Hammers or hammerless for hunting:
1. One must keep the action open for safety while hunting with a hammer gun if its hammers are cocked. If the hammers are not cocked it is hard to quickly cock both hammers when a bird appears! With the hammers cocked one could trip and fall in which the gun might close violently and a hammer slip off its sear. This is not good for one's hunting mates or dogs. The hammerless gun has an easy to use safety mechinism.
2. Reloading either requires the action to be opened, shells stuffed into the chambers, action closed, and either both hammers cocked or the automatic safety be pushed forward. While waterfowl hunting, if one is very lucky or they need to dispatch a cripple, one needs to reload quickly.
I have Parker Top Lever hammer guns and Hammerless guns. I prefer to hunt with hammerless but do shoot enjoy shooting the beautiful top lever and lifter hammer guns!
Compare hammers or hammerless to a automatic transmission in a sports car. I bought a new Camaro last year with a stick shift 6 speed transmission. The same car with its computer operated 6 speed automatic trans and steering wheel mounted paddle shifter would have been more functional but not as much fun to drive! If however I had to drive in heavy traffic for hours every day I might have bought a Camaro with an automatic!
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