Paintballs and pooches.

I think every person should own a paintball gun as I am convinced they are the first line method of animal deterant.

I became acquainted with paintball guns years ago when Hub decided this was a game he might enjoy and he used to say things like, "would you go run around in the bush? I have to sight in my gun." Let me tell you, you only say yes to that one time.

Over the years paintball guns evolved greatly. At first everyone had the same gun and the game was about skill. But then some guys got newer guns with bigger ammo holders and air tanks instead of air cartridges and very quickly might made right. The bigger fire power meant the game was not won by skill but the ability to relentlessly blast your opponent with more paintballs than his gun could even carry. Skill left the game and for my Hub, so did a lot of the fun.

SInce then paintball guns have been employed to convince dogs and bears that they should stay away from the chickens. You might wonder why I didn't take a paintball gun and unload a few into bobcat in the hen house recently. I'll get to that in a minute. But first, why I think paintball guns are the first choice for blasting critters.

#1) it will not kill them. I do ntot want to kill anything, but I do want to DETER them and give them something to think about.

#2) some guns make quite a noise when they fire, and that also acts a deterent. Dogs and bears are often noise averse.

#3) damage is a bruise or if you are really close, some broken skin, nothing that will require vet care. Once a neighbour shot my dog, point blank, with an air rifle. The pellet lodged deep in her side (lumbar?) muscle and the vet said it would do more damage cutting in to remove it than leaving it in place. Small boys with a mean streak should never have anything in their hands that can do more damage than a bruise. A paintball gun limits damage, but it hurts.

#4) I am not scared of paintball guns. They are the only gun I will handle.

Having a bunch of paintball guns in this house does NOT mean though that I have one ready when I need it! Older guns used to use those little metal canisters of CO2, the kind you put in cream whipper thingys. They were expensive to use. New guns use large tanks of air that you have filled wherever they do this sort of thing. THe problem is that over time the seals on these air tanks dry out and leak and when you need the air to fire, it has all leaked out! Therefore, it is my opinion that if you want a gun for popping critters, you need an OLD gun that used those drop in canisters, they never lose their charge.

I might have to dig through the paintball gns and see if HUb has an old one. I'll buy some drop in canisters and be ready for bear season.

Also, paintballs get brittle and the paint inside settles. You need to roll your balls (STOP THAT!) to keep the paint from sitting in one place. Otherwise they shoot crooked. I'm not making this up.

SO if you see and old stlye paintball gun in a junk shop some day (I think they were a Pirahnna) grab it! And get your better half to run through the bush while you fine tune the sight. (site?)

I think SmokeyRiver needs a paintball gun! But what sbout you, Uno? Will they work on cats?

Hmmm, now I am thinking ravens!

Yes, they will work on cats, but I would not want to be too close to such a small animal when I hit it. I also think a good shot, from close, to a raven might kill it.

The other thing to keep in mind is the paint they use seems to be oily. There is still yellow and red paint on trees we shot 15 years ago! You want to be careful about splatting it onto buildings or vehicles because it does not wash away in the rain! Expect to take a scrub brush and soapy water to get it out of rough surfaces like wood siding. Heaven help you if you get it on your carpet or upholstery! (been there, done that).

So I would not want to shoot a cat spraying on my porch because the mess would be everywhere! And it's not like the first shot is going to hit, so you'll likely get all trigger happy and be blasting off 5 or 13. BIG MESS! So whle I think a PB gun is a dandy item, there does need to be some strategy in its use, to prevent permanent paint splatts.

There is still yellow and red paint on trees we shot 15 years ago! You want to be careful about splatting it onto buildings or vehicles because it does not wash away in the rain! Expect to take a scrub brush and soapy water to get it out of rough surfaces like wood siding.

So Uno why aren't you out there scrubbing down the trees?




Sorry couln't resist.

Karona...don't think I have't tried!

The first generation paint ball gun was the 007. I used to own a few of them. I loved them and thought that they were great. I also was on a tournament team who won the Western Canadian Championships. We took shooting people seriously. We soon discovered that the more frequently that you changed the co2 cartridge that the more accurate your shot was. In tournament play they encourage head shots so you learned to run fast and keep your head down.

Dan, that's odd about encouraging head shots. Here, when you went to a game at one of the designated paintball places (field or bush) headshots were actively discouraged. If you were judged to be making too many deliberate headshots, you were ushered off the property.

Head protection has improved since the beginning, now many wear full face gear, or almost. Hub used to just wear goggles and an up close paintball to your cheek removes a lot of hide!

The fields where Hub used to play also used to chrono the guns. If you were shooting hot they sent you off to re-work your speed, but hot guns were not allowed to play. I don't know if those older guns, with the small cartridges, ever managed as much oomph as the bigger guns with the tanks. But at close range, some of thos big guns, if they were shooting hot and hit you, holy smokes, knock you off your feet!

I wish my neighbor would paintball that pooeating bedstealing pure bred weinerchi that we somehow got suckered into adopting! Ok, he is a nice dog but it's starting to tick me off that everytime we go outside to do chores, the neighbor (who has a lovely little muttly creature of her own, female and unspayed) seems to entice the blooming dog under the fence so he can go hang out over there. I'd like to give her a paintball gun and tell her to use it! It's not cute, or funny, or even a little bit sweet that he sneaks under the fence where the seasonal creek destroys all forms of barriers. It makes me want to punt him (he is football sized and colored) across the field back to his house! Can you tell he's over there right now, having tea? Guess I'll put my rubber boots back on so I can trudge through the sludgey muck hole and take him back from dim witted neighbor.

HUMBUG!

Once, when spanking kids was legal and well thought of, my mother went searching for my little bother, who had gone AWOL. He had been told NOT TO LEAVE THE YARD. But he always was too smart for his own good. Mother was armed with a switch and every step back to the house got little brohter a swack on the backside.

I think she should have shot him with a paintball gun every step of the way.

Wait! Did I say that in my typing out loud voice? My bad. I mean Briarwood that you should march over to your neighbours house and follow your dog home, shooting his little weenery butt every step of the way home while shouting insane things like ARE WE HAVING FUN NOW, ROMEO?
I share your pain.

uno wrote:Once, when spanking kids was legal and well thought of, my mother went searching for my little bother, who had gone AWOL. He had been told NOT TO LEAVE THE YARD. But he always was too smart for his own good. Mother was armed with a switch and every step back to the house got little brohter a swack on the backside.

I think she should have shot him with a paintball gun every step of the way.

Wait! Did I say that in my typing out loud voice? My bad. I mean Briarwood that you should march over to your neighbours house and follow your dog home, shooting his little weenery butt every step of the way home while shouting insane things like ARE WE HAVING FUN NOW, ROMEO?
I share your pain.

Oh... my .... goodness..... I have tears in my eyes, you crack me up!

(we got the switch too!)

uno wrote:Once, when spanking kids was legal and well thought of, my mother went searching for my little bother, who had gone AWOL. He had been told NOT TO LEAVE THE YARD. But he always was too smart for his own good. Mother was armed with a switch and every step back to the house got little brohter a swack on the backside.

I think she should have shot him with a paintball gun every step of the way.

Wait! Did I say that in my typing out loud voice? My bad. I mean Briarwood that you should march over to your neighbours house and follow your dog home, shooting his little weenery butt every step of the way home while shouting insane things like ARE WE HAVING FUN NOW, ROMEO?
I share your pain.

Shuddering remembering that switch.

Rolling picturing the scene walking home though LOL. I can see DH doing that!

Uno, you could use that to keep people away from the horses. Get some red paint balls and really freak them out when they get hit.

uno wrote:Dan, that's odd about encouraging head shots. Here, when you went to a game at one of the designated paintball places (field or bush) headshots were actively discouraged. If you were judged to be making too many deliberate headshots, you were ushered off the property.

Head protection has improved since the beginning, now many wear full face gear, or almost. Hub used to just wear goggles and an up close paintball to your cheek removes a lot of hide!

The fields where Hub used to play also used to chrono the guns. If you were shooting hot they sent you off to re-work your speed, but hot guns were not allowed to play. I don't know if those older guns, with the small cartridges, ever managed as much oomph as the bigger guns with the tanks. But at close range, some of thos big guns, if they were shooting hot and hit you, holy smokes, knock you off your feet!

The reason that they encouraged head shots was to make the tournament games seem more like a real war . I also played in public games and if you accidently hit an opponent in the head you were to give him or her your clean goggles and take their dirty ones and leave the game . And yes our 007 guns hit as hard as those with large canisters or even those ones that were shot from oozie style guns which used gun powder . each paint ball had a what looked like a 22 short casing attached to a paint ball and were propelled by the gun powder in the casing similar to a 22 bullet that you would shoot a gopher with. Over the years I had my lip split and hundreds of bruises and sometimes a gun was only only inches from my skin when it went off. We also played in the winter time because we took this sport so serious and the paint balls would freeze and one time when I shot a friend in the face the paint ball was stuck on his face and it didn't even break. It was kind of like a round ice cube stuck on his chin. I felt really bad. It was his first day ever playing and it took me quite a while to talk him into it and then that happened. It has been over 25 years since I played last. Our motto was, If you mess with the best you die like the rest. The last tournament that we won qualified us and we were suposed to go down to Atlanta Georgia for the North American Championships but half of our team chickened out because it was going to cost each member $3000.00 which was a lot of money 25 years ago and even though my wife had approved of me going down and spending the money there were many on our team that could talk the talk but not walk the walk so we had to forfiet the right to represent Western Canada.