During the course of a year, readers of this column read about me shooting and hunting with all sorts of sporting arms. Part of the outdoor experience, at least for me, is learning about new methods and new tools for hunting. I thoroughly enjoy hunting with my bows but also muzzleloaders, centerfires, occasionally handguns and even big bore air rifles. Like most rifle hunters, I considered 300 yards a long shot at deer so for many years, I simply sight in my flat shooting calibers about an inch high at 100 yards knowing that I can hold center of shoulder on deer size game out to 300 yards and collect my venison.
Until last week down in Houston County near Crockett, I never considered shooting much past 300 yards and shooting at yardages out to 1,200 yards with any accuracy was something accomplished at shooting matches by highly skilled shooters using very specialized rifles and scopes. Was I in for an eye opener!
Dr. John McCall is a noted eye surgeon and traveled big game hunter from Crockett that developed a line of state of the art rifle scopes a few years ago and formed a company called Stealth Vision. The good doctor and one of his partners, Joe Cunningham invited me to join a group of friends for the day and learn that any average shooter (me) with basic rifle shooting skills can, with a quality rifle, shoot accurately out to a thousand yards and a bit beyond. Describing the internal workings of the scope is way beyond my pay grade but I did learn how simple long range shooting can be with one of these scopes. The technology built into these scopes make them very easy to operate and use by the average shooter.
