A few weeks ago I spent a warm fall day in the woods with a group of deer hunters. This is the 2nd time I've had an assignment to follow a deer hunting party. This was a little different though, as the guys were using blackpowder, flintlock muskets like they used back in the 18th century. The rifles are long, skinny and generally ornately decorated. They use a peice of flint to ignite the powder- that you have to measure and load into the gun yourself. They also use hand-poured lead balls ( instead of the classic bullet shape ) and cotton ticking between the ball and the powder. In some cases material from abandoned horned nests will be used as wadding. No kidding.
It takes a special kind of hunter to want to use a blackpowder gun for hunting. They can be pretty accurate, but are not nearly as convenient as modern rifles. Any moisture will potentially dampen the powder and either fire with a delay, or not at all. Odds of a downed deer are decreased a bit for sure. But the guys I followed were tired of hunting being so easy and wanted to notch the challenge up a bit.
If you'd like to read and see more, take a look at the NY Times article HERE.
There is a slideshow of images, so don't miss that. It shows the details of the hunt from a rifle firing down to the (often) antiquated dress of the hunters. Check out the beautiful guns too.
2 comments:
you should have photographed them with a 19th century camera. :-) nice work!
Did you write the photo captions, too?
"Hunting like Daniel Boone." Your son is happy, I'm sure.
"...the Snake River, a dark waterway in the Chengwatana Forest..." Sounds like a haunted, dangerous land!
Great stuff.
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