Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Hunts with special guns

I just got in from a dove hunt with my FILs model 12 16 gauge. It
Was the only thing I got from his estate after his death in January.
I couldn’t hit shat with it, but it was pretty special.

Anybody else got any stories or pics of “sentimental gun shooting”?

What choke? It normally takes a few trips to get on with a gun. Put only one shell in the chamber. Swing through and touch off as it hits the head. Keep up the swing through the shot.

If its a full choke, well, you're screwed.

My 16 ga model 12 shoots high, way high. I can’t hit a dang thing with it unless it’s holding still.

My 16 ga model 12 shoots high, way high. I can’t hit a dang thing with it unless it’s holding still. Worst shooting gun I’ve ever owned.

all my hunts are with "special' guns. The tremendously re-worked M21 Beretta .22lr pocket gun for small game, the pocket 9mmm for deer and hogs, the shorty AR in 223 for anything bigger (head shots only, 100m or less only, and if beyond 50m, only from a braced firing position.

Dad gave me his beautiful old 12 gauge Browning. I do a fair bit of upland game hunting. He hadn't used it in 25 years or more.

Honestly, I was astounded. I knew he had the gun, but as he's aged, he's sold some shotguns, rifles and handguns that I didn't think he'd ever sell. Those decisions are of course completely up to him. When he gave me the old Browning... Wow... It's not a gun I'd have selected for myself. Too gaudy for me. But it's Dad's gun. And dang, it shoots great and knocks down pheasant, chukar & quail. Ya, this is another family gun that I hunt with.





Hunting with family guns is pretty cool for me.

Regards, Guy

Not a hunt but this gun was bought new by my Great Granddad. Here it is being fired for the fist time in over 70 years.

Shot my first deer with my dad's 32 Winchester Special. My mom shot her first deer with it. My dad shot his first deer with it.

I used to hunt a lot with an Ithaca 37 16ga my Grandad gave me for plowing for him one summer. It was a beater with a busted stock, no bluing, and a vented Polychoke when he gave it to me. When I went to gunsmith school I found a stock, polished and blued it, and sawed the doinker off and threaded it for choke tubes. A couple years ago my dad had rotator cuff surgery and borrowed it to use as a lefty since it was a bottom ejector. He took a shine to it and has been using it ever since. I’m sure I’ll get it back one day but I’m in no hurry.

I have a Ruger Single Six that was a great Uncle’s. I acquired it in a trade about a year after his passing when I was 13. It’s been a great companion and I’ve shot an amazing amount of critters from rats to wild pigs. The most memorable being a coyote I rolled on a dead run with a heart shot at 73 paces. I think I was as surprised as the coyote!

I have a worn square butt 2” model 36 S&W in my front pocket as I sit on the creek bank right now. I carry it often and have shot quite a bit of small game and pests with it. A very good friend bought it out from under me when we worked together at the gun shop and it pissed me off. I was less pissed when he gave it to me for my birthday a little while later. Sadly he’s gone on now.

Killed a few Sitka Blacktails and fox with a cherry Savage 99EG in 300 that my wife gave me for our first anniversary. It’s a neat old rifle that means a lot to me, I may even take it to Colorado for my 3rd season mule deer hunt this year.

I know all guns are special and all hunts are special.

I was was looking for sentimental stories about guns handed down
from previous generations.

Thanks Jag for the input. This gun has a “poly-choke” I was testing
The whole time. Never got it figured out.

Very cool

Good luck with convincing me that isn't cool as heck.

I only have one gun passed down from in the family, but it's my favorite knocking around and small game rifle by far. Marlin '94 25-20 made in 1906. It has a barrel liner installed, a Williams 5-D receiver sight, and shoots my cast 260283 bullets very well.

I also have a pair of handguns the family has given me, a Sig Sauer 1911 Stainless Target 45, and a Ruger Flattop Stainless 45 Convertible. If the rabbits ever make a comeback I'll take the Ruger after them and maybe after a deer this fall.

Every firearm I own is one I bought, working some filthy, hot sweaty job.

About every time I was in a 1ft high crawlspace with frogs and dead rats, laying in raw sewage, dragging a drill through water, drilling for termites... I would tell myself I’m buying a new rifle after I break it off deep in these people.

Another one in particular, was reflashing a church steeple on a 12/12 roof. Red wasps going Stuka dive bombing on me, lady pastor standing with her hands on her fat hips from the parking lot 40ft below, telling me I have domain over those wasps. Them Presbyterians bought me a savage 10mL smokeless and some zeiss class that day.

Typical weekend hunt

On Wednesday I'll be taking my great Grandad's 35 wsl to Wyoming to try and kill a goat or mulie with it. My backup is a fluted savage 308, but hopefully I can kill something with the wsl. He ordered it from Winchester, I want to do more research on it. It would be cool to have some paperwork on it.

A limit of doves with Dad's 1913 vintage Winchester 1911 SL (cylinder bore) from a few years ago.

Retired this spring and then the hail took out my roof, instead of hiring it done I did it myself. I wrapped up early one day ahead of rain and went to town to pay the bills and hit the LGS I frequent. The owner was buying a estate collection , one of the guns was an original Sharps 74 Business rifle in 45-70 a couple or so days later he offered it to me and I bought it. When I hold it and remember the insurance company paid me to buy it I get a warm fuzzy and yeah it has a date with a deer this fall
Mb

Hubba Hubba!

What's the lineup there?

I sorta knew a guy who drew a really good moose tag in MT.

He killed the bull with a special Winchester Lever Action or maybe not.