teaching rifle merit badge

[Bruce Herb]

I am teaching rifle merit badge using
muzzleloaders. Just wandering if any one else
did this type of stuff?
The Scouts seem to sign up more when they find out the Meerit badge is with muzzle loading rifles.

Boo

 

[coehornboy]

Out here on the left coast, my scouts go to the Wente Scout Reservation in Northern California. In addition to shotgun and rifle (.22) merit badges, they have a "Mountain Man" outpost. The scouts hike in to a remote area where they get to load and shoot .50 BP caplocks, throw tomahawks, and cook a "foil pouch" meal on the coals. Being the non PC person that I am, I pay for the entire troop from my pocket, as some parents may not agree that their boys be allowed to shoot. Most of the boys reported that it is the highlight of their camp experience that week!!

As a person who has worked as a BSA rangemaster (in our area we use the NRA rangemaster program), I think it would be fun to use BP for the rifle merit badge. However,logistically, it would be tough with the large numbers of scouts that participate in a camp setting. As an example, there are 4 rifle merit badge classes each day with 15 or so boys in each class. Each class lasts approx. 2 hours, including teaching and shooting (and cleaning!!) At the end of the week (10 hours total), the boys need to have an understanding and retention of the material AND be able to score the appropriate amount of shots. In this type of setting, and with a large amount of boys, it would be tough to monitor loading and safe handling of BP rifles.

How many scouts do you have in a group at any one time? What equipment do you use? And how many adults do you have on the line to offer oversight and/or assistance. Sounds like a challenge!! I would love to see BP expanded at our scout camps (we also have an annual shooting sports weekend for our district, but mainly .22 and shotgun) :v ). :thumbsup:

 

[Jon in MI]

I have to agree with coehornboy on the problems with having enough staff to keep up with the boys. They want to shoot and we have had several merit badge classes at our club and only had time and equipment to give the boys a taste of BP. In a summer camp setting you would need a huge staff to keep up.

Jon

 

[harryo]

I am teaching rifle merit badge using
muzzleloaders. Just wandering if any one else
did this type of stuff?
The Scouts seem to sign up more when they find out the Meerit badge is with muzzle loading rifles.

Yes, Boo. I am also a rifle merit badge instructor and also use my muzleloaders for instruction, if that is what the boy's wish. Most of them do choose to shoot the muzzleloaders. Why would they want to use a puny, little .22 when they can use big guns that go BOOM and make a lot of smoke! :grin:

 

[walruskid1]

first place i ever shot bp was at camp firelands in 1972 thanks to a scoutmaster with a zouave. knocked off a pop can and was hooked for life. thanks mr. sindelar. :hatsoff:

 

[mikelange]

I'm not involved with the Scouts and thus don't do the merit badge thing, but I've taught several kids to shoot and used muzzleloaders exclusively. Even built one kid-sized to just have around.... I've noticed that both the kids and their moms (the dads are conspicuous in their absence, if you get my drift) are a lot more comfortable with the idea of handling an "old" frontloader than even a .22 -- seems less dangerous, I don't know. It's a great opportunity to slip in a little bit of our country's history, too.

 

[pondoro]

I run a 4-H shooting sports club. We do 22 rifle, pistol, muzzleloaders, archery, shotgun and living history. I am also a merit badge counselor for rifle, archery and pistol. The two jobs go together well.

Most of my Boy Scout "clients" go to summer camp, start a merit badge, but do not complete all of the requirements. They come home and hear that I can sign the last few, show up at my 4-H club, and end up joining 4-H. The boys who are doing rifle have usually started with 22's and choose to finish the same way.

Muzzleloading goes in cycles at my 4-H club, some years it has 8-10 kids, then it will drift down to 3-4 kids. We had an "up" year last year and the muzzleloading kids were all young, so I hope that we will have them for several years. Also Living History is a fairly new 4-H curriculum and there are two or three other clubs in the county that have LH trained instructors. That might turn into more muzzleloading shooters coming to my club, since those other clubs do not have ranges.