Been there and done that. Cherry Point is where my life was good till 71 when Iwa Kuni came along. Then in 72 I ended up as part of Task Force Delta which introduced me to Nam. That was the first M16 I ever saw or held. Cherry point in 71 I was a sergeant before I went WESPAC. After the M14 the Matty Matel was nice to shoot.We were one of the pilot platoons with the M16. I laughed when I heard the "boing" of the buffer spring in the stock. Never saw another one my entire enlistment. Cherry Point had M14's which I loved, so I learned the rifle fast. Got to shoot annual on the base rifle team and the Eastern Division matches.
In October of 67' I shot Expert Rifleman with an M-14 during BCT at Ft. Bliss , Texas.
And Neither one is a songbird.Starlings and sparrows are both exempt from the law.
Neither of the two are native, both invasive enough to have spread across the continent in just a few decades.
Mine was similar, but with a pellet rifle and I was camped out on my grandma’s backyard bird feeder. Grandpa thought it was pretty funny. He had told me I could only shoot black birds and blue jays. Well, they all looked kinda dark and a blue bird is easily confused with a blue jay when you are eight years old and getting trigger time on your first pellet rifle. I bet I killed forty birds in a couple hours. Grandma tore my tail up, then mom tore my tail up. Dad and grandpa just kinda watched and then they bought me a pair of binoculars and a scope for better target ID.At about ten, my Father was relatively impressed, but I received a thorough tongue and shoe lashing at and about my back and head from my Mother.
It seems she fell upon a grisly sight of about twenty five Chickadees and Yellow Finches laying on the ground under the Mountain Ash. All with one massive hole of about fifty caliber, and sporting an increased weight of one muzzle loader ball of a jar I had found down stairs in my Dad's hunting accoutrements.
She finished informing me how wrong it was and relieved me of my Barrett slingshot with wrist brace. Dad just asked, “Did you miss any?”
“Two.”
He just smiled and pat my head.
“Go throw them in the weeds…”
Not exactly a medal, but I was smiling tossing them over. He didn’t even make me take the balls out.
I may have done it once more, but the neighbor’s Dalmatian came all the way around the pond, ran up and ate the bird! I thought I better stop to avoid poisoning the dog.
In that vein, I suppose my 1st badge of honor was the butt-whoopin' I got for shooting my sister in the hand with a BB gun when I was 8 years old. Didn't see the BB gun for about a year afterwards. To be fair, it wasn't a BB I shot her with, but a hard berry off a bush at the corner of the house. I didn't have BB's, but these little berries were the same size, more or less and I could single-load them down the barrel of my Daisy. It still raised a blister on her hand, though, about 1/10th the size of the one my Dad raised on the cheek of my arse.For me it was the shiner my brother gave me after I bullseye'd the back of his throat with a spit-wad shot from the .32 caliber pizza-hut straw and wrapper wad in Salina, Ks. After that I was hooked on shooting of every kind. Yes I picked up bottle and aluminum can anything yards, trash piles to pay for 22lr to shoot.
That tweety bird shot from a telephone wire with my trusty Daisy Golden 800 BB gun.What was your first marksmanship badge of honor?
Since my youth, my game has been trapshooting.
I had won some sub-junior and junior trophies, but there wasn't much competition. Not too many kids shooting in those days. My competition was my dad and his friends. I broke my first 100x100 when I was fifteen. I still consider that my first real accomplishment. It doesn't matter how old you are.....if you shoot a perfect score....that's pretty good.View attachment 1199970
I'm the goofy looking kid on the left.
100x100