Who got you started?

[Kingdady]

I am curiose as to who introduced everyone on here into muzleloading and how old were you at the time. For me it was my grandad he got me shooting front loaders when I was 7yrs old it was a .45 cal T/C boy did we have fun. Oh and I am only 35 now.

 

[taylorhaught]

No one introduced muzzleloading directly. It was more of a concequence of increasing my draw odds. I started two years ago when I was 25

 

[funman]

I didnt get started until 33 yrs old. A friend of mine had a muzzle loader he let me shoot one day. After i learned how it worked i was hooked. Wish i would of knew sooner. I was always into the more modern guns. Now i take my muzzle loader hunting during general gun season.

 

[Bucker]

starting

bought one at an auction n a whim. New nothing about them, I went to a big boix store and bought everything I didn't need and more. Shot a buck the first year and I was hooked. This site only made it worse or better, depends on how you look at :twisted: it. I started at 49 years old, i missed so much time w/ this sport.............

 

[toytruck]

I started in 1993(age 41) after VA finally got a muzzleloading season in the early 90's. I bought a (still have it) TC Renegade .54cal. and killed a spike buck and was hooked for life.

I now own five muzzleloaders including a .12 ga. shotgun and hunt deer and small game with them. I have killed at least one to two deer every season since with my front stuffers.

 

[Nimrodder]

I bought my first one in 1994 when I was 24. I wanted to extend my hunting opportunities. I've been hooked ever since.

 

[paia]

I started myself in 1986 when I was 25, just married and bought a place in the PA countryside where I could hunt deer up the mountain behind the house. I started with a T/C Renegade .50 flintlock to hunt PA's late flintlock-only season. Now I have a custom .54 flint, a custom .45 percussion, two .50 Omegas and a .50 Savage and enjoy them all. My two biggest bucks were killed in 2004 and 2007 on a friend's farm in Iowa with my first Omega. And I have killed 7 deer with the .54 flint and that is just as exciting.

I sold that Renegade to a friend at work a few years ago and his teenage son killed his first ML deer with it this year, which I thought was nice.

 

[BigDaddy]

I was 40 when I bought my first ML, but I ended up selling it before I even got the chance to shoot it. I was 42 when I got my next one. I now have one season under my belt, and I am hooked! I dont relly think any one person got me started. Maybe a guy that I work with.

 

[MOdeer]

In my case, the Missouri Department of Conservation got me started. 1980, 19 years old. They had a special BP hunt for deer the week before regular rifle season at a place called Peck Ranch Wildlife Area. 2 day hunt, didn't see a buck to shoot, but the next weekend on opening day of regular rifle, I killed a 13 point 2.5 year old buck at around 10 feet. That was with a TC Hawken style .50, still have that rifle, and am still hooked on muzzleloading!

 

[frontier gander]

the movie Jeremiah Johnson and the TV series Grizzly Adams got me into muzzle loading. I had to basically teach myself and learn as i went along. Didnt know about these forums until 4 or so years ago.

 

[black powder]

started late around 1999 wanted more privacy on public land when hunting deer..ML season opens 2 weeks before rifle [centerfire] season ..went through 5 ML before i finally got something that i realy enjoy ..

 

[big6x6]

I got myself in it basically just to try something new. I bought a Traditions Lightning Bolt in 1999 I think. It was a piece of crap and I never felt confident enough that it would ignite to hunt with it. In a couple of months I bought a then new T/C Black Diamond. What a great muzzleloader! Now muzzleloaders are all I hunt with!

 

[DPH]

I bought my first .50 caliber Hawken (Italian) as a kit around 1980. It was a good round ball shooter. I still have it. I got it because of the separate ML season that we had (and still have).

In the middle 90's I bought a TC .54 Hawken so that I could shoot Maxi-balls, but didn't kill much with it.

I bought my Remington 700ML in about 2002-03 so that I could use a scope. It shoots sabots so much better and farther that my Hawkens and I rarely shoot the Hawkens anymore.

 

[Reese]

My dad use to take me along to black powder shoots when I was 11. I did pretty good but there were no youth divisions back then so I had to compete with all the adults.

When our area went shotgun only, I tried several shotguns but just was never really satisfied with them accuracy wise. I stayed with them for a long time because I thought I needed the ability for a quick second shot.

I met Toby Bridges at a Deer and Turkey Expo in PA in the early 1990's. He was marketing the Knight rifles but I was not ready to use a single shot rifle for deer hunting. But the seed was planted.

I retired the slug gun about 6 years ago and have realized that picking one well placed shot is all it takes. I have shot more deer in the past 6 years with a muzzleloader than the past 30 years with shotgun and rifle combined. Maturity, practice and making the first shot count (confidence through experience) has had a lot to do with that as well.

 

[03mossy]

My father in law and i got a lease about 5 years ago and as a way to get more use out of our new hunting land we got into muzzleloading. after the fun we had the first year i was hooked! the majority of the things i have learned have been from this site.

 

[Underclocked]

Nathan Boone.



:wink:

 

[MK85Shooter]

I got started in the mid 90's when I was out of college a few years. My dad had borrowed his neighbors TC Hawken 50 cal to extend the hunting season in Indiana and I borrowed it a couple of times. Neither one of us ever shot anything with it but I was hooked. My 1st one was a Knight MK85 in blue/laminate (what a pretty gun that was). I sold it the next year and bought a SS/Synthetic MK85 and dad caught the bug and bought an MK85 in blue/walnut. I hunted with it mostly in the late MZ season and occasional during the shotgun season until 2006 when my wife bought me a Savage 10ML-II SS/Laminate for Christmas. Its all I hunt with now.

 

[alphaburnt]

It was a high school friends Dad, my father never hunted or fished, and Randall used to take me along on all of their outings. I started in 1988 with a used Charles Daly Hawken .50 and had a lot of fun ever since. Graduated to an inline in 1993 with a Knight .50 Wolverine and have been using inlines and Knights since.

 

[Bucker]

Nathan Boone

Nathan Boone.


UC, I figured you knew him, where else you get all that knowledge and history yu share?[[/quote]

 

[HawgHunter]

I was bitten by the muzzleloader bug in 1973 while at deer camp. The owner of the camp showed up with a 1865 Zouave replica in 58 caliber. We had a lot of fun shooting it. A year later Michigan started it's first separate season so I had to have one. I found one at a Sears store and assembled enough components to get me started.

In 1989 I purchased a Knight MK-85 carbine length MK-85 in 54 caliber and have since purchased a several more. Quite a few deer and bear have been found after the smoke cleared. I'm still hooked a quarter century later.