Game Loads And Practical Ballistics For The American Hunter

Now for the first time, here is a book written specifically for hunters about the guns and loads that they use. In this complete and fully illustrated digest, you'll read about such diverse topics as: how to improve your long-range shooting; how to shoot accurately in winds of any speed or direction; how to solve the problems associated with shooting up and down hills; what causes mirage and how to read it; why some bullets shoot tighter groups farther away; how gunpowder is made; why bullets that move left also rise; which cartridges are suitable for everything plus comprehensive ballistics tables. (8 1/2 x 11, 288 pages, b&w photos, charts)

FIELD & STREAM, America’s largest outdoor sports magazine, celebrates the outdoor experience with great stories, compelling photography, and sound advice while honoring the traditions hunters and fishermen have passed down for generations.

FIELD & STREAM, America’s largest outdoor sports magazine, celebrates the outdoor experience with great stories, compelling photography, and sound advice while honoring the traditions hunters and fishermen have passed down for generations.

This book covers all the hunting rifles and calibers needed for North America's diverse game. Concisely written, it covers a wide variety of game, and is an excellent guide for all hunters.

The perfect rifle for hunting small game and varmints in settled and semi-settled agricultural and grazing districts should be quiet, safe to shoot there and inexpensive; and, owing to the small size of the vital areas of most of such game, should be superlatively accurate. Its bullet should, whenever possible, either expand and remain in the game, or destroy itself completely upon impact with earth, sod, stones or rock. It should kill well, yet not cause needless mangling or suffering. The .22 caliber rifle, both in the rim fire and in the flatter-shooting center fire, gives the least report, throws the lightest and smallest projectile, is among the most accurate of all calibers, and is the least expensive to shoot. In the .22 long rifle caliber, it is also the easiest to supply with factory ammunition, which can be purchased at nearly any village hardware store. In center fire, it is cheap to reload, has very light recoil, and causes but little annoyance to farmers and stock raisers. In Eastern farming or estate country, the .22 caliber, both rim and center fire, is the quietest and yet the most effective of all our rifle calibers for either field or woods hunting of small game. In short, from the thoroughly practical standpoint of being usable where any sort of rifled firearm may be shot, it has more advantages and fewer disadvantages than any other caliber. Further, the use of a .22 caliber rifle in the field or in the forests is much like the use of a 20 gauge shotgun on quail or a fine fly rod to dangle dry flies before trout or small mouth black bass. It is the equipment of the man of appreciation and discernment who wishes to develop and depend upon skill rather than upon force and smashing power. After all, most of us go hunting for sport. We wish to enjoy ourselves to the full while gunning, consequently we do not wish to be stopped, neither do most of us wish to annoy landowners. Nevertheless, we need a weapon of precision, great mechanical refinement, X-ring accuracy, and yet which is of a type which appeals to those who have substituted skill and ability in hunting and shooting for the 30" killing pattern of the 12 gauge shotgun. The real story of what has been done, can be done, and what you can do if properly equipped and instructed and shooting a splendidly accurate, properly sighted, precision-built .22 caliber rifle in field and forest has never been adequately told in a book exclusively devoted to hunting and shooting small game and varmints with .22 caliber rifles. The author went into this as much as space permitted in 1931 in “.22 Caliber Rifle Shooting,” but that work is now out of print, the issue having become exhausted. This book, by text and illustration, covers the subject. It is in no part a work of fiction. The shooting related in this book actually occurred. It tells you exactly how to hunt successfully, and to shoot each common variety of North American small game and varmints, where to find them, how to locate and hunt them, and gives numerous examples of rifles and cartridges which produced unusual results. For the youth or the man with his first .22 caliber rifle, for the small bore target shot who has enjoyed only one-half of an experience with a .22 rifle (the remaining half to be found afield), and for the crank rifleman, reloader, small bore ballistics shark and experimenter, this book is a must. Read this work in the spirit in which it was written, that of sportsmen writing one to another; of old timers in the game of field shooting giving their experiences, their hunting lore, their ammunition developments, their misses and their long range hits. This is the book for any small game and varmint hunter who has a rifle and wants to use it more successfully. If you can read this work without learning anything about hunting with the small caliber rifle, you certainly know game shooting with the .22 rifle. May it bring you many happy days in the field.

This fascinating book starts with the basics, going back to the days of muzzle loading before considering the various attempts made over the centuries to improve the bullet. It moves on to examine the development of the cartridge right up to the present day, and provides the reader with a clear understanding of the principles governing the bullet's flight. Topics covered include the factors that influence ballistic performance and accuracy; 'internal ballistics' (factors influencing performance whilst the bullet is still in the barrel) and 'external ballistics' (factors affecting the bullet's flight when it leaves the barrel). Simple formulae are included to enhance the understanding of the principles involved. The book also describes a number of interesting experiments concerning performance and accuracy and presents the results. It aims to assist those enthusiasts who make their own bullets by analysing faults that have an impact on accuracy and covers both rifled firearms and smooth-bore guns.Includes a glossary that incorporates rifle terminology and those terms specific to the shotgun, and is superbly illustrated with over 100 colour photographs.