Ranging About

Kragg - not dissimilar to the Lee in feel & action.

Extremely enjoyable day at the range thanks to Tom, of Boomers & BS, who kindly let me sample a portion of his significant arsenal. I enjoyed it all - Garand v. Lee Enfield shoot off, .458 Lott, .557 Snider, Encore, Contender and more besides.

Somewhat indifferent marksmanship on my part at 100 yrds, shooting low with the Lee (oddly) and to the right with a scoped Mauser 7mm - which Tom shot with deadly accuracy. Still, we were in it for the fun and, for me, a chance to try out new weaponry.

Enormous Huge Great Rifle!

Shot better with the pistols, in particular Tom's custom 1911 Dan Wesson; I'm a complete convert, not that I was unwilling... Seriously - what an excellent pistol. Go out and buy one if you can. Today.

Just a lot of pistols.

Then, just as we'd finished firing the larger hand guns and were about to settle into shooting some relaxing Ruger & assorted .22 pistols, the rain came down in sheets and it was back to the range office to take shelter from the storm.

Despite the last portion of the shoot getting rained off, a great day was had by all:

Huge respect to the authour of Boomers & BS for sharing part of his exciting and powerful collection of fire arms.

The 1911 is "right on" - certainly as customised by Tom.

"Astro" range near Florence, Texas, is friendly and was happily empty - on Friday.

Garand seems easier to shoot than the Lee - but a very different rifle.

Winchester 70 Featherweight (30-06) looks beautiful, kicks like fury.

Evil Nazi sporterised rifle can be dead on target.

Ancient Rhodie Cavalry Carbine (?) might not hit much these days but is mighty fun to shoot.

You can shoot EXTREMELY LARGE ROUNDS through pistols single handed and hit the target.

And just in case you were wondering, the .410 through a rifled pistol barrel is no use whatsoever as a self defense round at 15 yards - perhaps much less (thx. Tom for the demo). At least that's the way I see it.

Looking forward to the next shoot.

Cheers,

LSP

Broken Old Rubbish

You know how it is, sometimes you get in the mood to buy a gun, which is the way I felt Thursday afternoon after riding about and target shooting at the stable stock tank. So I walked down to the "Gold Nugget Gun and Pawn" to see what was on offer.

Not much. An SMLE which looked sound and tempting until I found out that the bolt fell apart. Then there was a Mauser and that looked alright too, but its magazine was missing. An SKS seemed in decent(ish) shape but it was Norinco, so if it wasn't broken it soon would be, then there was a series of synth stock Savages in various of brokenness and so on, gun after busted gun.

Don't get me wrong, I like GNG&P and always have a pleasant visit while browsing the weaponry - but today was a bust - except, perhaps, an old Winchester 70, which seemed OK but a little pricey for what it was.

Anyway, what I really want is a semi auto battle rifle in 7.62 - just to have fun blasting away and using against pigs if the opportunity presents itself. Tom from Boomers&BS (check his neat post on 'Dragonslayer' & Encore projects) recommends an M1A/M14 type rifle or one of the FN FAL variants - as I understand it they're about the same price and performance. But I've never shot the M1A/M14 whereas I've had plenty of time on the FN (years ago...); so I guess the latter has a kind of nostalgia value and I used to be familiar with it. I think that swings me in the direction of the one time rifle of the Free World - still, the other's attractive because its American and, to me, new. What to do? Get both! But I haven't recieved a government bailout! I guess its FN first - then save up for an M1A, or something like that. saying that, all advice welcome.

Speaking of kit - great thanks to Suburban Bushwacker for "magisterial" knife post, which lured me towards the useful looking F1/S1 and the great looking custom jobs made by the Backyard Bushman.

Hope to make a dent in the porcine menace today - they've gotten away with far too much.

LSP

Trapper

In Pershore, U.K., the squirrels are running wild, out of hand. So what's to be done? Shoot them? yes, but it's a 'built up area', so MCP traps them and...

They meet their demise.

As I recall, the same mallet/cosh was used against the moles. It's a weighty thing and, at the end of the day, more humane than not. Squirrels end up on BBQ. Well, its not hog, but you get your game where you find it and as SBW reminds us, if you're not prepared to kill what you eat...

On another theme; go to the excellent Boomers site for some well needed Hillaire Belloc + great article viz. Apex rifle. 

LSP