Right Hand Left Eye

[Karate]

As the title to this post suggest I am right handed but left eye dominate...Most of my shooting thus far has been with a Handgun so I have not had any problems...but have been trying to get into long guns...that were I have questions...The weapons that I am going to be talking about are Browning A bolt...AR-15 and a Remington 870...

I am almost sure that with the Shotgu I have no choice but to learn to work it left handed...esp for shooting sheets...if there are options let me know please

How about the rifles will optics be able to compensate for my weak eye or do I need to learn to shoot them left handed...right now I do not have any optic on either the AR or the A bolt(waiting to see if I needed to trade for a left handed ver before firinge the A Bolt)...I planning on putting a Leupold on the A Bolt (the new model that fit close to the barrel)...

The AR is another matter...I do not really want a conventional style scope on it....this gun is just used for a fun gun and HD...I was wanting maybe
sometype of Hologram...later I was wanting to put a forward mounted laser and light on it for low light shooting...

Advice needed

 

[BozemanMT]

My wife is the same way (right handed, left eye dominant)
She shoots lefty for rifles and shotguns (and beats me doing it )
and pistols she shoots righty (or both hands actually usually)
works fine
There is also the trick of putting a piece of tape on your dominant eye to fool it, but really, just shoot lefty, in about an hour you'll be smoking them.

 

[Dave McCracken]

There's all sorts of "Cures" and methods to fix this.

Here's a couple options....

Shoot LH. Probably the most likely way to succeed.

Shoot RH and close your left eye. Obvious disadvantages.

Tape a spot on your left lens. This means you will be using a master eye that ordinarily is not the master.

HTH....

 

[wdlsguy]

Remington, Ruger, Savage and others make left-hand bolt action rifles. They are a lot more intuitive to operate if you shoot from the left shoulder like I do.

The Browning BPS and Mossberg 500 are left-hand friendly. Remington makes left-hand shotguns, but the selection is limited, so you may want want to install a left-hand safety in one of their right-hand shotguns.

I alternate shoulders between magazines when shooting the AR-15, in case I ever need to shoot from behind cover.

 

[mete]

The rule is - shoot to your dominant eye - it's easier to train your hand than to train your eye !!

 

[zero_chances]

same problem here. its a pain sometimes

 

[LaEscopeta]

The rule is - shoot to your dominant eye - it's easier to train your hand than to train your eye !!

I’m right hand/left eye too, and the advice I got when starting shotgunning is…squint. Sort of the same idea as a piece of tape on your glasses in front of your dominate eye, if you obscure the vision in that eye the less dominate one will take over. Practice by mounting the gun on your dominate hand side and slowly squinting your good eye until the correct sight picture comes into focus with the less dominate eye. I find if I squint enough to look through the eyelashes of my good eye I can sight with my left eye but still see enough with the right to get binocular vision and depth perception. I squint before I call for the target.

Then again my skeet scores that were improving almost every time I went shooting have leveled off, still in the below average range. I may have to re-think the above.

 

[Will Fennell]

The best course of action is to .......

Folks,
If you are left eye dominate and shooting from the right shoulder, the bestadvice is to switch shoulders. It will feel VERY awkward at first, but will get better with use. The best way to work on this is NOT with your shotgun, and expensive shells, but with an air rifle. Cheap practice, that you can do EVERYDAY @ home. THe first target you hit with your shotgun by simply looking hard at the target and letting your hand/eye coordination take over will convince you that you made the right choice

 

[sm]

Mr. Fennell , I agree with you.

BB guns and learning to shoot.

My mentors did this, and later Bob Brister in his book shares this. I use BB guns to teach not only shotguns, also rifle and handgun.

Focus on correct basic fundamentals, stamina from holding and using a BB gun, no recoil to speak of and inexpensive to allow a lot of quality practice.

Even after one gets to shooting a platform, BB guns allow quality practice, and there is that fun factor.

 

[Karate]

Great advice...I think I will try changing shoulders....I like the idea of using an air rifle to practice...if I change with the shotgun should I also change with a scoped rifle (Browning A bolt 243)...

 

[jmcraven]

I'm Rt Hand/Left Eye, as well.

My right eye astigmatism is so bad that shooting a long gun right handed is not an option, so I started shooting from my left shoulder when I was 18. I earned 'expert' in ROTC even as a righty, but as my right eye sight got worse I had to make the switch.

After a few months of practice (with a 10/22), I was back to out-shooting all my friends again. You'll get used to it (probably quicker than think).

 

[dmarbell]

Dominate eye?

Is it possible to not have a dominate eye? I haven't shot left handed yet, keep in mind. But when I point a gun right-handed, with both eyes open, I see mainly the left side of the barrel. Same thing happens when I point left-handed, I see the right side of the barrel. I know the trick about determining eye dominance, but when I point I already see the two fingers clearly, so it's a matter of choosing one!!

If I'm right, and I don't have a major dominate eye, it looks like I could wear the eyeglass cover on my left eye, shoot right-handed, and live happily ever after.

Anybody else have this issue? Or am I missing something completely? By the way, can eye doctors determine eye dominance?

Danny

 

[MCgunner]

I was about 8 years old when I realized I had this problem and switched to shooting from the left. Now, after so many years, it feels really weird to pick up a shotgun or rifle and try to sight it right handed even though I'm naturally right handed. Just takes a little time to acclimate, not a big deal.

One advantage I've found is that I shoot a right handed bolt action left handed and don't have a problem working the bolt with my right hand as I hold the rifle with the left on the pistol grip. Works rather well. If I was a true south paw, that might be difficult. Left hand actions STILL aren't available for some models. By shooting right hand actions, I have a better selection of rifles. If this really bugged me, I guess I'd probably shoot a lever gun and be happy. The Browning BLR is a rather nice rifle. I don't have a problem with lever guns OR pumps, but I've never tried shooting a left handed bolt gun, might be a little weird after all these years, but I'm sure I could adapt to it. I'm happy with my right handed bolts, though.

 

[Will Fennell]

its about focus.....

Danny,
I'm strongly right eye dominate, but when I mount the shotgun[right handed], if I allow my visual focus to shift back to the shotgun barrel, instead of out at the target, I "see" the left side of my barrel also....

If you think you are right eye dominate.....focus out at a distant target.....keep your focus there and mount the gun....keeping your focus out at the target...and I bet you will not be aware of the side of your barrel .....

as long as you keep your focus on the target, not on the barrel.

let us know how this works for you.

 

[Zach S]

I have the same problem, right handed, left eyed.

I shoot pistols right handed, and longarms left.

 

[GooseGestapo]

Like MCgunner, I too discovered that though right handed, I'm left eye dominant.
The technical term is "ipsilateral dominant".....

I shoot handguns equally well either right or left handed, though I "use" my right eye for sighting, even if shooting with both eyes open.

Like MCgunner, I find it "less satisfactory" to shoot a longgun "right" handed, though on occasion while hunting I've found it neccessary to "switch hands" to make a shot.

It isn't a problem for the "quality" of your shooting as I've even "eeked" out a couple of national records in PPC shooting myself.

A very well know shooter who "suffers" from the same "affliction" is none other than Jeff Cooper.

Perhaps what led to the developement of the "Scout Rifle" concept ???

 

[dmarbell]

It's all about focus...

Will,

You're right about the focus. I just focused on targets (in my back yard) from about 25 yards out to 100 +/-. When I raised the gun to point on my right shoulder without changing focus, the gun was lined up beneath my right eye line.

I noticed , though, that even focused on the target, as I raise the gun I can see two barrels. The barrel image on the left is my right eye line. Training myself to focus on the target and "use" the left barrel image shouldn't be difficult, should it?

Also, the two barrel images above are approximately the same intensity. My thinking is that I don't have a strongly dominate eye.

What do you think about the dot-over-the-lens for shooting glasses? It looks like it'd be easy enough to try, and to undo if it doesn't work.

What does anyone use for blocking out the lens on shooting glasses?

Danny