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anyone hunt small game with a muzzle loading rifle?
JW_Halverson:
I absolutely loooove hunting rabbits with my smokepoles. My favorite for wild bunnies that flush at the drop of a hat is my double barrel black powder caplock 10 guage. Yeah, I said 10 guage! You got a problem with that?!?!?!
Mind you, I use just over half an ounce of shot and about 50 grains of powder so it shoots like a 28 guage, hehehe.
Then there is the Wilderness Mountain Arms .36 cal flintlock. I use as little as 25 grains of FFFg and the little bitty pea sized lead ball, but it is known to kill. My two best ever flintlock shots were on cottontails at over 100 yds and that self-same gun. I was bumping up to 50 grains of powder that day and hitting those two sitting fluffy-butts back to back really made my day.
Just remember that the smaller bore rifles really foul up quickly, you will need to swap between shots or risk breaking a ramrod in the field and ending a good day badly.
Longhunter mentions his 28 ga. smoothrifle....I think he's referring to an octagon barrel in a fullstock that looks like a rifle but doesn't have rifling cut into the barrel instead of a octagon-to-round style trade musket. Current theory is that there were plenty of "rifles" out there on the frontier that didn't have rifling in the barrels simply because it really added a lot of $$$ to the cost of a gun. The side benefit was that you could shoot birdshot as well as big roundballs so one gun did double duty.
recurve shooter:
thanks for all the replies guys. that .25 looks cool! i didnt even know they made them that small. i was thinkin a .40 cuz i could use it for small game and maby deer. maby. but my state regulations say it has to be 36 or smaller for small game. i have fourty pounds of realy soft lead ingots in my closet, so whatever i get i'll cast my own rbs, which is fun. i really want one now. :D all i can think about honestly. any idea how much a decent production smallbore would cost me? i dont have the cash for one of the amazing custom guns yall shoot, but a production can do the job in a decent rifleman's hands, i think. :P
jw, dude a hunded yards on a bunny is a heck of a shot for my .22s and even a little challenging for that .17 hmr, much less a smoke pole!!!! way to go!
Grunt:
--- Quote from: JW_Halverson on November 29, 2010, 10:11:19 pm ---I absolutely loooove hunting rabbits with my smokepoles. My favorite for wild bunnies that flush at the drop of a hat is my double barrel black powder caplock 10 guage. Yeah, I said 10 guage! You got a problem with that?!?!?!
Mind you, I use just over half an ounce of shot and about 50 grains of powder so it shoots like a 28 guage, hehehe.
Then there is the Wilderness Mountain Arms .36 cal flintlock. I use as little as 25 grains of FFFg and the little bitty pea sized lead ball, but it is known to kill. My two best ever flintlock shots were on cottontails at over 100 yds and that self-same gun. I was bumping up to 50 grains of powder that day and hitting those two sitting fluffy-butts back to back really made my day.
Just remember that the smaller bore rifles really foul up quickly, you will need to swap between shots or risk breaking a ramrod in the field and ending a good day badly.
Longhunter mentions his 28 ga. smoothrifle....I think he's referring to an octagon barrel in a fullstock that looks like a rifle but doesn't have rifling cut into the barrel instead of a octagon-to-round style trade musket. Current theory is that there were plenty of "rifles" out there on the frontier that didn't have rifling in the barrels simply because it really added a lot of $$$ to the cost of a gun. The side benefit was that you could shoot birdshot as well as big roundballs so one gun did double duty.
--- End quote ---
Yeh, I use a 3/16 brass ram rod with a muzzle protector sleve with the .25. I think the 25. barrel was made by H&H but they were a pain to make so they stopped producing them.
jonathan creason:
Ya'll have really got me wanting a flintlock now. Dang those kits are pricey, though. It'll be a while before I've got enough cash to put down on one of them.
recurve shooter:
jc, its bp guns are addictive!!!! over the summer i bought a 44 revolver to play with. now i have two .44 revolvers and a .58 rifle, and i went all out and bought all the good casting stuff. ;D
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