sick of that jackass who writes for NMLRA

[Idaho Ron]

Yes we can use a ML in a "any weapon" hunt. My son applies for Moose with this thinking that he would use a TC Renengade on his moose if he draws. The Problem is the quality "any weapon" hunts have odds of drawing that are about 1-10. You might get a chance to hunt them once in ten years. The Quality traditional ML hunts were about 1-3 or 1-4.
When The law was for only a PRB,The IDFG gave out tags in very good trophy quality areas. The guys that got them and shot at deer with PRB's were not always the kind of guys that would pass on a poor shot. I would say that most didn't know the affective range of their load and most exceeded that limit by a very large margin. Ron

 

[flintlock75]

Last year a proposal was made to Fish and Game to make the use of PRB a requirement, the person who put that out was looking for a way to shutdown the inline hunters, since RB dosent do well in a fast twist inline. The State ML association testified against it and it failed to pass.
One reason the ASMLA pushed for a special hunter ed program fo ML hunts was that people who never fired a ML before applied for permits, and when drawn would run to the store a by one( Inlines of course) they had no clue how to use it and since it looked just like there 700 remmington it just has to shoot the same :youcrazy: Once at the range we saw a guy trying to load his with 1/2" steel ball bearings. Not Good.

 

[Idaho Ron]

There has been talk about ML hunter ed but there is NO money for it and NO instructors. Ron

 

[paulvallandigham]

ML ed. is part of the Standard Hunter Safety Education taught in all 50 states, and all the Canadian Provinces. ( They all use the same materials.) whether a particular instructor knows anything about MLers is another issue. Volunteer to be an instructor and you will answer that question. I have been a volunteer H-S instructor since 1982. I was " Drafted" by a friend of mine who also asked me to be the Attorney for our local BP gun club, and got me involved with the club. The materials are " adequate", but have been reduced in scope over the years, by people who haven't a clue.

The powers-that-be are relying way too much on local instructors taking the initiative to learn more about what they are teaching than what appears in the booklet provided. I received very strange looks from my Master Instructor( supervisor of instructors), and other instructors, at a training seminar, when I commented on having gone to the library to read up on topics in the course material with which I did not have much familiarity. To date, I have yet to meet another instructor who has made the effort to know more about the course materials by doing his own research and studying. I have worked with instructors who have taught for years, but only teach or help teach one subject. I was informed by my Safety Education Coordinator that I was one of the very few instructors who actually was prepared to, and did teach the entire course.

I am not looking for compliment, or kudos. To the contrary, I could not imagine Not being prepared to teach the entire course!

One class, I had found 4 other instructors to help teach the course, and each was going to teach at least 2 chapters. I was looking forward to hear how they would present the materials.

The day before the course began, and the day it did begin with a night session, all of them called to express regret in not being able to attend because of illness, a family emergency, out of town guests dropping in unannounced, etc.

I called my Master Instructor that evening when the class was finished for the day, and asked him to come over and help me with the class the next day. He, of course, asked about the other instructors, and began laughing, with an apology, when I told him how they had all bowed out! I told him when the class ended that I was very glad I had my summer case of laryngitis the week before, and not that weekend. Instead of certifying 40+ students, we would have had to cancel the class entirely. He did teach a couple of chapters to give me a break to catch up the needed paper work, and for that I was very grateful.

My point is that if you want ML safety and procedures to be taught, volunteer to work as Hunter Safety Instructors, and instruct all the students, whether their interest is Archery, or modern rifle, shotgun or pistol, or those darn zip guns! The more people who learn the dos and don'ts, even if they don't remember them, the better our sport. They will remember that there is a source of correct information, and that so much of what is being told people about these modern zip guns is a big lie. Yes, you will have to field questions about zip guns, but it give you an opporntunity to explain the difference between these guns and the traditional guns we shoot, compare the price of powders, the cost of bullets vs. cast balls, difference and ease of cleaning, need for cleaning,etc. If you have a live fire component to the course, where you can actually demonstrate a traditional MLer for the students, you will spark much interest- even from the zip gun crowd. I always hear from them, " I didn't know.....". If I give them a chance to load it and shoot it under my supervision, they find out how much more fun traditional guns are. :grin: :shocked2: :thumbsup:

 

[davemcg]

"I'm in favor of keeping 'primitive weapons' season primitive."

I would agree but we must first have a primitive season to "keep primitive" most ML seasons have evolved the other way as many choose the easy way rather than learn how to use the traditional gear,may be in time things will swing the other way...

....I suppose the dollar will talk and the mainstream mags will promote the modern bullets/sights and other gear and ignore or falsely whitewash the traditional gear with a coat of inaccurate info as to effectiveness of the traditional PRB and fixed sights, Hell there are many right here who do the latter to one degree or another, it is sad that the talking heads who are aimed at the general public can undermine the traditional gear but really a bad sign when it happens on a supposedly traditionaly oriented ML forum.I guess it is to be expected when many just don't have a good handle on where traditional gear ends and the modern stuff begins though I often wonder how much some really care about knowing.

Media bias & Money trails aside, there is the idea of personal choice and what's important to an individual, I used to hunt with my dad and some of his buddies. I was rendezvousing and all that at the time but we hunted with modern rifles. One year they decided to try M/Ling BE-cause it was something different, warmer weather, less people, and only bow season preceded it, "perhaps the game wouldn't be as spooked", not one thought was given to "our forefathers" or "the old ways" or "tradition", as a matter of fact I think I can safely say for them it was probably a break from tradition to go with BP since their fathers and grandfathers used 30.06 and or 45/70s.

I already had a T/C Hawken perc. and was fine with shooting PRB and about 80 - 90 grains of 3f, that's what I stuck with, although as I got out of rendezvousing I did go to a peep sight (when you shoot a lot with an iron sight it's easy to remember "I need to hold low and left to hit center" but with just one week a year you tend to forget that)
Anyway a couple of the guys had SS barreled, synthetic stocked inline guns using pellets or pyrodex and always trying different projectile cofigurations. But see they weren't into "Blackpowder shooting" per-se they were into hunting with "Black powder rifles" It works the other way too, I mean, I like Deer and Elk meat but my main interest was in the hides, dew claws and bugle teeth. There's obviously no easy answer to this, but a lot of it gets back to mind set, "Am I a muzzle loader shooter who hunts, or a hunter who uses a muzzle loader." I don't think those statements are necessarily synonymous.

I'm done :snore: :yakyak:

 

[Semisane]

It also depends on the game and circumstances of the geographic region you're dealing with. Down here in Louisiana we have the standard bow season, modern rifle season, and "primitive weapons" season (replaces muzzle loading season this year and includes certain cartridge rifles). The various seasons start Oct 1 and end Jan 28. A hunter can take a total of 3 white tail bucks and three does in all seasons combined. We may as well have one four month "deer season" and everyone can hunt with whatever weapon they want on any particular day - bow Friday evening, ML Saturday morning, CF Rifle Saturday evening. Hunt the way you like.

 

[Russ T Frizzen]

tg-As you know, we've gone down this road before. Most of these seasons started out as primitive seasons--in Massachusetts for example the firearm had to be a copy of a gun existing prior to 1865 or the real thing. Now you can pretty much use anything because most hunters didn't care at all about tradition or history or learning new (ancient) skills so they could effectively use traditional muzzleloaders. They lobbied for and got laws changed so that they could use their ultramodern ray guns and scopes and all the other stuff that goes with it. Of course they had plenty of help from the zip gun makers and their shills.
Recently one of these bozos informed me that the old guns are just no good. They aren't powerful enough or accurate enough to take a deer and the powder smells bad, too. His rifle uses nice clean smokeless powder and with his scope and sabots he can nail a deer at 250 yards everytime! I pointed out that people have been putting meat on the table for hundreds of years with the traditional guns and still do and that these guns bought him his freedom in 1776 and held the nation together until the 1860s and breechloaders took over the job. He said times had changed and the new guns are better and that is the bottom line. And for most people I guess it is. There are those who care about the old ways--the traditions and history and try to keep it alive--and those who simply could not care less. Some of us get it and some of us don't, and it is a waste of time to even hope that the latter will change. The easy way will always be their choice and the loss of their heritage will be the price they pay.

 

[buck1]

TG I concur totaly!! There is a place for every kind of hunting wepon including inlines, compound bows, crossbows, etc.etc. especially for handicapped people! But these wepons were not the ones PRIMITIVE seasons were based upon and shouldn't be aloud to be used in such unless the hunter has a handicap that would prevent them to otherwise participate in the primitive season!! {IMHO} If a healthy person wants to use the MODERN version of a primitive wepon he should do so in a modern season!! Buck

 

[Russ T Frizzen]

Absolutely true. You wouldn't think "primitive" would so hard for folks to grasp, would you? Seems like it is though.

 

TG I concur totaly!! There is a place for every kind of hunting wepon including inlines, compound bows, crossbows, etc.etc. especially for handicapped people!

This may draw fire, but why do we need so many different seasons? What is the advantage of having a special season for every kind of weapon?

Why can't we just hunt? Does it really matter if someone over the hill is hunting with a different weapon than you are?

One thing's for sure -- if you eliminate the "primitive/muzzleloading" season, inlines will shrivel and die on the vine.

 

[slowpokebr549]

Here in Missouri they let folks use inlines and scopes. I will admit I was really pissy about the advent of SS, scoped, pellet guns. I have talked and shot with some of my neighbors in recent years and have done my best represent sidelocks to them. On several range sessions here at the trap club, I have proven that my sidelocks can shoot with the zip guns.Not only that, they all just had more fun shooting mine. My guns were quite an eye opener to several who hated cleaning their inlines. I just swabbed mine out, lubed them and put them up.They all thought that cleaning real black powder and a sidelock was some kind of major undertaking.My nearest neighbor has come over to the dark side and bought a .54. He is thrilled with it saying that it far less picky about loads than his Omega.I think that a lot of the initial flood of inline hunters has petered out.Lots of em who jumped in for the extra season found out that it was harder, messier, and more restrictive than they had been led to believe. As long as a fella is a good hunter and doesn't believe the hype about inlines being 200 yard guns, well thats fine with me. It's all the BS that is being fed to these poor shmucks that makes me mad.

 

[laufer]

I would say a higher wounding rate with prb is BS, ...

I agree. Only bad hunters/ shooters- poor shot placement and low hunting ethics, not the balls.

 

[flintlock75]

The standard hunter ed course i took 35+ years ago included an ML portion. The classes that have been taught in Alaska have not included ML education, only general safety. When the ML classes were proposed by the ASMLA they were taught by vollenters, Fish and Game had there instructors take the class and then took over teaching them. My understanding of the current classes is they teach how to use a ML and the limitations of the weapons and then go to the range to shoot.

 

[Robert Egler]

This may draw fire, but why do we need so many different seasons? What is the advantage of having a special season for every kind of weapon?

Why can't we just hunt? Does it really matter if someone over the hill is hunting with a different weapon than you are?

One thing's for sure -- if you eliminate the "primitive/muzzleloading" season, inlines will shrivel and die on the vine.

Well, since I can hunt with a muzzleloader in any season except bow season, I can just hunt, since that's the only gun hunting I do now.

But I agree with your point about so many seasons. Soon we've have "spear season", and then someone will start using stainless steel spear heads on carbon composite shafts. :wink:

 

[paulvallandigham]

The problem in all states is finding volunteers who are motivated enough to find a location to give the class, order the materials, conduct the class and test, certify the students and then send the paper work into the state with unused materials. Its a lot of work, and not many people are willing to give that much time.

If the state has taken over the job of teaching the course, its because they can't find reliable volunteer instructors.

In my county, at one time we had a list of more than 20 certified H-S instructors, but of that list, only 3 of us EVER found a location, set a date, and organized other instructors to help teach the course. All the rest were passive " instructors". Some had not taught any part of a course in years, and were still kept on the list. I used to call all the people on the list every year, to see if they wanted to help out teaching a course with me. That was back when I was teaching 3 courses a year. No matter how many months in advance I called these Instructors, they always had somewhere else to be! I finally asked them why they bothered to get certified to teach the course? I didn't get any answers. The course is 10 hours long, taught on at least 2 days. Because of the lack of adequate ranges here, we rarely get to add a live fire component to the course.

I arranged with our local Chapter of Pheasants Forever to cooperate with a local Hunting Preserve to sponsor a kid's day, where my students could shoot clay targets at the preserve, and then go out and shoot pheasants at a reduced fee. PF provided lunch, and prizes. I still could not get many students and their parents to show up for the event! It has grown over the years, but very slowly, as word has gotten around at the schools to other kids about how much fun they have at the shoot. I had 3 students the first year, from two classes totally more than 80 students, and 5 students the second year( To give you an idea of my frustration!) I doubt the State game departments have any better success recruiting committed instructors. The only reason they get kids to attend the course is because the certificate is required to be able to hunt at all. People today seem only willing to do the very minimum to " get by ".

 

[Little Wattsy]

Absolutely true. You wouldn't think "primitive" would so hard for folks to grasp, would you? Seems like it is though.

I know what you mean...After all a rock and sling should be pretty self explanitory....

 

[Little Wattsy]

"I'm in favor of keeping 'primitive weapons' season primitive."

I would agree but we must first have a primitive season to "keep primitive" most ML seasons have evolved the other way as many choose the easy way rather than learn how to use the traditional gear,may be in time things will swing the other way...

....I suppose the dollar will talk and the mainstream mags will promote the modern bullets/sights and other gear and ignore or falsely whitewash the traditional gear with a coat of inaccurate info as to effectiveness of the traditional PRB and fixed sights, Hell there are many right here who do the latter to one degree or another, it is sad that the talking heads who are aimed at the general public can undermine the traditional gear but really a bad sign when it happens on a supposedly traditionaly oriented ML forum.I guess it is to be expected when many just don't have a good handle on where traditional gear ends and the modern stuff begins though I often wonder how much some really care about knowing.

Media bias & Money trails aside, there is the idea of personal choice and what's important to an individual, I used to hunt with my dad and some of his buddies. I was rendezvousing and all that at the time but we hunted with modern rifles. One year they decided to try M/Ling BE-cause it was something different, warmer weather, less people, and only bow season preceded it, "perhaps the game wouldn't be as spooked", not one thought was given to "our forefathers" or "the old ways" or "tradition", as a matter of fact I think I can safely say for them it was probably a break from tradition to go with BP since their fathers and grandfathers used 30.06 and or 45/70s.

I already had a T/C Hawken perc. and was fine with shooting PRB and about 80 - 90 grains of 3f, that's what I stuck with, although as I got out of rendezvousing I did go to a peep sight (when you shoot a lot with an iron sight it's easy to remember "I need to hold low and left to hit center" but with just one week a year you tend to forget that)
Anyway a couple of the guys had SS barreled, synthetic stocked inline guns using pellets or pyrodex and always trying different projectile cofigurations. But see they weren't into "Blackpowder shooting" per-se they were into hunting with "Black powder rifles" It works the other way too, I mean, I like Deer and Elk meat but my main interest was in the hides, dew claws and bugle teeth. There's obviously no easy answer to this, but a lot of it gets back to mind set, "Am I a muzzle loader shooter who hunts, or a hunter who uses a muzzle loader." I don't think those statements are necessarily synonymous.

I'm done :snore: :yakyak:

"Am I a muzzle loader shooter who hunts, or a hunter who uses a muzzle loader." I don't think those statements are necessarily synonymous VERY WELL SAID! And I guess that THAT describrs me well; An avid hunter that likes to shoot BP. Or in other words I feel that the sport of hunting trumps tradition IF push HAS to come to shove. And all THAT does NOT mean that I dont LOVE my Renegade!!

 

[longcruise]

I would say a higher wounding rate with prb is BS,

I'm inclined to think the same. I'd like to see the study, stats and research that was done to arrive at that conclusion.

Most of those decisions are political and based upon the input of interested parties. The pary with the most members, influence and best presentation has their interests upheld.

 

[longcruise]

If the state has taken over the job of teaching the course, its because they can't find reliable volunteer instructors.

The state does control the hunter safety classes in CO and they provide places to teach as well as an indoor pistol/rimfire range for the attendees to do the shooting portion of the class. All of the instructors are volunteers and there seems to be no problem in recruiting instructors. However, the instructors can't teach what they don't know. That includes ML and archery. There are a few bowhunters and trad ml hunters who are volunteers and teach with better content on those two areas but most do not truly understand the use of either.

When I took the class (don't need it cause of age) with my grandson, the class was all day Saturday and all day Sunday ending with the written test and then a rimfire shooting session. The instructor was truly a great teacher and was especially good at working with young kids. But, the archery and ml portion was weak just because that was not an area he understood and he had no examples of ml firearms or bows for illustration.

Paul, I disagree with your statement in another post that the hunter safety classes are standardized across the country. I don't think they are at all.

The other thing is, there is a difference between a hunter safety class and a bowhunter or ml education class. The state bowhunters assn here teaches bowhunter ed to all that are interested and is given the use of state facilities if needed or wanted to put on the classes but that is not a "hunter ed" class.

Many in the bowhunting community want to see mandatory bowhunter ed classes as well as proficiency testing.

That attitude will soon carry over to all hunting methods and will only serve to cripple the hunting sports. Regulators exist too, and thrive on, regulating. How would we like it if we had to demonstrate proficiency with a shotgun in order to hunt birds? How about proficiency with a rod and reel in order to fish?

 

[Vaino]

I'm primarily a hunter and the "tool" to procure the game is secondary, although I mainly build flint LRs. Started hunting using a slingshot and those years were some of the most enjoyable. Then it was all sorts of .22s, modern shotguns and rifles, then recurve and compound bows and finally MLers. Have never fired an inline and probably won't but for those that do, that's their choice. Personally though, I wonder why some use a scope sighted inline, w/ simplified loading....why not just use a CF rifle? The only logical reason is to hunt in another season? If people want to hunt w/ inlines that's no "skin off my tail" and I certainly don't feel endangered w/ people using inlines....perhaps a little intrigued as to their "sense" of doing so.....Fred