Gun Infidelity
 

I sometimes feel like I'm cheating on a gun when I stop using one that's served me well to use a new one. Anyone else have that feeling?

Here's several of my one-time go-to guns that now have been "jilted" by me for another pretty face.

If you have a jilted gun and a photo, how about share it here?

Photos 1 & 2

One of my first good doubles was this little 28 bore John Dickson and Sons boxlock. I used this gun for more years that any other I have owned, and it accounted for more birds, including pheasants (we had them in the area back then), than any other gun I've owned. It came with a short stock with a leather covered recoil pad. Climbing an ice covered rocky bluff in NE Iowa after late season grouse, I fell and broke its stock. Jack Rowe made a replacement to my measurements, and the gun only improved my shooting. The quintessential grouse and woodcock gun, one season this little beauty took grouse in 5 states. I've not used it in over 6 years, and I feel guilty.

Photos 3 & 4

This CSMC Fox 16 gauge was ordered after Elaine and I visited the factory and got a personal tour from Tony. I wanted 29 inch barrels and a weight below 6 lbs. Tony delivered. I had my best dog, Prairie Trace, engraved on the floor plate. I took this gun to Montana where we added Huns, Sharptails, mountain Ruffed Grouse and Blue grouse to the checked-off section of my bucket list. It's a great gun for long and open shots especially, with a bit of weight forward to help keep my swing going. It has a special place in the safe, but hasn't seen daylight in a while.

Photos 5 & 6

I like back action hammer guns. I finally found one in 16 bore that fit my needs. This Cogswell and Harrison has 30 inch Damascus barrels, is tightly choked, high stocked, and weighs under 6 lbs. With a spreader load in the right barrel, it's a great prairie quail gun, and can reach out for them with it's left barrel. It takes pheasants over points by our dogs with authority. I had Brad Bachelder add a leather covered pad which only improved its fit. I shoot this gun as well as any I've used on wild birds.

You are a wealthy man in that you have the experiences each of these gave you, keep them in the Bank of memory and i hope you have the oppurtunity to make each of them you're go to gun again. I have 5 grouse guns and every year it is a fight with myself to use them all and i rarely succeed.

My harem doesn't seem to mind

I own two guns that I have retired from hunting because my memories of both can't get any better and I don't want to spoil it. One is a 10ga AH Parker show gun that I killed 4 drake mallards and one blactk on my first hunt with the gun with 4 shots, 5 ducks. The second is my C-HE Super that Dana Tauber sold me before his passing and battle with cancer. I hunted one season with the gun and could hardly miss a duck. It's 31019 a C-HE with XE grade stock. Dana and the duck gods were smiling down on me.

Man now I want to go see CSMC. Wow!

My first sxs was much lower on the food chain: a simple 16ga Stevens-made Springfield marked 5100. Twas my companion for many seasons and I sometimes think I shoot it better than any of my small arsenal - I once took a limit of four wild prairie roosters with four shots from that lowly old gun. I still have it; it's been demoted several times, moving down the row in the cabinet to its current resting place in a rack I made at the end of my desk for overflow. It has come out on the occasional rainy day...

https://i.imgur.com/NNnoVqCl.jpg

Phil, One doesn't see many of those Stevens guns in that kind of shape. That's a beauty.

I'm sure I must have seen a photo of one or both of those in an article, but it would be nice to see one again.

Garry here ya go.

Thank you! Wow...just wow. What a special pair. I can see why you hold them with such reverence.

Daniel, I can tell you understand what I'm trying to say. A gun becomes special for what you and it go through together and the privilege you have in carrying it. Craig's reference is a good example as is the way Phil regards his Stevens.

Can you share a photo of one of those 5 grouse guns? I'd love to see one.

Garry the weird thing about the hunt with the AH Parker was I was by myself in one of the slow blinds in our marsh. My partner couldn't hunt so it was just me and Lucy my lab. Just before dawn a pair of mallards came overhead and I killed the drake with one shot, Lucy retrieved the duck a ways back in the cattails . A couple of minutes later 50 mallards were over my pond and I killed a drake. Lucy made short work of that duck. A couple of minutes later another 50 mallards and blacks are over my pond, I killed two drakes with two shots. I line up Lucy for the retrieve and she keeps looking off line from the two mallards I have marked. Lucy goes left on my back command and she would not take a whistle. Lucy swims around the corner of the pond and picks up a big black duck drake (always believe your dog!) a willy I had not seen. After she picks up the black the two mallards were retrieved. I was done before 7am and back at the landing before 7:30am. For an old duck hunter it doesn't get any better.

My experience duck hunting is very limited, and even more limited with a good retriever. I love to watch a good, well trained dog do its thing. I would have paid to watch your lab on the morning you describe. To have a special gun to complete the gun-bird-dog triumvirate is something to remember. Hunting with a good friend is great. Hunting alone with your dog is equally so. What a nice memory.

What a great post Garry. You're suffering from a Truly First World problem, good for you! Other truly first world problems include dropping your cell phone in the hot tub, the 911 getting a flat, and your Leica has a light leak. I can't shoot all my pieces, but my Ithaca single shot 20g lever action with buck barrel has not been shot in 40 years. It took my first woodcock, first grouse, first squirrel and first cardinal on my neighbors bird feeder (that didn't go so well). I will never sell her. I'd dig her out for a photo but it's nothing to look at : )

Garry one is in my avatar, a 20 ga. repro q1&2, an a grade fox 16 choked cylinder and improve, a Sterlingworth 16 imp. &mod., Parker 1 frame 12 imp&mod.and a Baretta 20 imp.&mod. Now that i think of it there may be a few more that will do the job but are rarely called on. As far as photos i was going to say that you could put me in the category of a well known poster on this forum but i did post one of my Remington hammer gun 4 years ago and of some just hatched woodcock and have yet to catch on to the method.

I like your avatar very much.

Andy, my wife often asks, "What's your problem?" Now I know and will tell her. I'll not explain it, though. Not in my best interests. And if you ever meet her (BTW, she is of Italian descent, and I'm sure you both would have lots in common -- especially cooking), don't bring this up.:)

If you're ever out this way, bring your Ithaca. You can shoot deer from my deck.

Thank you for the invite Garry! Hope to meet you (and your wife of superior ethnic origins...) :) I'm hoping our 13 year old daughter will use the Ithaca someday for a deer, she's waiting on a new 20g youth gas gun now to lighten the recoil for skeet and sporting clays. Out of three kids she's the only one with interest, so who knows if she'll end up with a pile of Parkers someday.

" One is a 10ga AH Parker show gun that I killed 4 drake mallards and one black on my first hunt with the gun with 4 shots, 5 ducks."

Craig, at first I read your post and the thing that popped into my twisted mind was that this was a blend of an AH Fox and a Parker Bros!! Then the proper synapses fired and I realized you had an A grade hammerless. :shock: :bowdown:

I have two firearms that I used a lot originally and haven't shot either in a loooong time. First is a Stevens (315 or 311, not sure which) in 16g that was my Pappy's go to bird and bunny gun. The only thing I did to that gun was add a recoil pad to give more LOP. Shot many a dove, bunny and rooster with that gun. The second is one I remembered I had from reading "I have this old gun..." in the March issue of American Rifleman. It's a Winchester 67A. Single shot bolt .22LR that also was my Pappy's go to chuck gun. He's walk the perimeter of the farm every evening, spring-summer-fall with that old rifle. I guess I have to take at least one chuck with it this year so it doesn't feel lonely.

I have a 16ga Merkel o/u that has 29 " barrels weights 6lb 7oz and feels as good as any gun I have ever held. Made in the mid 1920's. It has killed many grouse and woodcock, haven't taken it out in years, hope to this year.

Mike, there are many ways a gun can be special. Your Pappy’s guns fit the definition in my view.

I like the filing of the frame on that nice gun. I hope you get it out this Fall.

I don't see how you can leave that Fox in the safe for so long..... :D

I guess the old saying.... So many guns, so little time has never been truer than it is for you. My collection of firearms is no where near what some of you guys have, and I can't find the time to give them near enough attention that I'd like to...... I guess, that's not really such a bad thing, but I do hear them softly crying in the back of the safe sometimes from lack of attention. :D

My guns don't care if I hunt without them. My dog is another story

Pat, when you retire, we’ll talk.

I pretty much quit deer hunting when I looked into my dog’s eyes after coming back from a deer hunt.

The weekend after Gator went on his last duck hunt, Harry and I went hunting on the river and left him due to it being a bit too strenuous for his old age. He sat by the door and whimpered over an hour after we left, according to Julia. I still regret that morning.

Mills, I have had similar experiences with my dogs. I’ve never been able to shake the regret from some of them, but it still haunts me.

I tend to make room in my hunting schedule for all the guns I own to get out at least once, but at the end of the day it’s the covers I hunt that define which ones see the most action. Being from a state where grouse are few and far between, and pheasants are essentially put and take, I find myself against the grain in the classic double world by desiring short barreled small chambered guns. Both for the lightness of the gun on long grouse walks and the fact I spend my time crawling through the places where no one else wants to for pheasants. So my 20 gauge lc smith, fox and Ithaca SKB’s get the nod for now. Being my collection is just beginning and a nice sub gauge graded gun from a prominent maker takes a little financial planning - I hope someday to have more options in these smaller gauge and barrel length configurations..But my 28” 12’s get their dose of vitamin D.

Dylan, I spent quite a few years chasing grouse in SE Ohio. I wish you could have known it back then…or did you?

My hunting career started in about 2005, so I did not. I have heard the stories of the days of old here when a dog wasn’t necessary and running out of shells was a real problem. I’ve witnessed the decline and now am seeing a mild resurgence in my area. We used to put 10 birds a day in the air when I was in high school 07-11 and then it slowly diminished to about 1-2 in 2018…then things started coming back up. just this last year I averaged 13. So I am holding out hope. However, they seem smarter than before. 13 in the air but if you were able to get close enough to 1-2 a day to get a decent shot your lucky. Most are 30 yards out and you hear the and catch them headed off through the woods….


Still more fun to me than going and popping a couple newly released pheasants though.

The most nostalgic gun I own is my big HE grade, 32" barreled, 3" chambered Fox duck gun. It has been a regular worrier of ducks ever since I acquired it, maybe 15 yrs. ago (?). I take it to Arkansas every year for ducks and, with bismuth, it has never let me down. Three years ago I went 6 for 6 with it. It is Thor's hammer, on ducks.

It is likely the last S X S I'd ever part with.

13 flushes in a day of hunting— in Ohio?!?!? I would not complain about that (and I keep those coverts secret).

Stan, I hope you never have to part with your Fox or have to decide on your last gun (especially remembering your exploits dove shooting with a .410).:)

Oh no, sorry for that confusion. I do most of my hunting in PA. The grouse are north of the Allegheny national forest.

Gosh, you had me thinking of going back to Ohio again:shock:. BTW, my wife is from the Youngstown area. I grouse hunted in some of the nearby WMAs back in the late 1980s/early 1990s and found grouse not too terribly far from you then (Madison, OH, yes?). There were enough to justify visiting my in-laws.:rotf:

I hope your PA coverts have a good nesting season.

That makes some sense, but 13 flushes is outstanding. Western parts of NY are clearly better than the eastern parts this past year or two. So far if this rain doesn't let up the nesting season will be bad in upstate NY.

Thanks, my friend. I hope so, too. I do seem quite a paradox, I guess, with my love for big duck guns and little .410s, at the same time. However, there is a common thread here ........... loooong barrels.

Rather than deciding on a "last gun" I seem to be going the opposite direction. :eek: I made an offer on a 29" barreled English .410 ejector gun yesterday, with 3" chambers and heavy nitro proof. We'll see.

Pictures are expected...and I can wait until after the dove opener so that you can pose your new gun next to the bird of peace.:)