Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire shooting sticks

I was at the range today. I was talking to a guy. He loves shooting sticks. I was wondering how many people use shooting sticks and their opinion of them.
Thank you
Rich

I think highly of the concept myself...............

I love the right kind of shooting sticks. Even the others are better than nothing.



Those just pinned together aren't adaptable enough to suit me.



Those with a leather "hammock" swung between the tops are better -- but not by much.



The ones that I made for myself use a leather strap that I can quickly slide up or down to suit my shooting posture (prone, sitting, kneeling) and adjust independently on uneven ground. My first ones were half-inch dowels, but using them to help hoist my old carcass erect from sitting put a serious bow in 'em. Disaster seemed just lurking for an opportunity to pounce. The game warden on the Fort Belknap Indian Reservation liked 'em when I was up there shooting prairie dogs several years ago, so I left 'em there for him and made myself another set with 3/4-inch dowels. I use 'em with handguns (see attached photo) and with rifles -- almost as good as shooting from a bench.

I was surprised in reading George Ruxton's eyewitness account of the mountain men to find that according to him they used a shooting stick for a great percentage of their shots, even taking it into shootouts with Indians. Apparently it was a longer or sturdier ramrod, called a wiping stick, that would double as a shooting steady. Sometimes it sounds like he is describing a walking stick rather than a ramrod, but other times it is unquestionably a ramrod. I like the idea of a Moses stick type walking and shooting stick, with a strap, but have never gotten serious about hunting with one. Sam Fadala called it a Moses stick in an article he wrote on making such a stick, years ago.

I have used a shooting board, a custom made backpack that serves about any sitting or prone situation on level or sloped ground, and doubles as a packboard to carry lunch, snowhoes, coyote hides, etc. Made of thin plywood with padded, scalloped edges and many cut-out holes for weight reduction and tie points, it is a round cornered tapezoid, narrow at the top with a scallop in top to take a rifle forend, and wider at the bottom. It has a ledge set at 90 degrees about 3/4 of the way down which gives it rest elevations from zero to about eight or ten inches, angled up the board when it is turned ledge down on the ground. On edge, the slope continues up to 16 inches or more, and on end, a sitting shot is comfortable over the top or depending on the slope, upside down over the ledge. The late William Mchalsky, sheep guide in Alberta, designed it for hunting coyotes and sold a few of them. On mine, I have to crowd close to the board on steep downhill shots, kind of scrunched in, but it is a critter getter aid of excellence.

I don't hardly ever shoot without them. From .22's on up. Hunting is a given, sling-em over my shoulder and go.

My wife and I both use them. Between us(over the last couple of seasons) we've taken three elk and one sheep using sticks. My wife's elk was taken ( at 394 lasered yards) this year using a tree limb for a rest as the shot was up at a very steep angle and the sticks were too short.
We often use them as a little extra support for balance on some of those steep or sidehill climbs. They also help if you are tranversing a snow covered rock/boulder field, you find the holes between rocks with the sticks rather than your leg or ankle!

Think at last count I have 6 different kinds. Some I made, some bought and discarded for various reasons. I mostly use a set of Stoney Point collapsible and a LEKI Trekking pole with the optional gun rest attached and secured to my revolver with Velcro straps. How does that commercial go??? �Don�t leave with out it�. The Stoneys are in my pack and the LEKI I use instead of a cane so it is always with me.

Dear Dr. Ken:

Could you please post a description of the leather stap that you currently use?

I have tried the pinned kind (didn't like'em) and I've made a kind of a hammock for my shooting sticks, but it has not been satisfactory either and I'm looking for something better. You sound like you have the solution!

A picture of your strap would be great, but if that is not possible I'm ready for the thousand words! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

jpb

Scroll back up to my earlier post and click on "Attachment" in the header bar. Ignore the ugly old coot and the lovely revolver in the photo and study the sticks and their connecting strap (which is a good bit longer than it needs to be -- I just couldn't force myself to cut it).

hey rich

I, like ken made my own. I used a 2x4 ripped it in half drilled a hole through the both the installed a 1032 screw/nut affair. at the bottom I use a real nice string with a notch at the bottom that i use so the sticks wont fly apart. the flat s of the 2x4 seems to help for rifle stability.

Bearbeater

I started using the stony point shooting sticks last year and really like them. Prior to that I grabbed sticks, bushes, used rocks, etc to get a solid shot, or used the sling on the rifle, which is good to do if you get caught flat footed, and need to make a standing shot at a game animal (which happens quite often to me it seems).

Thank you, Dr. Howell.

That picture makes thing much clearer! Thanks!

jpb

Over a hundred downloads of the photo of my cross-sticks! Wow!

In addition to its value in running rats out of your pantry, that photo may lead some of you to make your own "Ken Howell" shooting sticks. If you do, you'll run into a puzzle when you go to form the loops in the second end of the strap. You're also likely to underestimate the length of strap that you'll need. The strap in the photo is much longer than it needs to be -- partly because my first ones were too short!

Forming the double loop in the first end of the strap is no problem -- just wind the strap twice around one 3/4-inch dowel and run the other end of the strap through the slit. Obvious.

Not so obvious is how to form the double loop in the other end, since you (obviously) can't run the first end through the slit in the second end. There's a bit of trick to it, but the trick is simple and easy. The attached drawing shows how to do it. Some day, I'll get around to photographing the several steps -- until then, I hope that the attached drawing shows you enough to erase any puzzlement and all confusion. If it isn't enough, let me know.

Thanks Ken, I was puzzeling over that one.

A way to simplify this just occurred to me.



� Wind the strap around one dowel and run the other end through the slit.

� Take the dowel out of the loop.

� Pull the ends of the strap to straighten the loop out of it. (This will leave the leather on each side of the slit twisted.)

� Wind the other end of the strap twice around the other dowel and run the first end through the slit.

� Work the body of the strap through the slit in the first end to remove the twist on each side of the slit and form the second loop.

� Twist the body of the strap in the second loop to form the double loop.

� Slide the second double loop over the end of the second dowel.

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Also --



On the bottom end of each dowel (a couple of inches of which had to be reduced in diameter to accept 'em), I fitted a pair of brass ferrules made by trimming the necks, shoulders, and upper bodies off a couple of .50 Browning cases. Each ferrule covers a couple of inches of its stick's lower end.



I drilled and tapped the webs of these ferrules and threaded-in a couple of small bolts, each with a washer and a lock-nut, leaving most of the length of each bolt exposed. With the bolt heads ground off and the ends sharpened, these bolts (easily removed or replaced) become spikes for hard ground.

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The loops loosen a little with use and time. Just before each use, I grasp each stick in each hand, with the strap between the index finger and the second finger, and pull the loops tight on the sticks..

I gave up on dowell rods.I made a tripod affair with 3 pieces of half inch aluminum tubing about four feet long.They join five inches down from the upper end with a leather thong run thru holes drilled in the tubing.Enough slack is left to allow the lower ends to be spread apart with the hieght determined by how wide the sticks are spread.One of the sticks has the lower end bent at about a 45 degree angle about six inches from the end and the upper end shortened by a couple inches.This oddball leg rests between my knees while I sit on my little stool and the vee of the sticks is very steady.
Obviously my sticks are not quickly deployed but I can drop to one knee and use them as a single stick.I covered them in camoflauge tape.
As soon as other hunters see them they don't ask me to build a set for them.In fact,they sort of look at me funny.If they didn't work so good I'd throw them away.