Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Open sight fear

Yes. Every kid should be brought up on them. I started in the 60's when scopes were becoming affordable and the norm. A few years ago, however, I picked up a Sharps 45-90 and discovered one can do moa stuff quite easily with a peep, a blade, and targets that mesh well with ones sight picture.



In many hunting situations though with narrow paths, poor lighting, and small targets a scope can make a real difference.

I grew up shooting irons on bb guns and .22s, although I have to admit that I never shot irons much on center fire rifles until I was in my 30s and bought a couple cheap Yugo Mausers and 900 rounds of surplus 8 mm. It was then that I learned how well one could shoot at range with irons. I now shoot irons quite a bit and have killed several deer with irons. The rifle I have shot most over the last few years is a Ted Williams 30-30 with a Williams receiver sight.

Don't get me started scopes nowadays. Most people think that irons aren't useable past 50 yards and that you need a 14x to shoot a white tail buck at 300 yards.

I was okay, just okay with irons until I turned about 40. After that I had to start converting everything to scopes. I could not see irons well enough anymore. I gave up bow hunting in part, because I could not longer see the pins and the game. Then about 50, the process started to reverse itself. Today, I'm about halfway back to where I was at 40. Meanwhile all my deer rifles got glass mounted on them. Even my turkey shotgun has a scope.

It seems to be a generational thing. One of my deer hunting buddies uses open sights, and he is deadly taking shots on moving game that I wouldn't have thought to try. My grandad also was amazing with open sights. My dad is a flintlock shooter, and is not at all comfortalbe with a scope. I on the other hand have had a scope on my rifles since my first .22lr, and only shoot iron sights if there is a rifle not suited for a scope, like with winchester lever actions and pump action .22's etc.

I read a study quite a few years ago, but don't remember where. Anyway, they tested standard open sights, peep sights, and telescopic sights against each other. If I correctly remember the results, they found standard sights to be just as accurate out to 200 yards, and peep sights to 300. It wasn't til after the 300 yard mark that scopes gained any accuracy advantage.

My son and I were out shooting gophers a couple days ago. No scopes on either of the rifles we were using. I was having a hard time with my glasses while trying to make out the gophers over the sights. Thankfully with my contacts I don't have this problem. My son said we should have scopes. I told him while scopes are nice and we can see better with them I want him to learn how to use open sights first. Once I put my contacts in the gophers were in trouble.

I learned how to shoot with open sights and then used them for 20 years in the AF. Scopes have their benefits, but anything can fail so most of my rifles have open sights and several (leveractions) don't have scopes.

I grew up using open sights (buckhorn rear and bead) on single shot .22. I used to go through a 500 round brick of .22 shorts (LR ammo was too expensive for me) in less than a month when I was a kid. The combination of a single shot rifle and open sights meant I got VERY good at stalking close and shooting straight. Even I can hardly believe some of the shots I made and the distances I was able to hit.

Even when deer hunting I never considered a scoped rifle except when sitting in a tree stand as most of our hunting was with dogs in the thickets of East Texas. Most often it was an open sighted Marlin 336 in .35 Remington that brought home the venison and I was VERY good at hitting a moving target at any range distance I could see (not too far in those days before the timber companies "raped" the woods. A standing deer at 150 yards was almost too easy.

As I got older and dog hunting was outlawed.....and clear cuts opened the woods, I began to carry a scoped rifle that was able to reach out farther than the older woods rifles were able to handle. Even when hunting small game (squirrels and rabbits) I switched over to scope sights and almost forgot about open sights.

As I aged my eyes aren't what they once were. I wondered if I could still use open sights like I used to....until a couple of years ago.

In my gun trading I came into a mint condition Winchester 9422. It seemed a crime to ruin the sleek lines of this little lever gun with a scope. I shot it a bit on targets and was pleasantly surprised to find that I could still place my shots inside of an inch at 50 yards or so (minute of squirrel head).

My eyes aren't what they once were (I now have to wear corrective lenses) and I "know" I'm not seeing the target or sights as well as I did when I was 16, but the instincts are apparently still there. I can hit a target as well as I ever did (if at a slightly closer distance) even when the sights and target are a bit blurry. Guess it's muscle memory after 100's of thousands of rounds fired years ago.

I recently began to squirrel hunt again with open sights. On my latest hunt I was able to take 6 squirrels with 6 shots (although I count one as a "miss"....I hit him in the body instead of the head).

Unlike most others, I find the standard buckhorn rear and bead front superior to peep sights. I can and have used peep sight, but I find them to be slower and never feel as confident as with a buckhorn rear (even though I seem to hot just as often). Once again, I guess it's those thousand of rounds I fired as a youngster.

I shot my first deer at age 13 in 1973 with a Springfield wearing a receiver aperture sight. Everything since has been with optics until last fall where I shot a decent muley with a Ballard 45-70, vernier tang sight and blackpowder. It did take me several hours to get close enough to be comfortable with a +/-150 yard shot (trifocals and all ). I will likely hunt more in the future with this type of setup - I have some lever actions that need some field time.

I really struggle with barrel sights on rifles, but still do well with a rear peep/aperture of some sort, so that's all I use on non-scoped rifles. I quit shooting handguns all together in my 40's (out of frustration) when I started wearing bifocals. Now in my 50's with trifocals, I can see the sights well enough that I'm starting to shoot handguns again. I need to find a dedicated lens with my midrange correction and I should be good to go...

That's all fine and good, if your eyes can be corrected to a point.

But...

1. What do you do when glasses wont correct your vision, in your shooting eye?
2 What do you do when you have 9+ diopters astigmatism, in you shooting eye?
3. What do you do when the optic nerve has partially disconnected from the eyeball and there are gray areas (that see nothing), in you shooting eye?
4 What do you do when you cant focus on two items at the same time, unless they are the same distance from your shooting eye?

I could go on-and-on, but it would be useless. I grew up shooting iron sights and didnt shoot a scope until nearly 30 years old. Was I an expert with iron sights, no, but I did ok. Am I an expert with a scoped rifle, no, but I do ok.

I'm sick and tired of all the 'I can shoot better than you because I learned to shoot with iron sights and still do types.'

I'm glad you still have the eyesight to shoot the iron sights, and wish to God I did, but I dont and I can live with it.

Why cant you?

Like so many things, it isn't really about doing what one is capable of doing or doing things in a way that one enjoys. It's all about whose dick is bigger.

I just don't like 'stuff' on my guns - flash lights, laser sights, or scopes.
Especially on handguns, lever action rifles, and Ruger #1 Sporters.

I do however have one scoped Mini-14 Target rifle.

I don't mean my comments to belittle, but it depends, and I have no issues with not shooting irons, at some point they will be difficult to shoot.

That being said I have a friend that as I recall, is 9.25 or some really large( to me at least) correction and shoots irons in competition still today.

Takes a lot of work though.

I have a LOT of floaters and I"m not saying this compares to your areas of non vision, but I've had to deal with them in the way of seeing the sight often and simply have to look it off enough until something clicks again...

I have never been able to focus on 2 things at one time. Ever.

I have astigmatism about 1/3 as bad as yours, my lenses have to be specifically oriented.

As I noted, I've been through a lot. Others have been through more.

Sometimes its how bad you want to do something.

Other times we are all aware, it eventually won't work one way and you have to do it another way.

So no offense intended, and if you can't or don't want to make it work, I've no issues with that.

Many that have good eyes etc... are simply too lazy to want to make it work. Thats their call too.

Jeff

I got nothing against open sights, i favor the BLR open sights over my Marlins or peep sights.

I was on a hog hunt once and the land owner said we could shoot a doe for 100 dollars if we wanted. Having a scope saved me 5 hundred dollars. What I sought was a doe was actually a spike buck.

I love open sights and love to shoot them these days. And, I don't feel particularly handicapped by them within their range. On the other hand, I can't think of much, if anything at all to recommend them over a scope. I consider a low power, 4x or less, to be the perfect instrument for shooting out to four or five hundred yards.

It is as fast as anything, has plenty of magnification, and gathers light.

Agreed, but nearly impossible to find these days. Marble and Williams seem to think everyone wants a bead front sight.

Certainly irons are not for everyone. Especially anyone with significant vision issues. Scopes make a lot of thing better for a lot of shooters, whether they started with irons or not. I don't necessarily think a shooter is a better shooter because he or she started on irons. There are some darn fine shots out there who have never touched a rifle the didn't have a scope on it.

I think some people give up on irons as their vision starts to degrade because they have the mistaken notion they should be able to focus on three planes; the target the front sight and the rear sight. In reality no one's eye can focus on more than one plane at a time. In handgun instructor school they preach, "front sight, front sight, front sight." In other words focus on the front sight letting the rear sight and the target blur.

My eyes have gone from 20/10 ten years ago to needing trifocals today. I can still shoot irons very well, though I prefer a receiver sight to a notch and bead. In fact I really don't like a bead at all except for shotguns. Well that and rifles with express sights because they wouldn't look right with a blade. I much prefer a patridge style front sight and a receiver sight for the rear. I might try filing a square notch in a rifle rear sight one of these days and try it with a patridge front sight. I just picked up a Remington model 8, 25 Remington and while it has the receiver sight I like, the front sight is so fine I almost cannot see it. It looks like a piece of spider web it's so fine. I'm definitely replacing that with a patridge blade.

I'd like to treat myself to shooting glasses this year with interchangeable lenses and have my doc give me a correction for distance only, with an amber tint, distance only and clear for hunting, a regular correction with the trifocals for every day use, and a correction for the distance to the front sight of a handgun or rifle.

I agree with what you are saying. And, trust me, I would give just about anything to be able to see well enough to shoot with out a scope.

With the scope, I only have to focus on a single point and that I can do. Dont get me wrong, that point is not perfectly clear, but I get by. Depending on how much pressure is in the eye on any given day, I may see a dot and a half of another, when I look at a target. And then it may be just a single dot.

And, I agree that lots of folks could shoot iron sights, if they wanted to.

No offense intended here either.

I've killed more deer with irons than scopes in my lifetime. Still hunt with iron sighted rigs regularly.

Last I checked binoculars have been available for hundred years or so I think.

I'd rather leave the gun at home than the binocs...

I have purchased files. I still have most of them. I have no issue using them. Have done so on all my MZs with irons, Have adapted all my ARs with irons to what I want flat top and width wise.