What is the strangest shot you've ever taken?

[ProShooter]

Many. many years ago, I was on a volunteer fire department. I had just gotten into law enforcement so someone tasked me with cleaning the old 1960's civil defense line gun (.45-70).

Looked like this -


I cleaned that beast and of course, now had to test fire it. I took it down to the river and fired one of those metal spikes clear across the river into a tree. I was sure that ol' gun was going to explode.

 

[zdc1775]

Walking out after a day hunting deer and not seeing anything I scared a covey of quail and instinctively fired from the hip, killing two. One was just a mass of feathers and blood the other took a single 00 to the head.

 

[pikid89]

I was once hunting deer in a rainstorm...just as i was about to get out of the cold miserable tree stand, a doe trots out and won't stop...as i track it through my scope, I see it heading for a path into a really dense thicket...had it gotten there i would not have gotten a shot. Just before the thicket the deer stopped behind a huge oak tree that had a split about 4 ft off the ground, and all i could see was the does head in the crack. 100 gr .270 through the ears and that was all she wrote.

 

[FROGO207]

Some that were witnessed by others that come to mind.

Shooting a round of skeet with a 300WSM and dusting them all.
Shooting my Ruger 44MAG at a NRA std target on the 100 YD rifle range one handed and getting 5 of 6 within 3 inches and a clean miss on one.
Sticking a 270 brass on a branch of a tree and shooting it dead center at 30 yards with a .22 pistol in a stiff wind. Never could do it again that day though.

 

[woerm]

putting golfballs with a .22

that is about as addictive as shooting bottle rockets with bb rifles

 

[bakerj]

Was out shooting clay targets with Chief AJ and one of his 10/22's he was working the thrower and I was shooting. Switched over to a Ruger MKII pistol and hit four clays in a row with it.

 

[stonecoldy]

A flying starling with a Wristrocket and steel ball at 25 feet, a single bird (not a flock shot). Did duplicate that with a flock shot on blackbirds with a couple steel balls in the pocket. Had much more fun moving on to pellet guns though.

 

[osprey176]

I've used a 12 gauge to clear shooting lanes after placing a tree stand,pre season naturally.Shot three turkeys with one round,and who says a .444 won't penetrate ?We used to "do" the dishes with .22 pistols at camp...more fun than washing anyway.Cut fire wood,drilled holes in plywood,'"handled" that ornery feral cat in my backyard to protect my cocker spaniels dignity.

 

[redraidermgr]

I used to regularly plink with a scoped Ruger 10/22. Most fun i ever had was shooting a bottle cap off a 20oz soda bottle at 100 yards.

The best shot i had ever seen was a guy hitting a clay target (one of the orange ones) from 300 yards with a pistol. The small range i grew up using had 25, 50 and 100 yard range all on the same line but if anyone was using the 200 or 300 yard lines (behind the regular line) everyone had to go that firing line for safety. Some guys were trying to dial in a 7mm rem mag rifle. After they couldn't hit it for over an hour my friend, that was waiting for them to finish so he could go back to the pistol range, asked if they minded if he took a shot with his Ruger black-hawk in 45lc. He took aim and did Kentucky wind-age for the long range and shot and it broke the clay target that they hadn't been able to hit after almost a full 20 round box of ammo with a high powered scope and a spotter.

 

[Plan2Live]

As a kid I was pretty amazing with a wrist rocket slingshot, shooting bottles thrown into the air or bobbing in a strong current in a nearby drainage canal.

Recently, this spring after watching the movie Wanted starring Angelina Jolie with my sons, there's the scene where the hero shoots the wings of of flies, on a dare from my son, I started shooting carpenter bees out of the air (if they hovered for a second or two) with a Crossman pump BB gun. I guess I should mention the sights are not point of aim so I have to adjust for off target aim. Oh, and waiting for them to give me a clear background (not pointing into neighbor's yard) adds a layer of difficulty. But it's fun when you bring them down. Just wish I could get those sights zeroed in to point of aim.

 

[farson135]

Back when I was a competitive sporter air rifle shooter I shot through the middle of a lifesaver (the candy) without breaking the edges. My SAI owed me a pizza for that one.

 

[Mike1234567]

My grandfather gave me quarters to shoot from across the 80 foot yard and he let me keep all I could hit. When I could take every quarter he changed to dimes so I had to improve. Soon I could take all the dimes too so he adjusted the rules again... had to hit at least 1/8 inch from the edge. This was an old low-powered Daisy pellet gun with iron sights so the drop was significant even at 80 feet and even the slightest breeze required correction. You should have seen the faces of clerks when I handed them all those dented coins.

 

[Captaingyro]

I used to be a forward air controller, flying A-37's. We had a procedure for marking high-threat targets by "lofting" rockets onto them from miles away. There were charts that told you how far the rocket would travel, as well as time-of-flight, given release altitude, airspeed, and pitch angle. We rarely got to actually do it, because the procedure sent the rocket well up into the atmosphere, and Murpy's law dictates there will always be another aircraft up there.

Finally, I found myself out at a Red Flag exercise in Nevada. The restricted airspace there allows for this kind of thing, and I saved a whole pod of rockets one day to try it out. Bottom line...amazing. You offset the appropriate distance from the target, pull the nose up about thirty degrees, and hose that baby off. At the same time, you hack the clock. Then, because no one's shooting back, you chase the rocket, hoping to see the impact. The charts were surprisingly accurate, and you'd usually pick up a little puff of white phosphorous smoke out in the distance within a few seconds of when it was expected. Then, of course, you could strafe the smoke.

There are many worse ways to spend an afternoon.

 

[USAF_Vet]

This thread reminded me of one of my first gun experiences at scout camp. We were shooting scoped .22s at targets on a line of twine. I wasn't very accurate, and knew virtually nothing about firearms other than which point was the dangerous end. The scope was so horribly out of zero, aiming at the bullseye, I hit the twine holding everyone's target up. Completely accidental, probably couldn't duplicate it today if I tried.

 

[CAR-AR]

Way back when I was stationed in Maine a bunch of us joined the Berwick Gun Club. One day I brought out the Mini 14 and when I got down to 20 rounds I loaded up and let it rip. Since we were fairly poor I recovered all of my brass for future reloading. I found 19 cases from that last run but I couldn't find that last case to save my life but a buddy found it:

http://www.thehighroad.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=149685&stc=1&d=1316731941

I think it hit a 4x4 upright and bounced back into the firing line but it was pretty tore up.

 

[LJ-MosinFreak-Buck]

I've got another one with my Swiss.

I was on a rifle hunt in Nebraska (don't go too often, non-resident tags are expensive!) on family farm. It was about an hour until sunset, not seeing a single shootable deer since sun-up and it was last day of the season. Pressure was high, and I wanted my Venison chili, deer jerky, deer burgers... Where was I? Oh yeah...

My cousin and I were holed up in a blind on the front 40 (front 40 acres) about 250 yards from the house about 60 feet from a dried up creek bed. Only either or tags are amazing, allow a shot on any mature deer. Anyway lets get to the shot.

A medium-sized doe mozey'd on down through the creek bed and my cousin let me have the shot, he already had four. So I took aim with the K31, centered in on a high- vital shot and let 'er rip. Well the doe dropped, but tried crawling, ended up folding itself in half. I hit spine. Deer would die in a matter of minutes.

Get to the deer about a half hour later, didn't want to walk out too soon, my cousin took down a monster doe (figures ) and we leave the blind. I get to my doe, smell gut, and immediately knew what was wrong. Checked my ammo, and found that I had grabbed the WRONG SHELL BAG! I grabbed my GP11 instead of my soft point rounds.

Looked and looked and looked. Could not find an entrance or an exit wound. None at all. Only reason I knew I hit it was because it dropped and folded itself in half. Field dressing revealed spine fragments in the gut (lots of ruined meat, 40 lbs harvested off of a guesstimated weight of 140lbs).

Later after dressing, we found the cone of the bullet, no core. No entrance wound. No exit. Strangest shot I've ever taken.

 

[DeepSouth]

**warning** what you are about to read is neither legal, nor would I condone doing it.

SAME!!


When I was a little younger and lot less mature my brother made me a little spinning plinker for my 22's, it had three targets a 1" a 2" and a 3." I was highly intoxicated in the yard with some buddies just shooting the bull and being drunk. I had also just bought one of the new Marlin 450's, they had just come out, somebody asked to see it. So I went inside and got it showed it off then shouldered it and shot it at the target (That I couldn't hardly see) probably 60 yards away, open sights, drunk and in the dark (around midnight). And behold, I hit the 2" target dead center, my plinker was destroyed and flying through the air. My brother was mad and everyone else was amazed.

Later the same night I shot at a coon up a tree with the same gun, busted my face up pretty good when it slipped off my shoulder, don't know if I hit him, couldn't see for the blood.

 

[Hossfly68]

Christmas Day. I was 12 years old and couldn't wait to try out my new Browning lever action .22! Dad drew up a target and we went to the back pasture and he started teaching me how to sight in the scope. When I figured I had it just about perfect, I said, "betcha I can hit the tack in the top right corner of the target." Dad had been in the Marines and the Army and knew I didn't have a chance since it was the first time I'd ever shot a rifle or used a scope and we were about fifty or sixty yards away. I fired. We walked up to the target and my dad simply said, "well, I guess you hit it.". The tack had been driven into the railroad tie that the target was on. We packed up and called it a day. I went on to become The Squirrel Killer after that. Always got my fill. Stopped using the scope though and had even more fun. Finally ended up using the Colt Frontier scout that he used to teach me and my brothers how to shoot pistols.
Found out years later that he had bragged to all of his buddies that I was an excellent shot and he told that story to all of them.

 

[Shienhausser]

Nothing terribly exciting here, I guess the moment that me pause for a second was with a s&w 4" 686. My brother and I had just fired close to 6 boxes of ammo and somehow we had 1 cartridge left. I loaded it into the cylinder and just pointed it at the target not even taking a second to aim or even lining the sights up. Sure enough, bullseye on a 6" target at 10 yards haha, I just had the biggest grin.

 

[Strykervet]

This is a great thread, good job OP!

I have a few to mention. I always liked plinking, I grew up with a rifle, had one since I was 8. So I've taken quite a few odd and difficult shots. Of course as a kid growing up in the country, some of the things we did would be considered very taboo these days, and were then too, but the consequences weren't dire like they are today.

One of my childhood shots was a crow perched on a reed. I fired with a 10/22 or Marlin 60, I can't recall which I had at the moment, and I missed the crow but got some feathers. It flew off and my buddy laughed... Until the second shot nailed it dead center in mid-flight and it dropped like a rock. This was at about 50m or so.

I also used to shoot cans and bottle caps at varying distances, and one feat was shooting bottle caps at 100 yards with a 10/22. You could also shoot junk back then too, so I got a lot of practice shooting cars and buildings and everything else. When I was young, the world was a firing range for the most part.

Some of my most proud shots are from time spent at army ranges. We were training a group of SDM's and one said that the 14.5" barrel was too short to accurately engage targets with at range. We were using them out to 600m, and at the moment, we were at the 200m line using iron sights. My friend stopped the range and radioed the pit to put up a clean target and then he pulled out a compact HK USP .40 and nailed it firing one handed. That ended that arguement.

So it got me to thinking, and the next day I took my 6" 686+ and set up a clean painted steel silhouette at 300m. I shot it one handed, left hand on the hip, firing single action. I put five out of seven on the target, pretty cool.

The military issue M4 with an ACOG and a good shooter is capable of hitting a silhouette at 600m. The rifles used for this are typically 2MOA. I took one and hit a silhouette at 1000m, but I had to use a spotter to help guide the shot --I hit it on the third shot. 1000m really stretches the capability of a stock M4, and so I count this shot as a probability shot: based on the spotter data and my skill, it was bound to hit eventually.

I really like the pure skill shots. If you like this thread, you'll LOVE "Impossible Shots" on the Outdoor Channel on Wednesdays. I try never to miss that show, it is probably my favorite show.

Sadly, I don't have many current ones. Most of my range time is very structured at a public range, paper only, and I also spend a lot of time now working up loads and using a chronograph. Fun in its own right, but no spectacular shots.

I'm getting ready to go camping in the federal forests here soon. I'll keep this thread in mind when plinking and try to do an "impossible" shot.

 

[Strykervet]

Many. many years ago, I was on a volunteer fire department. I had just gotten into law enforcement so someone tasked me with cleaning the old 1960's civil defense line gun (.45-70).

Looked like this -


I cleaned that beast and of course, now had to test fire it. I took it down to the river and fired one of those metal spikes clear across the river into a tree. I was sure that ol' gun was going to explode.

Hey, that thing is pretty slick... I kind of want one.

I had a modified shotgun years ago that did something similar for running wire over really long distances.

 

[SDG]

Well, it wasn't me but a friend of mine winged a buzzard in flight ...








...with his potato gun.

 

[zstephens13]

I shot a clay out of the air with a .22 once.

Recently I shot the head of a drywall screw a seven yards. Perfect shot. I found the screw, too.

 

[wankerjake]

Shot a calf elk in the head freehand at ~200 yards. Absolutely the dumbest shot I've ever taken at an animal. As soon as I shot I thought "dude, you're an idiot. What were you thinking?" I thought I hit it but the whole walk to where it dropped I was cussing myself. Drilled it right thru the dome. It turned out ok but I think I learned my lesson. Stupid, stupid.

Well, it wasn't me but a friend of mine winged a buzzard in flight ...

...with his potato gun.

Hahaha. Awesome.

 

[MyGreenGuns]

3 of my stories

Was recently shooting .22 in backyard at cans. Knocked em all down, rather than set them back up I kept shooting. One of the cans popped up and landed upright back on the board I had originally put it on. Was shooting alone so no witness.

Shooting with ex-marine friend. We were shooting junk someone had left in the woods. We set up 20+ targets and lined up with one of us at each end of the truck. When he said "GO" we both opened fire. For an entire mag I hit every target just before he did. As he was reloading he just looked over at me and said, "Really? WT-?" I missed the whole next volley cause I was laughing so hard.

I remember jeepin with my uncle and his friends when I was 10ish. As we crested a hill three grouse popped up and started to fly away. His friend in the jeep ahead of us swerved his truck toward the ditch, rolled out of the door, drew from his crossdraw holster and one shot dropped the flying bird. I remember saying over the CB, "Remind me never to pi-- this guy off!" The bird hit the ground before his truck rolled to a stop against a tree.