Technoid:

Letter writer Glenn “shoot(s) low gun using the Orvis Method”. What’s that? (Methinks these tailors and haberdashers are getting a bit uppity in trying to attach their name to shooting techniques enjoyed since firelock times by we sports.)

Jay

El Lago, Texas

Dear Jay,

Darned if I know what the Orvis Method is. Ditto the Churchill Method and the CPSA Method. I still refer to everything as spot shooting, swing through, pull away and sustained. All the “methods” have to fall into one of those four categories ’cause their ain’t no other way to whack a birdie than one of those four. A sophisticated shot has to use all four lead methods. One method doesn’t work for everything all the time.

You might choose to get a copy of Bruce Bowlen’s “Orvis Wingshooting Handbook”. It’s a little paperback which has more good shooting information in it than any other book that I have read. Y

Bowlen advocates the “English” system where swing through is used, but differentiates it from “American” swing through by saying that the American swing through mounts the gun to the shoulder and face a moment before the barrel swings through the bird, while the English swing through “requires the shooter to pass the target during the gun mount”. The difference is subtle, but important.

Perhaps Bowlen’s “English” system is now the “Orvis” system. I really ought to go up to an Orvis school some time and take a lesson. I sure wish that I had a system- any system.

Best regards,

Bruce Buck
The Technoid writing for Shotgun Report, LLC
(Often in error, never in doubt.)