Resources

Taking Care of Your Guns Before You Store Them

After you purchase a gun, you must store it properly. But, just like that lovely vintage lace dress from your great grandmother or a treasured coin collection from your favorite uncle, you must take care of your newly acquired item properly before storing it.

Conversations with New Shooters:Lucretia Free

She says she wears a “publisher’s hat.” Meet Lucretia Free, founder and publisher of The American Woman Shooter.

Free isn’t new to the publishing business, having already launched the successful community newspaper in southeast Tucson, The Vail Voice, and its sister paper in northeast Tucson, The Tanque Verde Voice. She is, however, new to the shooting sports.

“Early last year, a friend invited me to the range. I was expecting it to be a very long morning. Instead, I was very surprised to find that I enjoyed shooting,” recalled Free.

Gun Safety Begins With You

Did you know?

• The National Shooting Sports Foundation’s Project ChildSafe program helps coordinate distribution of firearm safety kits which include a free cable-style gun lock. Since Project ChildSafe’s inception, more than 36 million safety kits have been donated throughout the U.S.
• Firearm-related fatalities in the U.S. have been decreasing consistently since record keeping began in 1903 and dramatically in the last 20 years.
• More than 600 different organizations have signed on to support the National Shooting Sports Foundation’s “Own It? Respect It. Secure It.” campaign, designed to help prevent firearms from falling into the wrong hands.

What is a Modern Sporting Rifle?

Rifles are incredible tools. From a distance, a hunter can take a large animal that will put food in the freezer to feed your family for the year. A farmer can stop a predator or nuisance animal from destroying crops and livestock. And anyone, from homeowner to serious competitor to weekend plinker, can hone their skills with practice and gain proficiency to shoot over distances of a 1,000 yards or more.

First Hunts—Everyone Starts at the Beginning

The decision to hunt can come before or after you learn how to shoot. Regardless of when that decision takes place, once you’ve made it—and before you step foot into the pheasant field or take a seat in the duck blind or whitetail stand—you need to become extremely accurate with the particular firearm you intend to take along with you. The NSSF’s website, www.nssf.org, is the perfect place to help you find ranges where you can practice, and it also lists dozens of training programs, all so that you can be assured your shot will fall where intended. But aside from practice, what else do you need to get out there and hunting as soon as possible? Let’s take a look at five things that should be at the top of your preparation list.

Four Things You Can Do With a Rifle (Besides Hunt)

Barbara is more of a hunter than I am and, in this issue of First Shots News, she tells you how to get started in hunting. While I hunt a little bit, mostly ducks and geese, she’s hardcore and chases down ill-tempered wild boars with flint knives—at least that’s what I’ve heard, and I’m sticking by that story.

The Road to Rio

Sometimes it takes a second chance to make the right impression.

It was just such a second chance that allowed, Rome, New York, native Tammy Delano to move to the Olympic Training Center as a resident athlete, win a gold medal at the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) World Cup in Poland, and earn the right to compete in R2 and R3 for the USA Shooting Team at the IPC World Championships in Suhl, Germany.

How to travel with a firearm

“Have gun, will travel,” is not as simple as it sounds.

Whether you’re planning to attend a competition, going on a distant hunt, or just want to take along a firearm for your own personal-defense when you travel away from home, you absolutely need to know the rules of how to legally travel with your gun.

Finding the Right Competition for Your Pistol Skills

There are so many opportunities to compete with your pistol. From air pistols to full-power handguns, there is something for every type of pistol shooter in this roundup below.