Ok. I’m going to throw out the most oddball experience and recommendation ever here. First some backstory:
I have a 10-year-old boy that is not quite ready to hunt IMO. He’s missing the drive to do it for real right now, but… he has expressed some interest so I’m breaking him in little by little. Obviously, he shoots a lot of archery like his old man, and he’s pretty good, but he’s not up to par for the regs for that here (he needs to pull 40 pounds minimum for Idaho). I work in LE, and have a pile of guns, and I’m plenty familiar with them, so that’s where we’ll start.
He’s a little feller and kinda timid, so at the range, he’s shot almost everything I have that he can manage. On top of that, he’s a righty and left eye dominant, so it’s a bear to tackle this problem. He’ll shoot a .22 all day and loves it, but lays his head funny on the stock due to the opposite eye dominance. Thats not going to work with any recoil.
So; his second favorite to shoot is an AK I have in 9mm with a red dot; super easy shooter and he can keep both eyes open, but not really a great deer or bear rifle choice.
I have a 30-30 with a forward mounted scout scope: also easy to keep both eyes open and I killed my first elk with that gun. The recoil is a bit on the heavy side for him and the length of pull is way too much. That one is out.
Enter the crazy, off the wall rifle of the whole bunch: the SKS. It’s a softer shooter than the 30-30, being semi-auto, he doesn’t have to think about operating the action, and I have a red dot mounted in a rail where the rear sight goes, so the eye thing isn’t an issue. The length of pull is the commie short stock too, so it fits great. He’s hitting paper plates at 100 with it most the time (still needs work), so I’m thinking that’s the one as nuts as it sounds.
Moral of the story is, they have to try the gun and jive with it I learned. The more options you can get your hands on, the more they can figure it out.
I have a 10-year-old boy that is not quite ready to hunt IMO. He’s missing the drive to do it for real right now, but… he has expressed some interest so I’m breaking him in little by little. Obviously, he shoots a lot of archery like his old man, and he’s pretty good, but he’s not up to par for the regs for that here (he needs to pull 40 pounds minimum for Idaho). I work in LE, and have a pile of guns, and I’m plenty familiar with them, so that’s where we’ll start.
He’s a little feller and kinda timid, so at the range, he’s shot almost everything I have that he can manage. On top of that, he’s a righty and left eye dominant, so it’s a bear to tackle this problem. He’ll shoot a .22 all day and loves it, but lays his head funny on the stock due to the opposite eye dominance. Thats not going to work with any recoil.
So; his second favorite to shoot is an AK I have in 9mm with a red dot; super easy shooter and he can keep both eyes open, but not really a great deer or bear rifle choice.
I have a 30-30 with a forward mounted scout scope: also easy to keep both eyes open and I killed my first elk with that gun. The recoil is a bit on the heavy side for him and the length of pull is way too much. That one is out.
Enter the crazy, off the wall rifle of the whole bunch: the SKS. It’s a softer shooter than the 30-30, being semi-auto, he doesn’t have to think about operating the action, and I have a red dot mounted in a rail where the rear sight goes, so the eye thing isn’t an issue. The length of pull is the commie short stock too, so it fits great. He’s hitting paper plates at 100 with it most the time (still needs work), so I’m thinking that’s the one as nuts as it sounds.
Moral of the story is, they have to try the gun and jive with it I learned. The more options you can get your hands on, the more they can figure it out.
