Blackpowder Ain't Just for Cowboy and BPCR Target Shooting ...

[john boy]

I'm a Waterfowler.
For the last several years, I have hunted the ducks and geese exclusively with BP paper roll crimped shotgun shells - Bismuth and an old 1901 Parkerhurst damascus external 12g shotgun.  The bismuth is expensive, but watching the birds cup their wings into the decoys and then cocking them hammers back ... I have found the sport much more enjoyable.  A good smoke screen over the blocks is kind of neat too 
If one wants to give the 'yester yore' shooting a try with your Damascus or an old SxS, here's a reload that works out to 40+ yards:
* Federal or Canuck paper hulls (if you can find them because they are the best)
* W209 Primer
* 85gr FFFg
* Nitro card
* 1/2" greased fiber wad
* 1 1/4 Bismuth #4's
* Over shot card
* Rolled on a turn of the century roller
Do they work?  This year's late season goose hunt

Three of us limited out and no cripples.  Three bag limit.  A friend and I took a new waterfowler on his 1st hunt and we were mum to the new fella about the shells.  He was curious though about the Parkerhurst.  He was up wind and my 1st shot kind of engulfed his ground sack with smoke. 
I heard ... 'What the h*ll!

[Paladin UK]

JB says.......

.....an old 1901 Parkerhurst damascus external 12g shotgun.

109 yrs old `n` still spittin FIRE!!!!.............YehaWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW

Paladin (What sometimes feels that old  ) UK

[fourfingersofdeath]

It is very satisfying letting rip with the BP loads in a shotgun (as well as anything else ).

I am planning to hunt with an old Damascened Bbl hammer gun and a 1910 vintage 44WCF this year. Too durned hot at the moment though for casting or hunting, so I'll stick to cowboy shooting with a big hat and diving into the shade whenever possible at the moment. Great photo, thanks!

[Blackpowder Burn]

Now that looks like a hoot - and what a great photo.

The shotgun is my next area of attention in my "BP Retrograde Advancement Program".  I presently load it with plastic hulls and wads for CAS, but when time and resources (i.e., money) allow I want to make the regression (or Retrograde Advancement) to paper hulls, fiber wads, etc.

You've given me something to aspire to here.  Thanks,

[john boy]

Paladin, this was like finding a rough looking jewel.  It was standing at the end of a dealer's rack covered muzzle to butt plate with some kind of a gunk coating, like 10 layers of cosmoline. The tubes are now mirror bright but dirty as all Hades then and all the internal parts functioned perfectly.
Nobody apparently wanted it because it looked like a beat up old junker.  The price ended up to be $125 and was happy to pay it!
Plenty of work with mineral oil took the crap off - nice burl wood with no cracks but dings that come with age and about 3/4's of the checkering still intact with a nice plum patina bluing.  I give her a coat now and then with boiled linseed oil and the wood keeps looking better and better
She's back in her glory days now and points like just sticking your finger at the target. 

[Montana Slim]

Nice!!

I use a similar load of #5 (Lead) shot in paper hulls for miscellaneous critters with my old double Eclipse Meteor.

Regards,
Slim

[Pulp]

My Albert Greener 10 gauge is pretty good at bustin' clay pigeons.  Never tried it on an actual trap range, but just at home.

[john boy]

Folks, if you haven't tried it, goose jerky is mighty fine tasting.  I'll share my home brew mix recipe with you all when DD shares his Pearl Lube II recipe with us! 

[Delmonico]

Bring one or two of them out here and I'll drag out the dutch ovens.  Got an old Czech recipe that is great.

[Cuts Crooked]

Folks, if you haven't tried it, goose jerky is mighty fine tasting.  I'll share my home brew mix recipe with you all when DD shares his Pearl Lube II recipe with us! 

+1 on goose jerky! One of my co-workers makes it from snow geese.....fanfreakintastic!!!!!!

[Delmonico]

Cuts and John Boy, you both are total heathens wasting those fine geese on jerky, an olk Holstien is fine for that. (Know a farmer who did one time. )  Next thing is you'll be tellin' me you make sausage and jerky out of fine venison.

[john boy]

Next thing is you'll be tellin' me you make sausage and jerky out of fine venison.

Yep! 
D, the first time my wife cooked a venison rump roast and the marrow was oozing out of the bone - that was the last she ever, in 43 years of marriage, touched or eaten venison

[Delmonico]

Yep! 
D, the first time my wife cooked a venison rump roast and the marrow was oozing out of the bone - that was the last she ever, in 43 years of marriage, touched or eaten venison

Geez, beef will do the same thing.   I sure wish you were closer, I would be glad to cook you up some fine dishes with wild game in a dutch oven.  Cheesesteaks made out of loin and served on a sourdough bisquit is to die for, braised deer steak and canned milk gravy over the same bisquits is the finest meal in the whole world.  And that dish with the sweetened kraut, the tater dumplings and the goose is to die for.

[Mossyrock]

JB,

As someone who routinlly shoots two 10ga Damascus-barreled doubles, how about pictures of your prize?

[john boy]

Mossyrock, I'll have to get the camera out for a closer picture.  Hang tight

[litl rooster]

don't matter what kind of powder yer using the problem is there is a bag limit on them honkers

[Montana Slim]

don't matter what kind of powder yer using the problem is there is a bag limit on them honkers

I have a number of photos of myself..posing with piles of harvested ducks, geese, deer, etc, etc.....When the photos come out, I get qizzed by a few guys: "how many of you were hunting"....my joke reply is "nope, just me..good thing I brought plenty of shells". Of course thats not true.

Side note, My Pa has some old family photos (early 1950ish) from deer hunts, presumably in Minnesota. There is a pile of deer strung up & a black bear splayed out on the ground. Each hunter had his picture taken holding that bear hide/head....and individually with the captured "herd". But, there is nobody living to tell the story....who got the bear?

Photos tell a story, but "things" aren't always as they appear.

Regards,
Slim