Articles by Herschel Smith

First.

On the evening of September 30, a sow grizzly bear charged an elk hunter in thick timber near Henry’s Lake, Idaho. According to an Idaho Department of Fish & Game (IDFG) press release issued this morning, the hunter yelled to alert his partner about the charging bruin before firing several shots from his sidearm that killed the bear “only a short distance way, before it was able to make contact.”

“The hunter immediately called the Citizens Against Poaching hotline to report the incident,” the press release states. “Idaho Department of Fish and Game responded to the call and conducted a thorough investigation. It was determined that the hunter acted in self-defense during a surprise encounter with the bear from a very close distance.”

This is incomplete reporting because we aren’t informed of the handgun make and caliber.  But at least the outcome is clear.

Second.

A 73-year-old woman was mauled by a bear while walking with her husband and their dog in Montana near Glacier National Park on Sunday, officials have announced. The woman’s husband used bear spray to get the beast off his wife and they were able to make it back to their vehicle and drive to a location where they could call emergency services at around 3 pm.

Between bear spray and a large bore handgun, you know which one I’d choose.

You walk with the equipment God gave you.

I’ll come live with you and love you, but only under one condition.

Us animals got to stick together.

Us animals got to play together.

A protective breed.  My Heidi-girl was very protective too.

A special needs duck. Even the animals know to take care of those in need. They don’t rush – they seem to know the drill.

@myprideandducksI didn’t realise until watching the video back later that they placed Cleo in between them when they were walking home, even though she walks so much slower than them! I love ducks!♬ original sound – My Pride and Ducks

A leopard befriends a cow.  Interesting.

Special needs dog learns to use the stairs.

I will take my ball or I’m not going walking.  I have my special stuff too.

Rabbid bobcat.

A Python attacks a family of Mongoose. It didn’t go well for the snake.

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This is long and complicated “inside baseball” stuff, except with the court system.  Watch his two videos, or if you don’t have the time, watch only the last one.

BLUF: The Ninth Circuit intends to drop their pants and moon the supreme court.

Shooting Illustrated.

Dry firing is one of those controversial subjects upon which everyone seems to have an opinion. I am a big proponent of dry firing handguns and rifles, particularly when using my Wall Drill to improve. It also helps sustain trigger control and sight alignment as a collective rather than a separate effort. Dry firing against a wall keeps the eye on the front sight through the pull of the trigger, which maintains follow-through, allowing detection and correction of deficiencies in the foundational skills of shot delivery.

With the exception of rimfire revolvers and revolvers with the firing pin mounted on the hammer, I see no hard and fast reason that snap caps are needed to dry-fire your revolvers. That said, there is certainly nothing wrong with using them in either of your revolvers just to be on the safe side. If you want a second opinion, I recommend contacting the manufacturer of your firearms and see what it has to say. I suspect the manufacturer will agree with my suggestion, but there is always the chance it will have a different perspective. I would support the manufacturer’s opinion in that manufacturers usually know more about their products than individuals not in their employ.

Although snap caps and dummy rounds are often lumped into the same category, they are slightly different in nature.

Dummy rounds are available in different colors and can be made of metal or plastic in the external dimensions of a specific cartridge. Typically, they have a solid base or occasionally a hollow opening where the primer pocket would be located.

A subset of a dummy round is the action-proving cartridge, which is loaded to the external dimensions and weight of live ammunition, but is without propellant and is visually identifiable from live ammunition. Its purpose is to validate proper feeding, chambering, extracting and ejecting of ammunition through a semi-automatic firearm.

Dummy rounds are also used as a diagnostic tool when interspersed with live ammo in a shooter’s magazine to detect deficiencies in shot release. When the shooter pulls the trigger on a dummy round, the gun should not move any more than it did prior to pulling the trigger. If additional movement of the gun is experienced, there is work to be done to improve shooting performance.

Snap caps differ from dummy rounds in that they have a rubber or spring-loaded mechanism located in the base of the cartridge to cushion the impact of the
firing pin when the trigger is pulled.

A snap cap provides something for the firing pin to contact, like the primer in a live cartridge. In fact, the snap cap is intended to replicate what the firing pin experiences when firing live ammunition.

This is important in older firearms, especially shotguns, because without something like a primer to impact when the trigger is pulled, something must absorb the energy generated by the released spring tension powering the firing pin. This could be internal metal parts or springs, all of which will fatigue over multiple impacts. This fatigue often leads to broken parts and failure of the gun to function properly.

Older firearms, especially shotguns, should be stored with snap caps in place, enabling the springs driving the firing pins to be relaxed by pulling the trigger(s) prior to being put away. Think of it in this manner: The firing pin is designed to impact a primer, which stops its forward movement when firing a gun. The snap cap provides the same feature in stopping the firing pin with the addition of a little “give,” similar to indenting a primer.

In addition, snap caps are generally brightly colored to distinguish them from live ammo, which helps to maintain the separation of live ammunition and the gun especially during storage and dry-fire exercises.

It is always good to have a few snap caps of the appropriate caliber or gauge in your range bag for dry-firing or storage purposes. Such a simple piece of gear can really help take your training to the next level.

I have to say, I won’t drop the hammer on a rimfire revolver or semi-auto handgun without ammunition being chambered.  But as long as the firing pin isn’t banging on anything, I have never worried about that with either a rifle or shotgun.

I also won’t drop the hammer on an AR-15 while the upper is off of the lower (for obvious reasons).  Grab it and gently let it fall.

Comments or observations?

Mad props and respect to him.  I used to be on the power lifting team in college and still work out to this day, albeit at a greatly reduced intensity because of age.  But I certainly can’t do this.

It takes time and commitment.

Marine Corps Times.

Leaders of Marine units can let their service members wear nonstandard uniform items amid a long-term shortage of the regular camouflage uniform.

The Marine Corps says it won’t have a full stock of the woodland-pattern camouflage combat utility uniform ― the everyday outfit for most Marines ― until summer or fall 2024. The shortage has prompted the top Marine leader to authorize unit commanders to allow the desert-colored camouflage combat utility uniform or the flame-resistant organizational gear, known as FROGs.

Ridiculous.  This is because of lack of planning, lack of logistics, lack of vision, lack of foresight, and lack of funding, along with worrying about the wrong things like gender and race studies.

U.S. Army from Glenn Reynolds.

NEGLECTING THE TROOPS: Congress blasts Pentagon for ‘dreadful’ barracks conditions. “In a scathing letter addressed to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, lawmakers accused the Pentagon of failing to ‘provide the most basic oversight and care’ of barracks at 10 installations cited in a recent report and called it a ‘failure of leadership’ by Austin ‘that cannot be ignored.’”

I have a nephew in the Army and have heard a number of stories along these lines — no food, no toilet paper, filthy barracks, etc.

If living quarters – whether barracks or tent – aren’t squared away, that’s the fault of leadership.  If the troops are filthy or live in filthy conditions, there is a lack of discipline.

Either way, there is a general lacking that deeply affects the U.S. military.

And it’s all by design, you understand?

What do you want to bet this lack of discipline doesn’t affect the Mexican cartels or the army of Communist China?

A few observations before the video.

First, what they are doing is illegal.  The police have no right to your identification if you haven’t been charged with a crime.  That they are “conducting an investigation” doesn’t mean a crime has been committed, and refusing to cooperate with the police in their investigation isn’t a crime either.

Second, you are under no obligation to assist police in their investigations.

Third, the goobers he was with (after other officers had been called) are just as culpable as he is, as they stood by while he did it.

Fourth, police academies across the nation are teaching police recruits that the fact that they are conducting an investigation means they have a right to anything they want, including identification, even after the SCOTUS ruled on the so-called “Terry Stop.”

The upper management of Sheriff and PDs know that what their recruits are being trained to do is illegal.  They also know that their recruits continue to believe the lies they were taught at the academy, and they don’t care.

The county attorney also knows that the police believe lies concerning detention and arrest.  They don’t care either.

Finally, based on the fact that PDs everywhere across America routinely recruit low IQ individuals, the recruits and officers are usually too stupid to understand that what they are doing is a crime.  But they are still culpable for the crime since they are supposed to know and understand since they have arrest powers and are agents of the state.

The Sussex County Sheriff’s Department can be reached here: sheriff@sussexcountyva.gov.

If you have to beat a dog in order to train him or her, you’re stupid and wicked and have no business being around animals or humans.

But this dog seems to have recovered from abuse quickly.

I demand to have my belly rubbed, and I’m badder than you.

Nothing wrong with a good pool party.

Good boy.

Don’t mess with bull elk, especially if they are rutting.

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As usual, Mark does a great job.