doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Does anyone REALLY believe the.............

I understand you, keith. After reading Elmer Keith's book, Sixguns By Keith, I spent many years shooting handguns at long ranges, mainly S&W .357s and .44 magnums while laying down, holding them between my knees. I could "walk" bullets out to targets several hundreds of yards away and get remarkably close. And sometimes I would hit them. I remember one time, being on a hill in Kentucky and shooting probably a thousand yards away or better, down at a large rock in the middle of a creek (where I could see where my bullets were hitting in all directions around the target) and coming pretty close to hitting it with my Smith .44 magnum. Probably within 20 or 30 feet. But still, hitting a bird in flight at 1250 yards would have to been so lucky, in my opinion, that it would have to have been called "lucky" rather than "skillful". Especially, since you don't have any idea when the bird would decide to change directions, when the wind speed would have increased, etc.

If I remember right, 2 MPH full value wind deflects a 180 grain 308 bullet over 2 feet. Remember that competitive shooters have scopes to read mirage and wind flags.

Getting pretty close to a stationary target that's big enough to see at 1250 yards is a lot different than hitting it. The human eye is capable os seeing about 1 minute of angle or a 1' dot at 100 yards. that equates to a 12.5" dot at 1250 yards. I don't think the naked eye can see a crow at that distance.

Most "1000 yard" shots are less than 500 yards. If you've ever stood on a 1000 yard line, the 4 foot bull on the target looks like a period on your front site. My sight was .072 and the bull was not as wide as the sight.

Dick Jones

I'm sure in good light against the right back ground a crow could easily be seen at 1250 yards.

Parsons had to have a sixth sense when it came to shooting...his shooting wasn't mechanical like a bench rest shooter.

Most here shoot at the public's expense, or their buddies - most never see the aftermath of deer season. I can tell you as a landowner that has found dead deer on their property, they are shot wherever they're shot and wonder off to die.
Some really think too much of themselves and their stuff!

at 1250 yards? that's bs.

Lowell, it's entirely possible those deer were victims of suicide. Did they seem depressed in the days leading up to their discovery?

usually all that's left is stinky gut piles!

In the "pure sh*t shot" category I once dropped a flying crow at 70 paced yards with a Remington M12 .22. The blood trail over 50 feet of fresh snow that ended at the dead bird (no tracks, just blood splatter) was all the proof needed for my witness to stop calling me a liar! (40 years later I still wish he hadn't turned to take a leak before I fired so he would've eyewitnessed the shot!) I never tried repeating the stunt.

So when you left the woods that day the snow was red and yellow....

Kinda. Several things I do know.

Really good shooters usually have really good eyesight. So yess, its' more than likely he could see a crow at that distance

As was pointed out, with Parsons, anything was possible.

There's difference between a lucky shot and a good shot. Ask a top notch shooter what his best shot was and he's likely to look at you stupidly - his are all good, working shots that get the job done expertly every time. Ask Joe Blow and he'll go on about a once in a lifetime Hail-Mary affair that he thinks was his best and everyone else knows was his luckiest. Big difference. But to the point, just yanking a cold gun out of the case and whacking a crow-sized target at most of a mile is luck. If the story has any basis, it was a lucky shot, but believable garnish to a career such as Parsons'.

As to Keith, he spent a lifetime taking a lot of stupid shots, wounding and crippling a lot of game along the way.