Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Rifle Hunting Safety Question

If I have already identified the game with the naked eye, I certainly don't mind checking it out further with a rifle scope, as I know how fleeting that opportunity may be. I do not, however, scan the landscape with a rifle scope; that's what binoculars and spotting scopes are for.

I have been looked over through a rifle scope and it really is unnerving because it is impossible to know the intentions of the operator. It is unmistakable, though, that someone is pointing a gun at you. And, unlike the inadvertent swinging of a shotgun muzzle past a fellow hunter, using a rifle scope like that is a deliberate act.

OK, I'll start.

I won't use my scope to glass with, I carry with a hot chamber and it just wouldn't be safe to point a loaded gun at someone.
Well, I guess it might be OK to glass a trespasser with a hot chamber, he just might actually get what he deserves.

How's that?
15 more pages, over or under?

NO.
I own land that the G&F leases for habitat and public access. I've also had hunters glass me with their scopes. It's not a good feeling, and I confront them and spread the joy. I had one swing his rifle off his shoulder to show me how his bolt had been open when he glassed me, and found a 1911 in my hand. they found somewhere else to hunt. when I mentioned this to other landowners, I was told they had been similarly glassed.

I wouldn't point a rifle barrel at anyone out of 1)safety 2)curtousy. Even if my rifle had the barrel welded shut and the bolt glued open I would not use my scope for scanning the surroundings. What kind of HA (Horses's Ass) would feel differently I cant recon. Don't point your guns at people, that simple(unless people you plan to kill). Amazing that we are talking about this 5 pages in.

No,I don't point my rifle around looking for game or pointing it toward a sound. If I see a deer or a group of deer at a distance,I may very well look at them with my scope before deciding to shoot.

I don't really understand where this thread has gone with everyone talking about someone pointing a rifle at them. Where I hunt I've never even carried binoculars. You can rarely find a place to see for 300 yards and I can see well enough with my eyes to tell if it's a deer or a man. I'm not going to point my rifle scope at anything I can't identify.

Most people walk by more game than they ever see

But how well you see lets you spot more game ime

Binocs aren't just for long open distances, lower power binocs in timber give you a decided advantage, again ime

You've might have killed more game than I've seen ( though I did see a herd of 10k caribou once)

I'm not telling, just suggesting get a decent 6-8x binocs and look through the woods with it carefully before you move, might be some surprises in store for you

I used to see three reasons for using one's rifle-mounted scope for general glassing. Stupidity, ignorance, and negligence.

But Sharman educated me on the importance of arrogance when defending one's royal acres.

I stand corrected. My apologies to all.

All who glass for game with a rifle scope attached to the rifle likely use a quality wood chisel or hunting knife to open paint cans and such.. (I use a cheap, chipped chisel myself. Damned screws/nails! .

Positive reasons not to glass with a scope:

1. Safety - for both - some people object to having firearms needlessly pointed at them - for any "reason".
2. Binoculars weigh 30 ounces? - a scoped rifle weighs 7-10 lbs, depending.
3. When in use, balance point of binoculars is maybe 3 inches in front of nose - for the rifle - maybe 20 inches. Figure what that, and #2 will do for steady hold for fine examination, checking out movement, or looking for a line or color out of place. Of course, if they are wearing safety orange, anything will work.
4. field of view.
5. light gathering

i see stuff better with my 20 year old, $160 Cabela's Pine Ridge binoculars than I can with my $350 Leupold scope. (yes- I did check!)nBut I did up the grade somewhat on the binoculars I gave my non-hunting son for Christmas. He has a lot more years of use ahead of him than I do... and I can only eat so much game....

I will admit I have no experience with the really high end stuff.

Perhaps one day I will mug one of you guys for your chit......

Let's see-

$3,000 binocs
$1500 spotting scope (low end)
$5,000 rifle and scope
$800 range finder (or is that in the binocs?)
$75 flashlight
$300 wool shirt
etc.

Any of you guys wear Rolex watches? Preferably with Black Hills Gold watchband. My wife loves that stuff.

PM me.

A person with the correct ground charts/mapping skills and todays 21st century GPS technology
should know where there are...I can do the same on the ground as in the air when coming into
controlled airspace or near restricted/no-go military air base zones..I don't cross invisible boundries
on the ground or in the air(both horizontal & vertical) unless given clearance or permission to do so.
Even with accurate charts and GPS, one still finds it wise to plot a course or track incorporating a
a personal buffer zone that you decide you won't breach set some distance prior to any official boundaries.

Im not really interested in peoples excuses for breaching areas they as an adult have a legal responsiblity
not to enter or be in.



LOL, people do hunt with me and my rules are different then, but at times I hunt alone on exclusive access remote wilderness,
(which is my choice) where I am am free to hunt and handle my rifle how I like and point my scope at distant terrain features or
game as I like, within property bounds. Amazing how some others are concerned with what I do in complete solitude on private
lands that have nothing at all to do with them.



I do not go glassing for people and never said I have, BUT as said earlier, if I am glassing at game with the scope
occasionally and briefly as I do, any person who gets swept with my rifle scope on exclusive use private lands is
trespassing. People interested in their own safety and well being need to make it their own personal responsibility
to best ensure they do not illegally and carelessly stray into private areas they don't belong with a firearm.


In over 40yrs I have never come across a person in my scope when periodically glassing at game,
probably because I go where most people don't go, and where they really shouldn't find themselves when I am there.



I don't have time or your weird inclination to follow people around on amateur gas bag hunting forums.
but just along as you don't follow other peoples children into the toilets or beat up on your partner or drink drive,
then knock yourself out, each to his own I say.

STFU sockpuppet troll

There are a few basic Cardinal Rules relative to safely handling any firearm. If you violate any of these rules, it is unsafe. These two particular Cardinal Rules would apply, it seems to me, in reference to the OP's question. So no, you cannot safely use your rifle scope to "glass for game" without violating the second cardinal rule listed below, "if" you happen to mistake a human for an animal. Plus, you are setting an unsafe example for anyone who sees you doing it, because if they respect you as a safe and experienced hunter, they will be encouraged to do as you do, and on, and on, and on . . . that bad habit will be passed to others.

1. Handle every gun as if it was loaded
2. Never point the business end of a gun at anything you do not intend to shoot and kill

As a whitetail hunter who hunts with a scope. I follow a basic pattern:

1) If I'm looking at something (maybe a deer) the binos come up.
2) If I'm looking at a deer and trying to decide if I'm going to shoot it, the rifle comes up.
3) If I think I see orange, the rifle never comes up.

BTW: I want to register a change in my vote on the cold/hot chamber issue. When Iast I weighed in, I still had Yutes with me. My kids grew up with a cold chamber. Now that they're grown and I'm all alone in the stand, I have begun hunting again with a hot chamber when I'm stationary. When I am out walking, I still carry cold.

IMO a good rule of thumb is, in any situation where you might lose muzzle control (like walking out) the chamber is empty.

Remember shamaa, you brought it up first......

Recommendation: If you ever find yourself hunting dangerous game, please let someone at least hold your wallet and a next of kin notification

Hell no it isn't safe; first rule of gun safety is muzzle control. By definition you can't know what you're gonna point at as you scan.

I kicked a dude out of my deer camp for this practice and will do so all day long.

I carry binoculars even tho I'd struggle to find a place where I could get a 100 yd shot where I hunt. It's amazing how much game you can sight well before they see you, allowing an easier set up for the shot even in tight quarters. They're great for bird watching too.

That's a curious comment about not carrying binoculars because you can't see 300 yards. We hunt very differently. Most of my binocular use is inside of 100 yards, and the majority of that less than 50 yards, though I glass some big country with them at times. I enjoy hunting forest, whether slipping along still hunting or on impromptu calling stands. My first awareness of game has been a deer leg or ear a few yards away, two square inches of elk hair at 12 yards, the rump of a bedded deer at 60 yards, a bear ear at 15 feet, etc.

I have had someone look at me through a scope on public land. Really scary. Both of us were standing in the open beside our vehicles on ridge tops 250 yards apart, so he knew that I was a man before he looked.

Sting
Lyrics


I Hung My Head

Early one morning with time to kill
I borrowed Jeb's rifle and sat on the hill
I saw a lone rider crossing the plain
I drew a bead on him to practice my aim
My brother's rifle went off in my hand
A shot rang out across the land
The horse he kept running, the rider was dead
I hung my head, I hung my head

I set off running to wake from the dream
My brother's rifle went into the stream
I kept on running into the salt lands
And that's where they found me, my head in my hands
The sheriff he asked me "Why had I run"
Then it came to me just what I had done
And all for no reason, just one piece of lead
I hung my head, I hung my head

Here in the courthouse, the whole town is there
I see the judge high up in his chair
"Explain to the courtroom what went through your mind
And we'll ask the jury what verdict they find"
I said "I felt the power of death over life
I orphaned his children I widowed his wife
I beg their forgiveness I wish I was dead"
I hung my head, I hung my head

Early one morning with time to kill
I see the gallows up on the hill
And out in the distance a trick of the brain
I see a lone rider crossing the plain
He's come to fetch me to see what they done
We'll ride together til Kingdom come
I pray for God's mercy for soon I'll be dead
I hung my head, I hung my head

If you have to stop and consider if something is safe. It probably isn't.

I don't hunt dangerous game, and no one brought up dangerous game. Do PH's allow their hunters to carry hot when they're walking through the brush and haven't spotted game yet?

Well, I do as well as many others here. Had you qualified your statement I still wouldn't agree, but anyway. And yes OF COURSE PHs allow it, in fact many insist on it.

Bears probably don't count as dangerous game so I'll not comment how you might possibly live to see another day with a cold chamber