Anything tactical?

Everytime I see local sheriffs decked out in more gear than Seal Team 6 on Operation Geronimo, I think to myself, "You just gotta wonder". The one today had been sitting on his arse in Starbucks so long that his cruiser was covered in as much snow as my truck was that had been sitting across the street for two hours... Maybe all the tactical gear weighted his non-tactical ass down so much that it was too much to waddle out to fight crime for truth, justice, and the American way!

Y'all reckon there is a Tactical Merit Badge these days?

-WA Mtnhunter

I particularly agree with the camo fad, nylon slings, tactical everything and the "extreme" product names. The zombie thing, it just sad that there are enough basement-dwelling failures at real life to make such things marketable.

Not that long ago our parents and grandparents killed lots of animals without any of the things on your short list. (when do we get the long list?)

If you don't believe in zombies, you haven't wandered around in the general public lately.

Yea, camouflage EVERYTHING is a joke just as the name of your carpet installation business being something like, "Royal Elk Flooring", or some other stupid name like that!
Also, putting a nylon sling on your model 70 (or the like) is akin to affixing a bumper sticker to the back of your Ferrari.

Being a Marine, and seeing all these non-military/LEO people run around dressed like some spec-ops with all types of tactical gear just sets me off something wicked. Kudos to you Mr. Petzal, you hit the nail right on the head.

Nice post Mr. Petzel. However I do like pull through “cleaners” when doing load development for my reloads. I like to send one down my barrel in between groups. It doesn’t totally clean my barrel which I like, but gets just enough of the powder fouling out to make me feel good about the next 5 shots. I do like the lead sleds for the same purpose of load development for reloads.

DEP, you never cease to amaze and entertain! LMAO! Beer spewed out of one's nostrils is not a pleasant experience!

Clay, Where in the heck did you dredge that on up from? LOL! That was a masterpiece if I have to say so myself!

Cheers!

DEP - I hope your long list of grievances includes the re-styling of the 1911 pistol to make a fashion statement.
With that upswept beavertail grip safety, it reminds me of the old Cadillac tailfins that were described as "directional stabilizers."

A-men brother David. You have busted the 10 ring for a perfect 100 on this one.

As someone with 60 closer in front of me than 50 is behind me I find myself in the same agitated state as Petzal most of the time. Maybe that's why people don't live to be 200. If you did, your head would eventually explode and the fragments would take out dozens of innocent bystanders.
Of the ten things DP cited, I think multiple reticles drive me farthest up the wall. I find myself yelling, "Idiot" at the screen every time I see some TV hunter fumbling around with his over-priced scope trying to calculate the proper reticle for an unsuspecting mammal standing broadside 150-yards away. We've already been down this road. Some of the first scopes used in this country were German models with more complicated features than a cuckoo clock. Users found themselves so mesmerized by the reticles that they forgot to shoot. Just sight the damned rifle in three inches high at 100 years and as long as the bullet is moving from 2,900 fps and up hold where you want to hit out to about 300-yards. If the target is farther away than that, try to get closer. It's called hunting; not sniping. (Same thing applies to 3-D moves, too. We tried that in the 50s and victims are still cross-eyed.)
Have to admit I harbor some fondness for pull-throughs, though, as long as you occasionally put the cleaning rod to use. The pull-through I use seems to do a pretty good job, although I won't argue that laziness is another by-product of getting long in the tooth...

Mr. Petzal, Speaking of gun slings, a year or two ago you blogged about a specfic leather sling you are fond of. I have searched my fragged hard drive for that post and cannot find it. Can you tell me what sling that is? I think I am in a position now to afford one.

I guess at 38 years old, I was born too late, because all of the above things drive me insane as well. I've had my Lead Sled for years, and I've maybe shot off of it twice. It is a good holder for my shot bags for shotgun loading though. A pull through cord will never see my bores. I've made one piece rods work just fine for years. To my knowledge, my checkered wool shirts and brown pants have never cost me more game than the guy wearing head to toe camo across the fence. I just can't stand camo anything. And lastly, nothing beats a Model 70 Featherweight with a normal Leupold VX-3 2.5-8 scope scope with duplex crosshairs with a Brownell's Latigo leather sling. I've never owned anything tactical, because I can't imagine anything being better than the setup I just mentioned. It's worked fine for years. And it always will. Even on the zombies that I don't believe in.

David,

I like your short list but feel it's not complete without mentioning the oodles of idiots on TV today ramming the beauty of these items down our throats. Of course, that is a list all to itself.

Dave you hit this one out of the park. You are the only reason I keep renewing my subscription to the magazine.

Recently I purchased a Stony Point brand "lead sled" that sells for $69 at the Bushnell factory store. My friend Bill Evans has one of the real Lead sleds that costs about 100 bucks (they have several models-this is the cheapest). Wanted to tell everyone the Stony Point sled is less money and is a better tool for the job. I used it to sight in my CVA Accura yesterday. Like Dave said you have to shoot off the shoulder after that because the gun will recoil differently and may well change bullet impact. That gun with 250 or 300 grain bullet and 120 grain charge of Blackhorn 209 packs quite a wallop. It was nice for the sled to take some of those whacks. At the range I clean with a one piece SS rod. Swabbing between shots is not needed with Blackhorn 209 but that is the only ML powder I have found that works that well. With 777, pyrodex, white hot pellets, etc, etc swab between shots or you are wasting your time. A really good black powder solvent can be made by mixing 1/3 Murphies oil soap, 1/3 denatured alcohol and 1/3 hydrogen peroxide use a dark bottle to preserve the peroxide.
Do any of you guys have a muzzleloader with stainless barrel? There are 2 problems black powder residue will stain the barrel and it stands out really bad in the woods. Recently had my gun Cerakoted flat black good bye to both problems. If you check my photo page in a few minutes there will be before and after pics. Bill Evans at Dynatek in KCMO did the work. You can reach Bill at 816-718-1446. He can also camouflage (dipping) just about anything in any pattern you choose.
For me the zombie stuff was just plain boring as was fly shooting and a few other things. Nice to visit once in a while.
BTW I have a new kid to take hunting.

I agree Dave. i'd like to add tupperware stocks, especially the ones with rubberized grips. I cant recall any of my guns with cut or stamped checkering ever slipping out of my hands. I do like the bore snake, but not in place of a proper cleaning. As for the camo everything, i lose stuff well enough as it is, sans camo.

Zombies are just kids having fun. I remember when some guys decided to take their single action revolvers and lever rifles to the range one weekend. Look how that turned out and they didn't have the factory support Zombie shooters have received. We need younger shooters to pick up the sport. Let them have their fun. I heard one of the gun grabbers a couple weeks ago on TV say he wasn't concerned about gun control. They'd just demonize guns like they did tobacco and the guns would just disappear.

Zombie hunters, cowboy action shooters, mountain man rendezvous, it's all good with me because it keeps people shooting.

Ah, Dear Dave, You just made my day. I was having a curmudgeonly
kind of day--Can a woman be a curmudgeon? Anyway, just because I nearly blew up my best friend and myself and thereby depositing pieces of us through out the small town we live in and pulverizing a whole pharmacy by getting a bit to close
to the propane tanks, I was feeling like the little 70 year old woman that I am. So anyway, this piece filled me with joy--Really liked the camo and zombie comments. Thanks--- now I will dream of camo stuff instead to almost becoming someone's bait hanging on a street light.

I wish you would have added TV hunting shows to your list! You know the ones where they shoot Elk at 1200yds and say See,nothing to it,yeah right nothing to it.How about the ones where all the deer walk calmly in and stand broadside at 25yds, smile for the camera before the sound of the shot and a long track in search of the downed beast before a miracle happens and they find it the next morning the truth in hunting as the name inplies couldnt be further from the truth

"When he brandished his Totally Rad, I blew him away with my Payback"!

I completely agree! Especially the last. I never saw the attraction to mythical creations of someones imagination that the gaming industry took and ran with.

Couldn't agree more Dave. As a retired SWAT commander I can tell you that giving a sniper or assault rifle a model name like "Warlord", etc. can actually guarantee that you won't sell that rifle to a lot of government agencies. Keep it to numbers and letters please. And as for wearing SWAT gear when you're hunting deer - leave the ghillie suits for the pros.

I like the whole list, but a couple things really talk to me. First is th tactical craze. I think many companies think they can paint something black and call it tactical. I guess they can, but I hope most people can see through it. Second, I'm glad someone else is befuddles by the whole zombie thing. Zombie ammo, zombie cammo, zombie themed proms....it's ridiculous. I do kind of like the zombie deer target.

I am one of the older duffers who still loves to hunt, and day dream of the hunts gone by. And I think Dave has hit the nail right on the head. My idea of camo 55 years ago was a WWII field jacket from the local Army-Navy Store. And it worked great for duck hunting. I even had the liner for it, so I wore it all winter long for any kind of hunting or ice fishing. I also got to wear a brand new one... a few years later, and it worked real good too. I might still have it in a closet somewhere, but I think I finally wore that one out and my boots out as well. I like my pocket knives in stainless steel and nice and shiney, so if I drop it, I can find it. My boy gave me a really neat camo one with all sorts of gadgets. I leave it in the truck console because it has one of the seat belt cutters in the end of it. I would loose it sure in the woods. Go get 'em, Dave.

While I will eternally respect DEP for his depth of knowledge on all things hunting and firearms, I found this list to be the journalistic equivalent of an old man standing on his porch yelling at kids to slow down on their bikes. Products and preferences change all the time, and most of the time it's based on progress. As far as zombies and the like, well, I think I'd prefer to watch "Walking Dead" over any show that was popular when DEP was my age.

Mr. Spontaneity's complaint for the rifle world would be the influx new meaningless intermediate cartridges like the

"30 caliber ultra bottle necked synergisticaly semi-flanged rebated rimmed belted semi-magnum"

AKA 30 Remington AR, .300 WSM, etc.

9 out of 10 ain't bad - I still think the zombie thing is funny, even if I get the most entertainment now from marketing fluff (anti-zombie loads!) and media panic (bath salts!) than from the zombie movies and books

Yes, and there is even camo bikini underwear for women. I guess it's for the male hunter who wants to have a hard time searching for his lady!

Dave,I agree with most of what you wrote, though I do disagree on the gun names. It might be that I'm bad with numbers or that a hunk of metal and plastic model X15-U47 has no soul. Nope, give me Old Betsy or The Thumper it's got some romance to it. ;)

Zombies are simply about a scenario, not that zombies are real or even might be real. The scenario is simply overwhelming odds, kind of a creeping doom. It's fatalistic in that eventually, you will lose, but until that time, you'll fight, run, etc. constantly and that idea is exciting/interesting to some.

About pull through cleaners (bore snake, for example), I've found them to be fantastic for my inline muzzleloader. I use one after every other shot to clean the barrel so reloading is easy and accuracy is much better. It's definitely not the end-all of cleaning, but it's something you can easily do in the field or at the range between shots or every few shots.