How long, or ever, since you took a firearms safety course?

[FROGO207]

No really formal course. I started my safety course about age 4 by my grandfather and uncle who were both X military. It lasted until I was about 10 years old. They then told me they were proud of how I handled a firearm and myself when using it. None of the family had to "correct" me after that and I have lived to 60+ years old without a problem in that respect. I agree that the common sense of firearms use today is not anywhere near it was in the 60's-80's. Your new requirements are there to chill the population from owning a certain class of firearm with a couple feelgood measures thrown it to boot. At least you don't have to attend those classes to keep already owned firearms--------yet!
I believe we all should go after the alcohol use and demand classes on safe/sane use and BAL devices to start ALL vehicles and such. Those that want to restrict our rights would be so busy defending their beer and wine they would have little time bother anyone about anything else. Think about how many innocent lives would be saved then. FWIW I have many liberal leaning "acquaintances", not friends, that berate me for being a firearms owner and therefore unsafe, that will not think twice about drinking several six packs or the same in wine or hard liquor and drive home with the reflexes of a petrified sloth! The horror!!!
ETA Does anyone honestly think that the NRA backed this to increase their instructors revenue stream?? Really now!

 

[buck460XVR]

Having grown up in Idaho with my dad being a professional big-game hunter and sporting goods store owner, and my step-dad being a cop and a hunter as well, I grew up hunting and figured you'd have to be a moron to violate the basic rules of not shooting at targets you aren't sure of, or drinking while hunting, or not keeping your firearm pointed in a safe direction.

Then I moved to Iowa.

I was shocked at the number of hunting accidents I saw in the paper. I was told that opening day of pheasant season was the biggest day in beer sales for the local stores.

Now I truly know why IOWA stands for Idiots Out Wandering Around...

So yes, I think the midwestern states should have mandatory firearms training because from what I observed, they weren't getting it.

Not everyone has the luck of the draw to learn from mentors skilled with firearms and firearm safety. Lot of kids coming to our Hunter Safety classes by their single/divorced mom, who don't have a clue about firearms. Also, many of those kids brought by their grandpa's(who have been hunting forever) already have bad safety habits instilled upon them, cause, supposedly, "grandpa" knew better.

As for the beer sales in Iowa........do you have proof of your statement or is it just one o those "commonly accepted thoughts"? Do we know the beer was drank before the hunters went into the field and that the number of incidents are basically alcohol related? Since Sunday alcohol sales are limited in Iowa, could be they were stocking up for after the hunt on Saturday. Could be the high number of accidents have little to do with alcohol consumption, but everything to do with lack of safety training or common sense. I am not a fan of Iowa myself, but I give their legal firearm owners/hunters the benefit of the doubt.

As for the safety of hunters from the Midwest. No fatalities from accidental shootings while hunting here in Wisconsin this year. Can't say the same about your home state of Idaho tho, even tho there is a significantly larger number of hunters in Wisconsin than Idaho. I don't think there was any fatalities in Iowa this year due to being accidentally shot while hunting either. Maybe the Midwest isn't the only place where "they ain't getting it".

Here in Wisconsin, we tend to make fun of hunters from Illinois. They are the brunt of the joke about shooting cows by mistake or guilty of shooting anything that moves. I doubt if it really is a state thing, more of an amount of experience/training thing.

 

[Trey Veston]

[QUOTE="buck460XVR, post: 10983146, member: 42855"
As for the safety of hunters from the Midwest. No fatalities from accidental shootings while hunting here in Wisconsin this year. [/QUOTE]

Yeah, impressive, LOL.

1. More than one-third of gun-related hunting accidents happen during the nine-day deer hunting season when 840,000 hunters are in the woods. Wisconsin recorded 131 gun-related hunting incidents involving injury or death over the past five years. Forty-five of those, or 34 percent, occurred during the deer hunt. In the last 10 years, Wisconsin averaged 28 gun-related accidents per year, which King said has been a little above the consistent total of about 18 injuries a year for the past six or seven years; two fatal accidents is not a common occurrence, he said.

https://www.wausaudailyherald.com/story/news/local/2015/11/27/deer-season-deadliest-years/76302796/

I lived in Iowa for over a decade, in three different towns. My ex-wife is from Iowa with family from all over the state. I know Iowa. It is an awful place with awful and petty people. Some of the nicest people I've known were in Iowa, but also some of the worst people I've known were from Iowa. I worked in the Maytag factory when I got out of the Navy and learned why unions are a scam. I've worked in Des Moines as an insurance adjuster. I've worked in Eldora as a corrections officer.

I know Iowa. I've never been to Wisconsin, but my grandparents moved from Peshtigo in the 40's to Idaho. So we root for Green Bay. My grandfather used to tell me stories of growing up in Wisconsin, stories about trapping in the winter when it was -30, riding the trains with hobos to check his trap lines, shooting deer with a single shot shotgun, and the mosquitos. He said I can never imagine how awful it is in the spring to venture into the woods and have half your blood drained before you know it.

I was fishing one day a couple of years ago on a local lake and a man passed by in a boat and we started chatting. He was visiting his son in college from Wisconsin and couldn't believe how nice it was out here. He said normally he has to wear a headnet when fishing due to mosquitos. One of my brother's best friends is from Wisconsin. He moved out here to go to the U of I and got a job with the Forest Service. He got homesick and moved back. He lasted two years and couldn't take it any longer. He is now in Boulder, CO area. If you are an outdoorsman, once you've experienced clear streams, mountains, and uncrowded forests, you can't go back.

 

[entropy]

1. Buck460VXR said this year, that article is form 2015.
2. USA Today, which the Wausau Daily Herald is a part of, is just as believable on 2A stories as the NY Times.

 

[Trey Veston]

1. Buck460VXR said this year, that article is form 2015.
2. USA Today, which the Wausau Daily Herald is a part of, is just as believable on 2A stories as the NY Times.

He's still wrong...

https://dnr.wi.gov/topic/hunt/IncidentReport/huntCurrent.html



Look, I don't want to turn this into a pissing match over whose state has the most accident prone hunters. Wisconsin had over 800k people hunting in a very short amount of time. Idaho has around 200k spread over months. It's surprising that WI doesn't have more accidents.

Admittedly, I started it by stating that my observations while living in the Midwest was that they did a lot of drinking while hunting; a severe violation of a basic hunter safety rule. Am I prejudice against Iowans? Absolutely. Sorry, but that's based on living there for over ten years.

So I apologize for all of the good and decent people of Iowa and the midwest.

 

[entropy]

Am I prejudice against Iowans? Absolutely.

We agree on that.

None of those were deer hunters. I believe that's what Buck460VXR meant, as his statement in post #38 refers to the deer season. Also note the fatality and one of the other wounded were old enough to have not been required to take hunter safety, nor is it listed whether they had.

 

[John Joseph]

Covered in a CCW renewal class every three years.

 

[captmoto]

Washington has exceeded the lunacy of California. No requirement here (yet). I took my hunter safety class in 1993 maybe. I renew my CCW every 2 years so there is that 4 hour class I have to go to.

 

[MedWheeler]

Law enforcement standards in 1987.

Trained a few times on the job after that, but none of those sessions was a dedicated "safety course."

 

[buck460XVR]

We agree on that.

None of those were deer hunters. I believe that's what Buck460VXR meant, as his statement in post #38 refers to the deer season. Also note the fatality and one of the other wounded were old enough to have not been required to take hunter safety, nor is it listed whether they had.

You are correct on both points sir.

 

[buck460XVR]

He's still wrong...

https://dnr.wi.gov/topic/hunt/IncidentReport/huntCurrent.html

View attachment 814420

Look, I don't want to turn this into a pissing match over whose state has the most accident prone hunters. Wisconsin had over 800k people hunting in a very short amount of time. Idaho has around 200k spread over months. It's surprising that WI doesn't have more accidents.

I don't want a pissing match either. My point was that gun safety is not just a Mid-western thing, it is something very important to responsible gun owners everywhere. I love watching old westerns from the fifties and sixties. A lot has to do with the old firearms, furniture and architecture displayed in them. One f the other things displayed in them is how many times they violate the 4 basic rules of gun safety. The Rifleman carries his lever by the barrel with it pointed at his armpit. If he has it in both hands, odds are his finger is on the trigger, even without a target in sight. This is not a display of gun safety from the old west, but of the 50s and 60s.

As for opening day of Pheasant season...I go bow hunting. Too many inexperienced idiots out there with guns hunting in large numbers on small parcels.

 

[entropy]

I just hunt the game farms for pheasant. I can hunt year round, I don't have to keep or train a dog, and I have a good friend who works at one and will call me when he gets a chance to hunt. I agree, hunters my age and younger, (I'll be 55 in a little over a week) tend to be much safer than the old farts I remember (long gone now) from when I was a kid. Most of them were cops, (My Dad was a cop, as were most of his hunting buddies) and some of them were the worst as far as the 4 Rules and gun safety. Familiarity breeds laxity, as MTMilitaman said in another concurrent thread.

 

[jmace57]

My Hunter's Safety course was when I was 12...in 1969.

 

[4v50 Gary]

All new enrollees at TSJC must take the NRA firearms safety course. I enrolled late in the semester and had to take it with the new class to catch up with my class. This was in Spring 2013.

 

[Pat Riot]

I the last 10 years I have taken 4 firearms safety courses. Before that it had be one every 4 or 5 years for one reason or another. Hunting courses, CCW, range safety, etc.

 

[Deus Machina]

Only my CC course. Dad, grandpa, research and common sense account for the rest.
I do plan on taking another so I can get a hunting license, both here in Florida and perhaps in Illinois. Might never use it, but I want the option to get a deer with my uncle or pheasant with dad before their eyes get much worse.

 

[ar-newbie]

safety is one of those basic topics that everyone puts on a good show about, but in truth very few are properly educated or even follow the principles. Go out to a public shooting range and just observe what is going on, it's enough to drive you crazy just considering it. it's no wonder the range officers are completely stressed out all the time. I see images on social media all the time, people posing with weapons pointed at the camera quite often.

 

[Trey Veston]

Go out to a public shooting range and just observe what is going on, it's enough to drive you crazy just considering it. it's no wonder the range officers are completely stressed out all the time.

Where I live, there are no public ranges. There are millions of acres of public land available, so folks just pick a spot with a back stop and have at it. The idea of having to go to a specific controlled area to shoot with strangers is a very strange and foreign idea. I don't think I'd like it.

 

[entropy]

Only my CC course. Dad, grandpa, research and common sense account for the rest.
I do plan on taking another so I can get a hunting license, both here in Florida and perhaps in Illinois. Might never use it, but I want the option to get a deer with my uncle or pheasant with dad before their eyes get much worse.

Do it, those will be memories you'll all cherish the rest of your lives.

 

[murf]

hunters safety course in 1978.

murf

 

[Elkins45]

I voted never because I’m just barely too old to have been required to take our hunter safety course. I did take the CCDW course 22 years ago, but I don’t really consider that a gun safety course. It was much more of a gun law course.

 

[huntsman]

I doubt I’d jump through those hoops just to own a semiauto, instead would choose a platform less demanding.

To answer the question, less than 5years, class wasn’t billed as a safety course but had safe gun handling to start with.

 

[bearcreek]

I doubt I’d jump through those hoops just to own a semiauto, instead would choose a platform less demanding.

Well, that's the traitor's goal when they make laws like that so.....

Not sure how to answer the question I guess. I've never been to a class which was specifically and only a safety class. I'm of the opinion that every gun owner should be attending a professional class at least once a year. Every class I've been to had some sort of safety briefing at least. Obviously once the subject matter gets more advanced the safety brief gets shorter. None of them would have satisfied the WA requirements. I found the suicide bit rather amusing. Pretty sure it's very unusual for people to shoot themselves multiple times with a semi auto when committing suicide. A single shot works just fine. No class required.

 

[entropy]

A single shot works just fine. No class required.

Not always as intended. A guy I went to school with put an 870 under his chin a month after graduation; it took him two weeks to die. And yes, it was birdshot.

 

[bearcreek]

Not always as intended. A guy I went to school with put an 870 under his chin a month after graduation; it took him two weeks to die. And yes, it was birdshot.

Yeah, it doesn't always work, but it's still extremely rare for people to shoot themselves twice. My point was that talking about suicide prevention only to people buying semi autos makes no sense.