to maintain than the British “Long Land Pattern” musket known informally as the Brown Bess, in which the barrel was pinned to the stock.
And 69 caliber remained the standard US bore size until 1855, when smoothbores were officially made obsolescent. But the older muskets did not vanish overnight: large numbers had been manufactured over the years and were still in storage in local armories across the nation, when the American Civil War began. Most had been converted from flintlock to percussion; some were rifled to use the hollow-base “Minie ball” invented by the French. Others were issued as smoothbores, for use in combat early in the conflict.
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"Yes. Yes it was." |
Not just early in the war. Grant wrote in his memoirs that when Vicksburg surrendered in July of 1863, many Union regiments taking part in the siege were still equipped with flintlock smoothbores. He authorized their commanders to exchange them for British made caplock rifles surrendered by the Confederates. Grant then turned the antiquated flintlock smoothbores over to the War Department, ostensibly as the weapons taken from the Confederates.
Your assumption has made a complete ass of yourself augie.
I remember like it was yesterday. I was right behind my father as we hunted for quail in Florida. I remember getting sprayed and saying ouch!
When I looked down, I was immediately covered in blood. I had been sprayed with bird shot from my head to my my wrist. FORTUNATELY, my ears and eyes were NOT hit.
I spent the afternoon at Shands Hospital in Gainesville, FLa (Univ of Fla) on the operating table getting bird shot removed.
The doctor and my mother became friends and he always sent her a Christmas card. She was a WWII vet nurse in Jacksonvile and gave my father he$$ because he took me hunting. The doctor and my mother were NOT impressed with my accident.
The shooter was a vet (I believe a retired major) and simply could not see us in the thick Fla underbrush as we were farther away than his quail target.
Whenever I get a head XRAY for dental, they always ask WHAT THE HELL IS IN YOUR HEAD? They have never removed all of the shot as the explanation is the birdshot gets encapsulated and is no threat. For years afterward, I would go to the doctor to get shot removed that had worked it’s way to the surface.
In my father’s hunting crowd, especially dove hunting, a few beers was normal while hunting. When I was shot, alcohol was NOT involved as quail hunting means walking long distances but dove hunting means sitting instead.
And what was it, exactly, that you assume I assumed, noob?
+1 on all your points.
The 2 3/4” 12 ga. shotgun shell is the most versatile of all shotgun gauges. From 7/8 oz. and even lighter payloads (3/4 and 5/8 oz.) all the way up the 1 1/2 oz. lead and beyond. That’s not even getting into varying shell lengths and steel shot and slug loads.
I’ve handloaded them all for going on 40 years.
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