I sure appreciate all the advice I'm getting. Few shoots are heard here anymore, as the rural population grows fast with city people moving in. Coyotes are getting bolder. Just looking for something that will reach out a little farther. I want to get back into hand loading now that I'm retired. I've been looking at all the old Winchesters and Marlins, wondering if their twist would support a slow cast bullet. A Swedish Mauser has a 1:8 twist in 6.5x55, and a 29" barrel(?).
If it’s to appease new folks moving to the area, I’d be taking the exact opposite approach frankly. In fact, I make it a point to keep tabs on any real estate open houses in the area, and will plan to do my plinking during those hours. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for keeping the peace, and keeping needless noise down when it comes to existing neighbors or if I know certain neighbours are sleeping off a night shift, but new folks moving out of the city need to know from day one that this sound is something that happens out here frequently, and not something that can be nimby’d away.
{fun side story}
My uncle has a dozen or so acres and a cabin off a quiet gravel road. When an adjacent property came up for sale, he made it a point to exercise his Ross whenever he saw the real estate’s agent in the drive way. Again, not obnoxiously, and not to be a jerk, but to gently communicate that this is what rural life sounds like sometimes. The day the moving trucks arrived, he did the same thing. That evening, he took over a basket of preserves and venison pepperoni as a welcome to the new family. Mercs and Beamers in the driveway. The new owner was a middle-eastern Lawyer from the city, who was buying a summer home and property to show his kids there’s more than just pavement in Canada. He brought up the gunfire he’d heard during the open house, and said it was one of the factors in moving there. He’d always wanted to be a hunter but had never even shot a gun. Well, one thing led to another, and now he’s one of the most involved hunters in the area, and freely allows neighbors to shoot and hunt on his property when he’s back in the city.
Point being, don’t think of gunfire as dissuading new nieghbours, think of it as attracting the
right neighbours.
