Have you been shooting longer than I've been alive?

Years of practical experience with study and/or application of firearms

  • 1 month to 1 year

    Votes: 12 1.9%

  • 2-5 years

    Votes: 50 8.0%

  • 6-10 years

    Votes: 45 7.2%

  • 11-15 years

    Votes: 39 6.3%

  • 16-20 years

    Votes: 53 8.5%

  • 21-25 years

    Votes: 55 8.8%

  • 26-30 years

    Votes: 51 8.2%

  • 31-35 years

    Votes: 64 10.3%

  • 36-40 years

    Votes: 64 10.3%

  • 41+ years

    Votes: 187 30.1%

  • Never fired a gun

    Votes: 2 0.3%
  • Total voters
    622
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Fired my first shot on a bolt action .22, at Boy Scout camp when I was twelve. That was a little over a decade ago... and I was surprised at the time that they still did that. I'd be even more surprised if they still did today, the way things are now.

Didn't shoot another gun until four years ago when I bought my own. Parents didn't allow guns in their house, so I had to wait until I was living by myself. That marked the time when I started getting interested in shooting. I had an involuntary late start, but I'm trying to make up for that.
 
+41 yrs of shooting here.
BB, .22 rifle, and recurve bow as a youth.
Skeet and doves mainly as a teen.
Got into handguns and CC as an adult.
Will also admit to shooting potato guns and slingshots!
 
I was started out at age 5, and I'm now 61. I still have that very first bolt-action .22 rifle that was given to me....a Winchester model 69A. I also have the original bill of sale for it....$14.95 (NEW!).

"Uncle Sam" handed me a select-fire M-16 when I was 19 years old. I was 24 when I became a LEO, and retired when I was 55.

I'm still shooting .22's, and loving it just as much as when I was 5 years old!
 
Born in 1955

Age 3 - .22 revolver, Model 10
Age 4 - .22 rifle
Age 5 - 28 ga shotgun
Age 6 - 1911

I have some serious life experiences beginning as a kid, that involves firearms.
Stopping immediate threat of injury, or death to me, or others.

My experiences are not like those of others perhaps- still, mine are real to me, and I own them; and some for a real long time.

On a more happy note, I've done the "right thing", and this was How raised-What you do.

Older I get, the more I understand why my Mentors & Elders grinned as they did, and sometimes winced.

Kids you gave guns to are now teaching their kids, or even grandkids how to shoot with those guns!

I didn't grow up - just got bigger is all...
 
I was raised on a poor dirt farm in Tenn. where we all hunted (squirrel, rabbit, birds, possum, coon, groundhog) to survive. If we could eat it we hunted it. Dad let me shoot his Win. 69a 22 when I was 5. I haven't stopped since. I'm now 60. And God willing I'll be shooting when I die!
 
I am right about 24 to 25 years into the guns. I have loved every last minute of it too. WOO HOO. I hope to get atleast another 50 to 60 out of it too.
 
My father gave me my first rifle when I was 4 and I am 43 now. It was my brother 5th birthday and he gave my brother a single shot .22LR and he gave me one also as he thought I would cry if I didn't get one. He was right!! I love shooting now - though I had difficulty holding the rifle then.

I've graduated to handguns in recent years and have been bitten by the 1911 bug. I have a stainless Springfield Loaded and a Dan Wesson CBOB and dream of the other 1911's that I plan to get - Wilson, Brown, Baer, Colt, S&W, Caspian custom, Springfield custom, and maybe some others.

I frequent various gun related forums / websites and read some gun magazines. In fact my wife sometimes thinks I'm a nut for guns - maybe it's true.

Luke
 
Forty years now with firearms.
It was Wrist Rockets, BB and pellet guns before that. :)
 
I read with some interest from time to time of the wide disparity in internet usage among the younger and older generations of Americans. Just as interesting to me as the demographics of gun familiarity is the age of those on this fine forum. Looks like the grown-ups don't have any trouble finding this place. Lots of folks to teach us kids.
 
Fifty plus years. :)
Started with Granddad's single shot .22 rifle in 1957, then his 12 gauge a year later. Was intoduced to the 1911 .45 Acp and M-14 7.62mm in 1965 by the USMC. Well it's 2007 and I am still shooting and collecting things that go bang when the trigger is squeezed! :D

:evil:
 
I really surprised with the numbers here. I knew there were plenty of you experienced 'oldbies' around here, but I would have thought the numbers would reflect quite a few less with 41+ years of shooting. I'm glad to be among such learned company.

For me, unless you count airguns, I started with a .22lr somewhere around 12 years old. I'm now 30. My firearms related knowledge has increased by leaps and bounds in the last two years or so. Especially so in the last few months since I am self-learning alot about gunsmithing. I was reading all the gun rags since I was just a little thing, so I was knew a lot even before I actually starting shooting. Only now though am I REALLY learning what makes them tick.. and how to make them tick better.
 
Shooting 60 + years now. Got my first and still have it 22 Stevens Model 87
Sot my first deer at 13 with a borrowed 32-40 Marlin carbine. In fact I
took two whitetails that year. Been using , collecting , and hunting ever
since. My borrowed single shot Iver Johnson has been replaced by several
different repeating shot guns:)
 
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