General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Can someone explain what law-abiding citizens do with their semiautomatic rifles? [View all]Igel
(35,300 posts)And occasionally javelina hunting. He's a federally licensed firearms dealer and once actually got to play with an assault rifle--said he wanted to "audition" it for a prospective buyer, but he just wanted to play with it. (As for a buyer, it's not easy to get permission to own an actual assault rifle.)
People in TX use semi-automatic rifles for hunting feral hogs. You wouldn't want to use a single-shot rifle. Properly trained, you can reload a bolt-action rifle fairly fast, but still if you have a huge hog running at you it's hard to work the bolt and run. I also heard somebody say they put down skunks and armadillos with their semi-automatic rifle. You don't want skunks around the house or barn and armadillos carry leprosy.
Had a roommate once who had a Glock semi-automatic pistol (all his guns were semi-automatic) for defense while home and biking to work, rifle at all other times. He worked for an armored truck company, sometimes driving and sometimes riding shotgun, and was worried that some robber would ID him and use him to gain access to company grounds or inside the truck. Oh, and almost every year he got his buck with his semi-automatic rifle. Took various and sundry firearms to the range almost weekly, playing with different mixes of powder and keeping track of accuracy and bullet velocity, trying to perfect the optimal bullet weight, powder mix, powder amount for his guns. He had notebooks full of actual data, mixed his own propellant and cast his own bullets.
Most hunter friends had a semi-automatic pistol that they took with their more traditional hunting rifles to finish a deer that was wounded and slowly dying. This was a while back, and they weren't wealthy enough to upgrade to assault-style weapons when their 15-year-old Remington bolt-action rifles worked perfectly well.
These things can be used for a variety of things. But they're things you have to be interested in doing.
I guess I own a semi-automatic Glock, it's in my brother's gun safe in a different state. Inherited it from parents (no background check and I'm not sure that the laws proposed would prohibit inheritance of firearms). Haven't ever touched it.