Have you gotten bad shooting tips?

Here is a Guns & Ammo article about 8 bad shooting tips.
http://www.gunsandammo.com/2011/11/07/bad-shooting-tips/

Have any of you gotten bad advice from would-be shooting experts, and what was it?

2011-11-08T20:06:16Z

Yeah, MJ, I couldn't let that one go without leaving a comment on the article, either!

MJ2011-11-08T17:04:35Z

Favorite Answer

What was really funny was how Brittany Boddington misspelled muzzle brake as "break." LOL

But hey, I'd still go hunting with her! So what if she can't spell!?

Anyway. There really is a lot of bad shooting advice out there. No one knows everything, no one is perfect, but some people just shouldn't open their mouth at all.


edit: Muzzle "break" in an article about bad shooting tips... Ha!

?2011-11-08T20:35:28Z

Not to much shooting tips, but simply bad advice in terms of equipment and what it can do....

1) A longer barrel on a shotgun will increase velocity because it burns all of the powder.

1A) Nope. After about 18 inches, all of the powder is burned. A longer barrel will help many shooters with their swings on moving targets. But otherwise, the velocity AND the patter (which is dependent on the choke) will be the same, regardless of barrel length.

2) Get a scope with as much magnification as possible.

2A) Waste of time. Especially if you are a big woods hunter. Most of my shots at deer have been at 50 yards or less...and usually running. A 10x magnification is worthless in such an environment.

3) European optics are superior in performance.

3A) I had 2 different German-manufactured scopes that had some sort of "growth" going on inside the scope tube. Sent them back to the US headquarters and they wanted $75 per scope to fix their problem. Leupolds, on the other hand, never gives me any trouble and in those cases where I did send them back, they fixed and cleaned them for free - even though the problems were on 40 year old scopes that I bought second-hand.

4) You need camo to hunt turkeys.

4A) During the fall, I sometimes leave my hunter orange hunting clothes out on the clothesline to air-out. My clothesline runs about 10 feet from my birdfeeder. Sure enough, the turkeys don't seem to mind coming into my yard with my hunting clothes hanging-up and treating themselves to a meal of birdfeed that has dropped to the ground.

5) It's better to have a tract of land where you can hunt on and not be "bothered" by other hunters.

5A) While there are plenty of dumb hunters that can screw-up your enjoyment in the woods, I've found that I get a lot more shooting at deer and bear when other hunters are tramping around the woods, stirring up the game and pushing the animals around.

6) You need a big macho knife with you when you go big game hunting. It's better for dressing, skinning and also survival purposes.

6A) I can cut down trees with my Swiss Army Camper knife and use it to "pole" a deer out with a hunting partner. (It actually has a saw blade for that.) Swiss Army knives also have tweezers that come in handy when you get an aggravating splinter under a fingernail, like I have once or twice. Not saying a little pocket folder should be the only knife you carry with you, but you can do a lot more with a Buck 110 folding hunter than you can do with the 9 inch blade on a "Rambo" knife.

7) Deer will flee an area when they hear things like chainsaws cutting or vehicles moving about.

7A) Nope. I've actually cut wood in back of my house with a chainsaw during the months of October and November and had deer come to the edge of the woods to see what I was doing.

8) You can wear just any old clothes for hunting and it doesn't matter.

8A) Depends. Hunting clothes, like pants, will be cut for better movement when crawling over logs. Your typical store-bought blue jeans are not meant for the kind of free movement that you may be doing while hunting.

Also, don't be fooled by weather conditions. I've worn lightweight clothes and gone hunting and...gotten lost. The idea of having to spend the night in the wilderness when the temps were going to go down from 55 F to 25 F is not a pleasant thought. This also leads me to another piece of advice - always carry some forms of survival gear. A knife, matches, a whistle and even a compass. You might THINK you are only going to be out for 2 hours in 55 F temps in the afternoon. But you just never know what fate will hand you.

Bear Crap2011-11-08T20:45:39Z

Wow I forgot all but a few of them. But the one I just could convince some was its not a good idea to put a drop of liquid mercury in a hollow point bullet. This is just a bad idea for many reasons.
Jury finds out you added mercury to a bullet you shot the bad guy with; bad.
The mercury will blend into the lead making it ‘brittle’; bad.
Mercury mixed with lead going out the barrel will produce very fine mist of toxic dust; bad.

Frank Joe2011-11-08T23:51:46Z

Edit: ill add to will's shotgun advice with this: You should get a pump action shotgun, Just by "racking the slide" will scare off all intruders. you wont actually have to fire.

BS if thats all it took then people would use mp3 players with that sound as protection

people have told me "tips" that could blow my hand off

ken2011-11-08T20:05:50Z

Yea, at the academy we're taught to shoot weaver, funny when your ballistic panel is in the front and your sides aren't protected....

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