mustistuff
Banned
read your books, you wander to the question but your master eye has nothing to do with proper shooting
cheers
How to improve your shooting
- Thread starter Bird-man
- Start date
read your books, you wander to the question but your master eye has nothing to do with proper shooting
cheers
I know these things can go on forever. I posted this for guys who are struggling.
Here's my final suggestion.
Do it. Put some time in, practice your shoulder mount, check your sight picture, practice swinging through a target, SEE what you are doing, make it as easy and automatic as scratching your butt.
Then get to a shooting range, DO THE WORK. When you hit or miss pay attention to what happened. Think about it. Where is the gun, the bead, etc.
I will tell you this, most people miss by shooting behind the bird, or shooting over it.
Behind: get out in front of that frigging thing!
Over it: bad mount, or the gun just doesn't fit. If you are seeing the top of the rib, you are shooting high.
Do these things, and a couple months from now let us know if it helped.
Good luck.
Here's my final suggestion.
Do it. Put some time in, practice your shoulder mount, check your sight picture, practice swinging through a target, SEE what you are doing, make it as easy and automatic as scratching your butt.
Then get to a shooting range, DO THE WORK. When you hit or miss pay attention to what happened. Think about it. Where is the gun, the bead, etc. I will tell you this, most people miss by shooting behind the bird, or shooting over it.
Behind: get out in front of that frigging thing!
Over it: bad mount, or the gun just doesn't fit. If you are seeing the top of the rib, you are shooting high.
Do these things, and a couple months from now let us know if it helped.
Good luck.
mustistuff
Banned
Shooting help
we all need some luck, your effort is well taken and you can be assured that most of it will go unheeded . great for the birds, as far as going on forever, great, with all the rain here, we need something to do. like cause of too much rain i have had a new gun now for about 4 days and can't get out of the house with it. bummer
cheers
I know these things can go on forever. I posted this for guys who are struggling.
Here's my final suggestion.
Do it. Put some time in, practice your shoulder mount, check your sight picture, practice swinging through a target, SEE what you are doing, make it as easy and automatic as scratching your butt.
I will tell you this, most people miss by shooting behind the bird, or shooting over it.
Behind: get out in front of that frigging thing!
Over it: bad mount, or the gun just doesn't fit. If you are seeing the top of the rib, you are shooting high.
Do these things, and a couple months from now let us know if it helped.
Good luck.
we all need some luck, your effort is well taken and you can be assured that most of it will go unheeded . great for the birds, as far as going on forever, great, with all the rain here, we need something to do. like cause of too much rain i have had a new gun now for about 4 days and can't get out of the house with it. bummer
cheers
Sure it can, as a practical matter.
You lost me on the "wander" and the "books" though.
mustistuff
Banned
master eye
the master eye is only significant if you are trying to look at or aim the barrel or in my case plural. read some books on shooting, mike macintosh for one, and wander means your subject is all over the place. anyway, glad you are doing it, gives us both something to do and the part of handling, using, the gun helps to develop a fluid motion that will get you more birds. an example of this is when it is really really cold out there while you are hunting, the misses go up and usually quite a bit as it makes your swing stiff and ragged, the same thing that happens when you haven't handled you gun for some time, again
cheers
the master eye is only significant if you are trying to look at or aim the barrel or in my case plural. read some books on shooting, mike macintosh for one, and wander means your subject is all over the place. anyway, glad you are doing it, gives us both something to do and the part of handling, using, the gun helps to develop a fluid motion that will get you more birds. an example of this is when it is really really cold out there while you are hunting, the misses go up and usually quite a bit as it makes your swing stiff and ragged, the same thing that happens when you haven't handled you gun for some time, again
cheers
davidtodd
New member
I shoot low gun doubles all around a skeet field in the off season, this keeps me in tune for upland birds.
I also shoot quite a bit of ATA trap, every now and then you will get a long flushing bird , and trap helps on this as well.
However, at times we shoot our doubles "backwards", shooting the low house bird on station one for instance, first.
That makes the high house bird a longer and dropping away target, as a rooster that is descending.
All this stuff makes for good practice IMO.
As far as chokes go, they are highly over rated IMO.
I have shot lots of trap birds with an IC and even cylinder bore choke in my guns, and skeet birds with MOD/FULL barrels.
One of the better shooters i know uses a fixed MOD model 37 and has no problem cleaning a skeet field oir dropping roosters with it.
I have never blamed a missed shot on the wrong choke, because if I elected to take the shot, it's all on me, not the size of load or the choke.
DT
I also shoot quite a bit of ATA trap, every now and then you will get a long flushing bird , and trap helps on this as well.
However, at times we shoot our doubles "backwards", shooting the low house bird on station one for instance, first.
That makes the high house bird a longer and dropping away target, as a rooster that is descending.
All this stuff makes for good practice IMO.
As far as chokes go, they are highly over rated IMO.
I have shot lots of trap birds with an IC and even cylinder bore choke in my guns, and skeet birds with MOD/FULL barrels.
One of the better shooters i know uses a fixed MOD model 37 and has no problem cleaning a skeet field oir dropping roosters with it.
I have never blamed a missed shot on the wrong choke, because if I elected to take the shot, it's all on me, not the size of load or the choke.
DT
Nope, deux.
Thanks for the library note though but I have read much, if not all, of MM and far more re swatting stuff with a scattergun. As well as having lived the practice for 50 years or so.
Misses in the cold often go up because of clothing bulk but climatic conditions or tiredness, or medications or on and on ad nauseum can increase the misses...as well as increasing the wounding.
Familiarization, Focus and Follow-thru will help any bird swatter the most...what will not help is ignoring any factor in a shot or shooting that is inconvenient to admit.
Slainte!
Thinking further, I believe there can be a difference between the master eye and the dominant eye....the whole master eye deal is a bit overblown on the Internet to me but it can be important so...
For example, I have fair vision at 61 and pass a driver eye check easily but was told at 40 that I could see a squirrel in a tree...better, so went with a prescription when hunting.
My prescription for each eye has changed over the years but....the right eye, my "Master" eye changes at a different pace than the left. Which means that my left eye becomes my dominant eye when prescriptions lag in updating. My right eye also degrades when tired at a faster rate...tired from use or concentration or allergies or whatever.
No amount of fit or anything else will compensate when your hand-eye coordination is off the mark from a bum peeper.
When I shot Registered Trap, The Dot helped with the concentration tiredness and stopping shooting registered has, to me, allowed my right eye to maintain it's sight to a longer degree...I never use The Dot now, don't need it.
There still are times tho when health and conditions allow the master eye to fall second in clear sight to what becomes my dominant eye...then, if not lucky or not shooting golden BBs, I miss or wound a bird.
As to helping folks shoot...better.
I was remiss in not suggesting an eye examination.....regardless of a real possibility for shooting help, it can be a very good thing to consider.
Especially, if one begins to miss at seemingly odd times and on normal shot presentations.
Practice seldom helps that bum peeper.
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birdshooter
Well-known member
What? you are kidding aren't you. It has everything to do with shooting where your looking.
You need to understand what is taking place with the master and subordinate eye when shooting a shotgun. Simply stated: if your a right handed shooter and left eye dominant you will NOT be looking where the shotgun barrel is pointing, that is unless you close your left eye. Simple fact sorry....
Fortunately, 70% of us have a master eye that is on the same side as we shoot. Women on the other hand are far more likely to have cross dominance issues. Not sure why, but many that I have instructed are.
Here is some reading that may enlighten you: http://www.positiveshooting.com/EyeDominanceMain.html
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mustistuff
Banned
facts and opinions
you guys just don't get it. that reading was all about aiming, you don't aim a shotgun in bird hunting you point it and you should be pointing it at where you are looking. sure one eye is dominate over the other and the learned eye hand coordination allows one to point where one is looking so therefore it does not matter which eye is working. as the article points out your hopefully dominate right eye, right handed shooter, is looking down the rib, if it is you left eye, you have trouble. in proper wing shooting like in hunting, you don't look down your barrel, you never even see it, you are looking at only the bird or particularly where you want the shot to go and the barrel goes where you are looking no matter which eye is dominate.
cheers
you guys just don't get it. that reading was all about aiming, you don't aim a shotgun in bird hunting you point it and you should be pointing it at where you are looking. sure one eye is dominate over the other and the learned eye hand coordination allows one to point where one is looking so therefore it does not matter which eye is working. as the article points out your hopefully dominate right eye, right handed shooter, is looking down the rib, if it is you left eye, you have trouble. in proper wing shooting like in hunting, you don't look down your barrel, you never even see it, you are looking at only the bird or particularly where you want the shot to go and the barrel goes where you are looking no matter which eye is dominate.
cheers
Eye dominance
Great article on eye dominance. I shoot right with strong left eye dominance, and have shut left eye for years. I bought some cheap translucent dots from Office Depot (the ones you use to mark folders and pages) and use the yellow dot on my yellow shooting glasses, so it blends in really well. It obstructs my left eye in the shooting position just enough to keep both eyes open, and allows peripheral vision. It has completely changed the way I shoot and allowed me to get my eye off the barrel and focused on the clay. It's also so much less fatiguing. I still suck, but I know as a continue to practice I will become a better shooter because it feels a lot more natural. It is also easier for me to get behind the gun because I started shooting a humpback this year. I regret that I didn't figure this out at a younger age.
Great article on eye dominance. I shoot right with strong left eye dominance, and have shut left eye for years. I bought some cheap translucent dots from Office Depot (the ones you use to mark folders and pages) and use the yellow dot on my yellow shooting glasses, so it blends in really well. It obstructs my left eye in the shooting position just enough to keep both eyes open, and allows peripheral vision. It has completely changed the way I shoot and allowed me to get my eye off the barrel and focused on the clay. It's also so much less fatiguing. I still suck, but I know as a continue to practice I will become a better shooter because it feels a lot more natural. It is also easier for me to get behind the gun because I started shooting a humpback this year. I regret that I didn't figure this out at a younger age.
I've read that with practice in using a left eye patch or cover lens of some sort a shooter can train the preferred shooting eye to become dominant.
It's interesting to read that many women have a left dominant eye while being right handed. I think in general men may have a biologically more highly developed visual spatial sense than most women probably due in part to men's evolutionary role as hunters where the activity would require enhanced physical traits for doing things like throwing spears or rocks at wild game or enemies. My notion of this is based purely on my own personal observations but hearing that more women than men are left eye dominant sort of supports the idea.
It's interesting to read that many women have a left dominant eye while being right handed. I think in general men may have a biologically more highly developed visual spatial sense than most women probably due in part to men's evolutionary role as hunters where the activity would require enhanced physical traits for doing things like throwing spears or rocks at wild game or enemies. My notion of this is based purely on my own personal observations but hearing that more women than men are left eye dominant sort of supports the idea.
Mustistuff, I know you like to provoke, but really at times you come off as a numbskull. If you were cross dominant your statements might carry some weight. But as it is, you just sound contrary and argumentative. Not unlike say, Archie Bunker.
Great point! I just went through this teaching my girlfriend how to shoot. She is right hand dominant but couldn't hit the broad side of a barn while shooting right handed. I asked her if she could close her left eye and she couldn't, but she could close her right eye. I set a clay out at 35 yards and told her to shoot at it right handed first. The shot hit three feet below the target in the dirt, next she shot left handed with her right eye closed and smoked it. Now she shoots left handed and is hitting 80% of the clays and looks natural as can be. This was the first time I had ever seen this problem but found it very interesting. I don't shoot with any eyes closed but in order to learn what your shotgun is doing I believe that one must close an eye and get a feel for the pattern as a beginner. Once you know what your gun is doing you can let instinct take over and become a wingshooter.
Oh, many of us get it....the central idea here and the reasons that some post.
Most also "get" that you should not aim a scattergun for shooting flying....got that one decades ago.
Where you err, if learning is important to you, is in the following idea you put forth...."with your shotgun shooting if you are doing it correctly, hitting the bird properly comes not from aiming but hand eye coordination, in other words the shot should go where you are looking and in that regard your eyes are working together."
For the wonderful stew of hand/eye coordination to work and it does, the hand(s) must follow the important eye. That does not always happen, for the master eye relative to shoulder and for the other reasons I mentioned earlier when the master eye loses it's dominance.
Our eyes simply do not always work together or w/o issues on any day....be nice if they did and we all had 20/10 vision but, that is unlikely.
As to "looking down the barrel"...good shooters do, down or over the barrel...they just do not try to paste the bead on the bird as every Job#1.
Some shooters will hip shoot or spot shoot well but that is all about, still, a relationship of some manner seen over the barrel that the brain indicates NOW, is the time to pull the trigger.
Eye dominance issues will even impact those trick shot-ish folks.
Reading about all this manner of upland stuff and more is a good thing but only if the reading is not narrowly channeled by cherry-picking and spinning ideas in any book.
One should read sans agenda and with an mind open to learning.
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birdshooter
Well-known member
There's no point in arguing, He's completely ignored everything we've stated and is closed minded no matter what you say. the link I provided should have cleared any misconceptions he would have had. But it's no use...