Have you ever found a gun in the bush?

The Kurgan said:
No, but I found a military-issue, unpinned (of course) 30-round C7 mag. I eventually threw it out as I was worried about owning an illegal item!
It was full of military issue blank rounds. Near CFB Meaford.
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Wow Meaford, brings back memories... During a night training patrol, we all got down on one knee and I landed on a "branch". When I reached down to investigate (no moon, black as coal night), I picked up a C7! I carried it along with mine all night. When we got back to camp, I found the guy who had lost it earlier. He was going crazy looking around. He could already see getting charged and kissing his officer career goodbye! I have never seen a guy so happy when I handed him back his rifle! The staff never heard word of it and I have a good friend for life now! Man was he lucky the patrol decided to halt at this particular point!
 
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^^^After spending 2days Running around Jerusalem Ridge in Gagetown while still in my reserve days, we had gone back to base for post-ex drills and I had a Cpl (an idiot at the best of times) come up and say, "MCpl, I lost my BFA sight in the training area." "It shouldn't be too hard to find, it's still attached to the rifle!"
He suddenly became very popular. No drinking for anyone that night as we all got to go back and go over our route for the last part of the day. It's still out there after an entire company searching for 6.5 hours. When we all got back in, we finished our post-ex drills, turned in, got ready to drive home. Kid was encouraged to release from the reserves.

I found a Mossberg 500 leaning against a tree once. Hadn't been there more than a day, I don't think. Didn't have a clue as to who owned it. A couple of weeks later, I heard that someone had gotten charged (this guy was always on the wrong side of the law) with theft of the shotgun since he had been around about the time it was discovered missing. I went to the RCMP with my story of finding the gun. They contacted the "victim" who confirmed it was his.
Apparently, he had been out bird hunting, leaned it against a tree, urinated, then walked home without it. Then reported it stolen!
Okay, the guy wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer, but, really? Forget why you are in there woods while taking a pee?
Luckily, the guy didn't go to jail for something he actually didn't do, although no one would have believed him in the least.
 
A fellow showed me a very rusty Colt SAA six-shooter he found in Southern Alberta alongside the trail to Fort Benton, Montana. Still loaded but no longer capable of being fired.
 
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fuzzy said:
Crossing the country on horse back in the 60s interests me more than all the other stories combined!!
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Read her book titled "Why" by Lou Alwood. Her and another women in there late twentys rode from Clinton, BC to Halifax without ever having been on horseback before. Quite the adventure to say the least. Wonder how many 28 year old women could do that these days?
 
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The Gagetown comment got me thinking back to mid1990s. We had heard about one of the Yanks losing a rifle out the door of a chopper in 1992. The rifle turned up a couple years later, mostly rusted through. I swaps not there for it, but saw the pics.


A buddy of mine had a new, camo Browning auto back in 1989. He leaned it against a tree, not far from the fighter jet that went down in the Porkies. He could not find it again. One of our buddies found it in 1995, barely recognizable as a shotgun.
 
Rob said:
A fellow showed me a very rusty Colt SAA six-shooter he found in Southern Alberta alongside the trail to Fort Benton, Montana. Still loaded but no longer capable of being fired.
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It's certainly not the same but, a fellow once displayed a .56 calibre percussion pistol that was purported to be found near the site of an old fur trading fort at Cypress Hills.

I own the very same model of pistol I purchased from a seller in Toronto, and in obviously much better condition.
 
When I was a teenager, I had borrowed my dad's Ruger #1 45-70 to deer hunt with. I leaned against a maple tree in a stand of hardwoods while shooting at a partridge with a pellet pistol. I missed the partridge and it ran so I pursued it with the pellet pistol. After missing a few more times it flushed and escaped. I went back for the rifle and could not find it. I walked around that stand of maple for about 2 hours looking for that rifle before I finally spotted it. I didn't tell my dad. Luckily, I didn't see a deer while I was looking for the rifle.
 
I found a 10/22 for a mate of mine a day after he rolled his truck into a bung hole off of a logging road whilst gooned. After checking out the spot, I just wandered up the side hill nearest the scene and found his gun leaned against a pecker pole. Took half an hour to get there, an 10 minutes to find the rifle which I sold him a few months prior. Them were the days.;)
 
Rob said:
Have you ever found a gun? I don't mean at a gunshow or auction. I mean out in the bush. I saw a beauty once, found on northern Vancouver Island. It was a nice Tikka M65 30-06. Found leaning up against a tree. The bore must have had a good coat of oil in it because it was fine...and the wood was dull but looked great after a fresh coat of oil...but from the rust pitting around the action it had to have been there for awhile, a few years anyway...advertised for an owner but never found one...so it was sold at a gun show.
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Also on northern Vancouver Island Rob, at Easter 1970. I was attending North Island Secondary School in Port McNeill and caught the bus the Holberg kids from the dorm took home Friday night. Got off at the elephant crossing and walked to Cape Scott. While there I stayed in the last one of the Air force cabins from WWII and there was a 303 jungle carbine under the bunk with a full magazine. I carried it around for the weekend and put it back when I walked back out.
 
Robert Nicholson said:
Just like the 99% of us who can't contribute a story to this thread.
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99.1% if you count me. :( However, did find a rifle stock (nose down) in a trout stream about 10 years ago. Looked to be from a Marlin and by the mag well...a 22WMR maybe? Pretty beat-up. Anyhow, after sitting there about 8 years in the corner of my shop...I converted it to a "prop" gun for my son to use as part of a Halloween costume. (went as a soldier) Still sitting in the pile of toys the kids play with today when they have friends over.
 
Not in the bush but I got a position on a herring collecting vessel here in Vancouver one year and there was a P14 303 under my mattress.
 
nowarningshot said:
Either seal medicine or herbe pirates. Like someones sig line, drinking rum before 10am doesnt make you a alcoholic, it makes you a pirate.
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No, just left behind by another crewman. Sometimes they had a chance at a deer in the Straits while working in the chum salmon fall fishery.
 
My great old friend Howard, drowned in a canoe accident a decade ago, had a pheasant farm outside Lachute, Quebec. He found an original Brown Bess musket hidden away in the old barn when he got the property. It was missing the hammer. Other than that, it was all there and not in too bad a condition either.
 
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