How many builders hunt?

[Onojutta]

Just a curious non-technical question here: How many of you guys who build guns do and don't hunt with them?

I've been an avid hunter for the last decade and a half, but I have found that I am slowly losing interest in that pursuit. Coincidentally (or perhaps ironically) my interest in gun building is growing.

Hunting deer is what possessed me to go out and buy my first flintlock. But since then, I have become fascinated with the history, heritage, and building of traditional firearms.

I'm just getting into the building part of muzzleloaders, but I think I'm worried that building guns and not hunting with them will leave a sort of void. Or could it be that building guns will fill the void left by hunting?

 

[Allan Gray]

There are few things more rewarding than taking a rifle that you've built yourself into the field. Even more so if you've got a stash of ammo that you've cast yourself from old lead scrap.

I also fly fish and would compare it to fishing with flies that you've tied yourself...just plain good stuff! :thumbsup:

 

[C_Laubach]

I build and hunt.




Chris Laubach

 

[Headhunter]

I hunt, therefore I build my own and some for lucky individuals.

HH

 

[shortstring]

Been building for 37 years, if you count all the sparrows & starlings that fell to my trusty Crossman, I've been hunting since I was 6 or so. In recent years I've hunted less & less, mostly out of lazyness. Easier to buy a hunk of dead cow.

 

[Capt. Jas.]

Been hunting since six and now 43. The joy and excitement of the hunt is not as it was. I have not hunted deer for a couple of years now. Still love bird hunting and most of the other hunting that allows some social interaction such as rabbit hunting but frankly would rather be in the shop.

I have taken much game in my life so I don't need to fill a "quota". The thrill is not worth the efforts of cleaning. I do however like to get them in my sights and yell "bang" as a coup.

I feel my hunting background and more importantly what I know of stock fitting adds to the end product of the guns I will make.

Building the guns has given me a new facet to enjoy and a new set of friends as well. I also like to shoot clay pigeons as much as I can. They taste awful but you don't have to clean them. :haha:

 

[Mike Brooks]

I hunted alot up untill probably about the year 2000. Just don't have time anymore. Besides, I don't own a muzzleloader anymore.....haven't for years. :shake:

 

[Longsmoke]

Brooks that statement almost knocked me over. Them I thought, I still have the first flintgun I built 14 or so years ago but all the guns I've built all have other homes. Untill a month ago when I finished one that is not for sale. Now I have 2.

Finding time and fighting over population is my biggest problem with hunting these days.

Although a cool misty spring morning with the Toms telling you where thay are is hard to beat. Any more the best part is setting under a 100 year old tree with a trusted flintlock in my lap, happy to have quite place to take a nap.

Bruce Everhart

 

[Vaino]

Have been hunting for 71 yrs and it all started in northern Minnesota staying w/ my grandparents on their subsistence farm. Not many deer back then but managed to supply some July venison for the first time when 11 yrs old. Since then have done many types of hunting and trapping and every minute was greatly enjoyed. In fact when I went off to full time college, my father said that I was hunting full time and studying part time. At 78 have "hung up" the guns and now enjoy only building which by the way is a very rewarding pursuit even for a "klutz". Only memories of all the hunts persist....Fred

 

[Black Hand]

I build (infrequently) and hunt. After all, it's too cold to work in my shop during hunting season anyway and it keeps me out of trouble...

 

[larry wv]

I build once in awhile. I get along with steel better than wood. I hunt with mine and beat the brush so to speak :shocked2: . The dings and scrapes add character. Larry Wv

 

[ron ward]

i've built several modern, high powers and of course, hunt with them. this will be my first ML build (don't know why it me so long to finaly build one!) and i do plan to hunt with it, in fact i plan to hunt the entire gun season with it first time i use it. if it goes good, i have given thought selling of my modern guns save one and building a few more muzzle guns of various style.
for my state and the conditions of hunting here, a ML is just as effective as a modern gun. i figured i would save one high power for the few spots i know i'll hunt where a long shot might be possible, i do like to sit over fields occasionaly.
the current issues in wisconsin, with the DNR and the deer herd has begun to make me think i might not be hunting as often as i have been or not at all for a year or two at some point. that's alright,too... i enjoy building the guns as much or more than using them and i would continue to build them even if hunting became only a very occasional activity.

 

[Little Wattsy]

Just a curious non-technical question here: How many of you guys who build guns do and don't hunt with them?

I've been an avid hunter for the last decade and a half, but I have found that I am slowly losing interest in that pursuit. Coincidentally (or perhaps ironically) my interest in gun building is growing.

Hunting deer is what possessed me to go out and buy my first flintlock. But since then, I have become fascinated with the history, heritage, and building of traditional firearms.

I'm just getting into the building part of muzzleloaders, but I think I'm worried that building guns and not hunting with them will leave a sort of void. Or could it be that building guns will fill the void left by hunting?

I build to hunt BUT I could see why those two actions could be mutually exclusive...

 

[fort fireman]

I've only built one fowler out of a part set and loved it.I'm in the process of planning my nxt build which will be a 54 cal. lancaster. I have hunted with my fowler and there is a deffinate pride in carrying a gun I built. The lancaster will be my deer and maybe montana elk gun(hopefully). I don't see me stopping hunting to build but I am really enjoying the building aspect of it also.

 

[Roy]

I try to go hunting..

 

[Ephraim]

I built and started hunting with a sling shot at age 7 or 8. started building rifles at age 14 and hunting tree rats. I am soon to be 63 and still build a rifle once in a while and still love going to the woods and shooting at tree rats.Just can't see them so well any more.
Ephraim

 

[Eric Krewson]

Finished my first rifle a month ago and plan to build several more in the future. I build bows and guns to hunt with because I like the feeling I get when I put game in the freezer with something I made.

Here is yesterdays buck. Not entirely a flintlock kill because it took a bunch of tracking and centerfire shot to put him down after a less than perfect flintlock shot the night before.

 

[Capt. Fred]

Nice buck Eric and good for you for tracking him down and taking him home.

I certainly don't consider myself a builder but I have put together a couple. I hunted with the 54 flinter this year for deer (no love) and plan on trying for a coyote or bobcat with my .40 too.

I'm with TG. It's not the game anymore but just looking for some quiet time in the woods.

 

[Swamp Buck]

Looks like we have the same plan in mind, just doing it in a different order.

I built a Early Lancaster 54 flintlock in 2008 and absolutely love it. I shot a 6-point buck that same year with it.

I have a Pennsylvania Fowler parts set on order and can't wait to build it. I will be in the woods next fall trying to blast a partridge with it and perhaps hunt deer with it also.

 

[rdillion]

When I build a rifle the thoughts of hunting with it goes into its design. But to be truthful it seems I have less and less time to get into the woods anymore. I do however do a lot of shooting at a friends house who lives close by. I've always been more of a shooter anyway. I tell my friends that if hunting didn't involve shooting I wouldn't go. :grin: