Remington .22 Shotgun, MoSkeet Trap

[Fred Fuller]

OK, oldtimers- help me out here. I had once read there was a game, gallery or carnival version of trap, using teeny clays and .22 smoothbores. Well, this weekend I saw a Remington Model 572 pump action .22 smoothbore with a Routledge bore. It has no sights, just a shotgun style bead. The barrel is bored out to about .410 from the muzzle back about 15" or so. It is a neat little gun and looks as if shooting it would be a huge amount of fun.

Anyone have any experience with it, or know any further details? I found the following but couldn't locate anything else.

http://www.merzantique.com/photo.php?id=1258_0_2_0_M36

http://www.pssatrap.org/Memorabilia/Traps/routledgemodel14moskeetrap.htm

lpl/nc

 

[Dave McCracken]

That takes me way back. I last saw one of these in use at Wheelus AFB, Libya in the late 60s. We shot up every shot cartridge on base and never did run them. The little clays were about 2" across, IIRC, and it took a couple pellets to bust them.

 

[Tom Held]

Buy It If You Can.

If this little gun is for sale you should buy it. I have one but with just the standard bore. I've only seen one with the Routledge Bore. It was at a gun shop in Warrenton, VA last year and was already sold.

I have the springloaded trap for it It is a lot of fun. You can still get 22 shot cartridges but not many pellets there. A few more pellets with the 22 "magnum" cartridges. But it's still like shooting dust. I think it's the equivalent of #12 shot (Is that right Dave?). You can break targets out to about 20 yards.

 

[Dave McCracken]

Yup, Tom. IIRC, 1/10 oz of 12 shot.

Heck, if you get one, let's try a round of skeet,heh,heh.....

 

[Kingcreek]

I friend of mine had a .22 bore model for about 2 weeks. We shot airborn Ritz crackers with it. He is a FFL and sets up at gun shows. Some Fella looking to sell came up to him with it and wanted $100 for it in like new condition. As he put the cash in his pocket the jerk had the nerve to laugh at my buddy and said "Boy, did you get screwed. wait till you see the rifling in that junker- all shot out!" Took friend about 15 minutes to figure out what he had and he soon sold it for a nice profit.

 

[Darkside]

I once saw a Mo-skeet-o trap that mounted on the barrel of the gun. Looked like a tiny version of the old spring style hand clay target thrower. The target was thrown by pulling a chain with a ring on it that you put on your finger. There was a box of the targets with it. The targets looked like smaller versions of the "mini" targets used in Sporting Clays. The fellow who had it said that you better hit the targets pretty quick because after they went 7-8 yards you might as well forget it. I think the guy kept the thing around as a conversation peice. I don't remember what kind of gun the trap was mounted on since I was more interested in the tiny trap.

Darkside

 

[Tom Held]

OK with PG

Dave, I was out at PG last night and talked to Mark Biggins. He said no problem if we wanted to try the 22 smoothbore but kind of laughed about it. So now we have to go out and try to break at least one target. I figure if we stand about 5 feet directly in front of the low house and shoot quick before the bird hits us in the forehead we'll be ok (You first!).

I'll see if I can find some 22 shot cartridges this week.

Tom

 

[Dave McCracken]

Great!! I'll look around also. Let me know when.....

 

[redbone]

Wow, back in time to 1966-67-68-69, Camp Kithawenund, Central Indiana. Boy Scouts. We got to shoot Mo-Skeet-O after we qualified with the rifle. It was a gas for a 11 or 12 year old kid. Didn't break many, but sure tried a lot. By the end of the week some of us got pretty good.

Our .22 smoothbores were bolt action, single shot. Don't remember a larger bore at the muzzle. But now I'm thinking, "Hmm... got that old bolt gun in the safe, and a 3/8" drill in the garage...." Could be fun!!! Is the overbore done so it can be choked?

Hey, try station 8. Ought to work there if anywhere. Our scout camp setup was more like Station 1 low house, straight away. The minature clays were very fragile and often broke out of the trap.

We had great Scoutmasters.... three guys, all WWII vets... excellent leaders. Insisted that every Scout in the troop learn to swim and shoot at summer camp if they didn't already know. One was still alive and came to my son's Eagle Scout Court of Honor a few years back.

Ahhh.... the good ol days. Thanks for the memories.

RBH

 

[redneck]

Lots of places carry CCI .22 shotshells. Seen them at meijers, walmart, and gander mountain. They don't have much punch to them at all. Winchester .22 shotshells are crimped brass cases and loaded with #10 shot as opposed to the #12 in CCI. They hit a lot harder. I was killing sparrows in a barn and found that the CCI would just wing them most of the time and the winchester wasn't even safe for fear of damaging the roof/siding.
I got the winchesters at gander mountain.

 

[FascoBeck]

I believe the MO...in the MO-SKEET-O was originally part of a set sold by MOssberg...hence the Play On Words with the first two letters of their company name.

I say a full set at a Missouri gun shop 10-12 years ago for a few hundred bucks and have kicked myself ever since for not grabbing it right then and there. I have since heard through the grape-vine....that the MO-SKEET-O clay pigeons are worth something like $5.00 + each and this set had a whole CARTON of them fully intact.

Perhaps someone out there is a Mossberg collector and has more data than I can provide. There was a RULES Booklet and as was mentioned earlier - a Hand-TRAP like device that was mounted ON the barrel of a smooth-bore .22 for #12 bird shot shells.