Shooting In the Rain

Last week I talked about the Missouri Shoot I went to and how it was raining all Saturday and so this week I want to tell you what you should do to clean your gun after shooting in the rain. First of all you want to make sure to wipe your gun down after you come in from shooting. First wipe it down with a towel or paper towels and then after you get all of the water off wipe it down with your regular oiled cloth. You will also want to run a Bore-Snake or rod down your barrel if you have one handy because water will get down your barrel.

We stayed in a motel and so on our way back from the shoot we stopped and picked up a couple cans of WD-40 and some other gun cleaning supplies. When we got back to the hotel everyone who was cleaning their guns got in one room because as we found out you will make the room smell of cleaning products. You will definitely want to have a window open or the door cracked because there will be a lot of aerosol fumes in that one little room.

You then want to take the wood off the gun if you can, unfortunately I couldn’t. You will want to take the wood off because you are going to completely spray down your gun with WD-40 because that gets rid of all the water trapped in the receiver and other metal parts that will rust. The reason to take off the wood is because the WD-40 will dry out your wood and that is not good, if you can’t take your wood off you will just have to make sure to wipe it down good with oil to protect it.

You will want to then go through your regular cleaning routine and make sure to wipe the gun off good. I say this because the Sunday of our shoot I was shooting trap and we ran out of targets so the puller was filling the trap and so during that break I began to look over my gun and found rust puddles between my rib. I immediately tried to wipe it away but could not reach so after I got done shooting I went in and took a paper towel and tore it into little strips to get the rust out from underneath my rib.

So that is how you take care of your gun after shooting in the rain. Of course you generally avoid shooting in the rain but sometimes it is unavoidable and you just have to make the most of it.

Tournament Preparation

Have you ever been to a tournament and wonder what do I do? If so you are not alone, many beginning archers don’ know what to do after they arrive at the shooting venue. Here are some things you need to do as soon as get to the shooting venue or before you arrive there.

1. The first thing you need to do before the tournament is find out where and at what time you shoot. This is imperative because many tournaments will not allow shooters to shoot if they arrive late to a tournament. It is also important to confirm the time and location of where you shoot once you arrive at the shooting venue. This needs to be done promptly because sometimes a course may have to be moved due to numerous uncontrollable reasons.

2. The first thing you should do once you arrive at the tournament site is to register. If you haven’t already registered it is important that you do this immediately after you arrive. If you don’t register on time you will either not be allowed to shoot or you will have to pay a very large late fee.

3. After you have registered and check the time and location of where you are going to be shooting you can now start to relax. Relaxing, before and during a tournament, will greatly improve your success at a tournament. By allowing your body to relax you will be less likely to tense up and force your arrow in a direction that it shouldn’t go in.

4. Before you start competing make sure you practice. Many things could have happened to your bow during your trip to the tournament so make sure everything is where it should be a working correctly. However it is also important that you don’t practice too much. If you practice too much then you will get tried during the tournament and likewise your score will suffer.

5. The most important thing that you can do on tournament day is to arrive to the tournament location early. This will allow you to get settled in and relaxed. If you rush to the tournament because you are late you are more likely to rush your shots. Remember, just because you have time doesn’t mean you need to practice once you warm up stop shooting.

6. Last but not least have faith in yourself; you have been practicing for a long time for this moment so make sure you make the most of it!

Heads Up

Squirrels are entertaining and annoying at the same time while deer hunting. It seems I see twice as many squirrels while deer hunting as I do when I am actually squirrel hunting. I know that this happens mainly because I am not shooting the first squirrel I see when I am deer hunting so it allows all of the squirrels to come out of their nests. Also the fact that I normally deer hunt from a tree stand makes a difference. When you are sitting on the ground the squirrels can easily see you from the tree tops, where as in a tree stand you just look like part of the tree.

When the squirrels start to come out they make a lot of noise which can sometimes spook the deer or even give away your position. I have already had many close encounters this year with squirrel while deer hunting. A couple weeks ago I had squirrel come down the tree next to me. By the time I realized it was there, it was close enough that I could reach over and grab it. When I turned and looked at it I think I scared it as much as it scared me. The squirrel took off into the tree wondering what I was.

I also have had many squirrels jump into the tree top of the tree my stand is in. This sends a very indescribable pulse down the tree that travels through your spine. There is no other feeling quite like it and you will only know it when you feel it. Most of the time these squirrels will jump on to another tree top, except for the curious one.

I could feel that pulse in the tree getting closer and closer. I kept looking up, but couldn’t see anything. Finally, I looked up and there was a big squirrel five feet directly above my head and looking straight down at me. Still curious, it kept coming at me. Soon after, I stood up to scare it off because it was too close for my comfort.

This is just a warning to all you other deer hunters. If you feel a strange pulse from the tree, then you might want to look up because there could be a squirrel closer to your head then you think.

Hybrid Traitor Fusion Reviewed

In a previous blog I mentioned that I went paintballing up at my friend’s farm. What I forgot to mention is that I also got a chance to test out the Hybrid Traitor Fusion. Hybrid Technology is a private label company. They have three guns out right now, the Mummy which is based off of the Bob Long Marq 6, and their own variations of the Smart Parts Shocker, and the gun being reviewed today, the Dangerous Power Fusion.
Like I said the Hybrid Traitor Fusion is based off of the Fusion made by Dangerous Power. From what I have been able to discern, the DP Fusion was already a pretty good gun to begin with. Then Hybrid Technologies got its hands on it and tweaked it to make it better. They swopped out some of DP’s parts for theirs in an effort to use the Fusion to its full potential.
When I got it in my hands for the first time I thought it was just your standard mid-range electric marker, nothing special. Boy was I wrong, I shot loader after loader out of that thing and was just awestruck by it performance. The Fusion is ready to get up and go straight out of the box. The board has pretty much every setting you would ever need in your life, from nppl to psp to nxl and everything in between. The Fusion is capable of shooting up to twenty five balls per second and trust me; as long as you have a hopper that will feed fast enough this gun has no problem spitting them out of the two piece cocker threaded barrel. This thing shoots ropes and the break beam eyes do a fantastic job of preventing ball breaks. The milling on the marker itself looks sweet and you can get your hands on one for 425-450 bones. This thing will easily match a PMR or a Mini and can even hang with the DM6 and other high-end guns at a fraction of the cost.

World Cup Time!

It's that time again, World Cup time! And you know what that means. All of the companies will be releasing the new versions of their markers and/or releasing new markers that will be the future of paintball. Here are a few things to look for in the coming weeks and in the next year.

1. Dye: Dye will be releasing the new addition to their Dye Matrix Series, the DM8. It is an even numbered year so that usually means new features. The only new feature that I am aware of is the new Hyper3 reg. It will supposedly make the DM8 more air efficient than the Hyper2 made its predicesors.
2. Smart Parts: Smart Parts will be debuting yet another entry level, "high end" marker, the Vibe. This thing looks like a fancy Epiphany. Once again Smart Parts takes advantage of their patents to release another low cost marker.
3. Blast: Bob Long is releasing their own low cost marker, the Protege. They have gone back to the Intimidator look and dropped the price to about $500. This marker will most likely perform like similar markers, the PMR, Epiphany, and Ion.
4. MacDev: I know I have already mentioned this but I don't want us to forget about it. MacDev's Droid will definately be a new one to look for.

We have our licenses, Officer

A while back I did a post about how to get a hunting license titled “Licensed to Kill.” After doing this post I recalled an experience I had last year that I was glad I had my license with me.

My friend and I went out goose hunting early one morning at a field next to the reservoir. At 8:00, after about an hour of hunting, I got a phone call from my mom saying a police officer called and that I needed to go to my truck to meet him. We were hunting over a hill in the back of the field so I couldn’t see me truck at the road form where we were at. We got up and walked to the road to meet the officer. We showed him our hunting licenses to prove that we were licensed. After that he told us that he really stopped because he thought my truck was a stolen vehicle that someone had ditched. This made me somewhat mad because he had pretty much ruined our hunt. The funny thing is that he got his car stuck in the mud next to my truck so he had to call a wrecker to pull his car out.

He really wasn’t there because he questioned our hunting licenses but I think if we wouldn’t have had them then he would have called us in. This is proof that you should always carry your hunting license with you when you are hunting. Even if the officer is looking for something else he still might check your license.

Archery Park

So the other day a professor brought to my attention a story that involved a Wisconsin archery park whose members are no longer allowed to shoot there. This is due to the complaints of neighbors who are concerned for their own safety. This is a common problem with outdoor shooting in an urban area. Although the article says that there are earthen berms that surround the park this often is not enough to stop all of the arrows that are deflected by various objects.
Most arrows that are shot hit their desired target however the problem is the ones that do not hit the desired target. Most likely these arrows would bounce off of an object and land somewhere in the park. The arrows that don’t land in the park are the one’s raising concerns. Even though it is an arrow these are usually not that dangerous. This is because most of their energy was lost when they first hit the ground.
What should be done to fix the problem here is to install a netting, like the one a mentioned in a previous post, on top of the earthen berms. This would further hinder any arrows from escaping the archery park, but it is important to remember that this will not fully stop all arrows from escaping the park because it is an outdoor park and arrows can fly really high. Another solution would be removing all hard surfaces that an arrow could possible bounce off of. An example of this would be a rock or anything metal. In this case wood would be acceptable because more than likely it will stop the arrow without making it bounce off. My last piece of advice would be to put a wood awning over the shooters. This would prevent arrows that are accidently released when pulling the bow back from leaving the park. The most likely way arrows are ending up out of the park is because archers are accidently releasing the string when they are pulling the bow back. This makes the arrows trajectory look like a very high arch. The awning would stop most arrows from leaving the inside of the park by stopping them immediately.
Unfortunately there is a good chance that this park will not reopen. However an alternative to an outdoor archery range would be an indoor archery range that could possibly be built on the same location. This would allow a safe backstop for the arrows in all directions. It is important to remember if you do not have a safe backstop do not shoot your arrows!