Even more so than a BB gun, a child’s first .22 is like a ticket to adventure, allowing entry into the serious, but exciting, world of shooting. Here are some of the top offerings available today.
In hunting there are the rifles you choose to make sure you take an animal humanely; and then, there are the rifles you choose to make sure the animal doesn’t take you. A choice for a black bear rifle lends itself to the latter.
Henry’s Big Boy Steel Carbine has traditional lever-action lines but retains Henry’s signature cutout in the magazine tube, through which cartridges are loaded and unloaded. Though somewhat unconventional in appearance and function, it makes the lever gun infinitely easier and safer to unload at hunt’s end.
Deer rifles and the cartridges loaded in them have run the gamut the last 50 years, from the Winchester 94 in .30-30 Win. to the Weatherby Mark V in .30-378 Wby. Mag. and the DPMS ARL in 6.5 Creedmoor.
Whether mounted on an AR, a lever gun or a single-shot, the KonusPro M-30 1x-6x-24mm is a handy scope for up-close encounters. Some of its features—such as a 30mm main tube and a well-designed reticle with dual-color illumination—may come as a surprise, considering its relatively low MSRP of less than $360.