My son got his first black animal. He used a 62 caliber smoothbore flintlock.

Congratulations there's some good eating in your future !

Very nice and congratulations . Don't even know if Pete in fairbanks has used a flintlock on bears.

Percussion and inlines.... never a flintlock. Although they were "state of the art" when I began hunting!

Pete

Nice eater.
Looks a bit rubbed on the flanks.(the hunter not the bear)

That's awesome. Not just a flintlock, but a smoothbore to boot. Hats off to your son.

Fantastic. I'm curious about the firearm. Is it a Northwest trade gun style? I've always wanted to get one of those and hunt with it. Did he build the gun, or purchase it, and if so where? Range, load, and any other particulars would be appreciated.

The gun was built by John Pruitt and I would say it is more of a contemporary style, I myself shoot a fowler made by Jackie Brown. If I was to get another one it would be a trade gun made by Rob Miller. He was using 80 grs. 2F blackpowder, overpowder card, 20 ga. prelubed wad, .010 prelubed patch, .600 lead ball, and 4F for priming. The smoothbores are a lot of fun since you can load it with shot or ball from small game to big game and are much easier to load as well as clean. He is shooting at 30 yds right now but we will be practicing more this summer at longer ranges and he needs to pattern it with shot. If you have one built you can have a small rear sight put on it which is still historically accurate but will help extend your range accuracy wise.

Super cool!!

Right on!

Oooh bear burgers!