My air gun collection

I finished last week’s column with a short mention of using air rifles to stay in shooting shape during this time of ammo and reloading component shortages. Pellets are inexpensive and air is free, so your shooting costs will shrink. Even if you choose a CO2 cartridge gun, your costs will not increase that much.

If you decide to try air guns, you need to know that the local selection of rifles isn’t that great, and you might end up ordering the model you want online. A small business located south of Houston, off the Parks Highway, specializes in air guns. The business name is Alaska Airguns/Alaska Shooting Specialties. Their phone number is: 907-315-5720. If you don’t find what you want there, several large companies in the Lower 48 specialize in selling air guns and their inventories appear to be adequate in these supply shortage times.

If you’re buying either a .177 or .22-caliber air rifle, pellets should still be available locally. Anything larger will need to be ordered when you order the rifle. A few years ago, I bought an inexpensive Daisy brand, single-shot rifle in .177 caliber locally to replace a similar one I had sold at a garage sale several years before. This is a “plinking grade” rifle for shooting in the back yard and running off stray dogs or moose. It’s constructed mostly of plastic and some steel and isn’t powerful enough to harm critters, but it might kill small birds (like starlings), mice and voles, or insects if necessary.

Benjamin made my pump-up, .22-caliber rifle. I bought it about 25 years ago and used it for plinking and pest control in the yard. With the proper number of pumps, this rifle is quite capable of harvesting squirrels, snowshoe hares, and grouse within 25 to 30 yards and is amazingly accurate with the receiver sight I have mounted on it. I’m not sure if Benjamin still makes this model although I’ve seen it in recent air rifle catalogs.

I bought a Benjamin “break barrel,” single shot, .22-caliber rifle a few years ago because the powerplant in this rifle was supposed to be unaffected by cold temperatures. It was also more powerful than the pump-up rifle and was advertised specifically as a small game hunting rifle. I had read that this type of rifle often required up to two hundred shots through it before best accuracy could be achieved and the mechanism smoothed out. I found that to be true since, initially, the rifle wouldn’t group worth beans and was rough to cock.

I’ve fired close to two hundred pellets through the gun, and it is now shooting quite accurately. I did have to upgrade the scope that came with the rifle to get decent accuracy. The action still requires a robust effort to cock, but it does seem smoother in cycling.

Both .22-caliber rifles are made of wood and steel with little or no plastic involved in their construction. They have a solid, “real gun” feel. The pump action rifle sells for around $200, if available. The break barrel action rifle retails from $150 to $250, depending on the specific model.

My third air rifle is a significant upgrade from the two .22-caliber guns. It’s a Benjamin Marauder .25-caliber, PCP (precharged pneumatic) rifle with an eight-shot magazine. The rifle uses an air reservoir holding a maximum of 3000 psi of air. Ballistically, this air gun is remarkably close to a .22-short, rimfire rifle in power and makes a particularly good small game hunting rifle. This is the gun, with a mounted scope, which I mentioned last week as the one I used to take a spruce grouse sitting in the top of a tall spruce tree.

I also have a couple of air pistols. One is an older Daisy model 747, .177-caliber, single-stroke target pistol. It’s an entry-grade target pistol which is no longer manufactured. It currently sells for around $200 on the used market. The second pistol is a Crossman .22-cailber, single-shot pump-action pistol I recently purchased and have yet to fire.

The Crossman pistol is inexpensive at around $62 and has been manufactured for years. There are almost unlimited aftermarket upgrades available for the Crossman. I mounted red-dot sights on both pistols. Both are large-framed handguns. The Daisy is quite accurate. The Crossman is supposed to be accurate and powerful enough for limited small game hunting, but I’ve yet to confirm that.

Airguns can be as inexpensive or high dollar as you want, but they’re all fun.