Use a ball block( Loading block) to carry pre-cut, pre-lubed PRBs for hunting. Pre-measure powder charges and carry them in separate tubes. You can make them from wood, metal, adapt them from plastic tubes, or buy them.
I have several tubes from Cigars that I cut down and fitted to carry charges of powder for my rifle. They are easily carried in a pocket, or a small hunting pouch.
I carry cleaning patches in a small plastic bag when hunting, to keep them dry, in a cargo pocket, along with several sheets of paper toweling to clean my hands and the gun after its fired. If I am hunting with my percussion shotgun, I carry the capper in my back jeans pocket, where I carry it every time I hunt, and at the range, too.
When I carried a hunting pouch, powder horn, powder measure, screwdrivers, jags, extra balls in a leather bag, short starter,pre-lubed patches in a tin, cleaning patches in another tin, needle-nose pliers, caps in a tin, and a few other odds and ends, such as ear plugs, and toothpicks, and pins to replace any pin that may be lost from my rifle, etc.... That BAG became a LOT OF DEAD weight.
After hunting that way for a few years, I began eliminating all the things I had never NEEDED in the field, putting them in the range box I leave in the trunk or back of my car/truck/SUV.
The Ball block has proven the BEST addition to my gear to save time and space to reload in the field. I don't carry more than 3 balls in a block when deer hunting. I used to carry more than 20 in my ball bag.
I am coning the muzzles of my guns to eliminate the need to carry a Short-Starter in the field.
I do sometimes use a small belt-sized hunting pouch these days that I bought from October Country many years ago. But, I also have simply put my components in the cargo pockets of my hunting vest for easy access, particularly when the weather is inclement. I even remember to take a cloth towel in one of those pockets to use to dry my face and glasses in the event of rain/mist, fog, etc.
I have no problem dressing up in my buckskins with my beautiful powder horns, and hunting pouch with all the gear, together with my hand-made knife and throwing hawk in my belt, or sash, for parades, or for public demonstrations and Rendezvous. That's part of the fun.
But, lugging all that stuff around in the woods when I am hunting IS NO FUN anymore.
Its even less fun when you are trying to haul all that stuff, AND Drag a deer out of the woods to your car, and that entails climbing up 200 feet in elevation and down again, while covering almost 2 miles to get back to your car! I learned then to NOT haul all that gear on a hunt, and that the old adage, " Shoot the little ones,or shoot 'em close to camp!" turned out to be very good advice. :shocked2: :haha: :grin: :bow: :thumbsup:
