My dad claims to have killed a deer with an air rifle when he was eight years old.
Got at good ass-whuppin’ from his dad for it, too 
Aside from issues of safety, you mention that you’re within city limits. I would be very surprised if what you want to do isn’t illegal. And if your neighbors see you shooting at birds with a rifle, expect a visit from the cops.
And while a pellet gun fired into the air may not prevent much real danger (unless someone is looking up and the pellet drops in their eye or something), what if the pellet richochets off the wire into your neighbor’s yard?
This is just a bad idea in many different ways.
Oh, and if you want to get rid of the bird, you could try seeing if your city has pest control. You might also consider something like an Owl decoy or something. Google up different ways to get rid of pest birds.
I take it no one here watched Mythbusters last night? They were testing whether a bullet shot straight into the air could kill someone when it returned to earth.
Of course, it’s known for a fact that people have been injured and even killed by bullets fired into the air. Eventually the show got around to explaining that in those cases the rounds were fired at relatively low angles and maintained their spin, therefore striking pointy end first.
But if fired straight up, or nearly so, a bullet starts tumbling as it returns to earth. In that condition it tends to fall edge (not point) down, with a termiinal velocity of about 100 mph. (The Mythbusters tested a 9mm handgund round and a rifle round whose caliber I don’t recall. Both returned similar results.)
They fired rounds of these weights at at this speed into the head of a pig carcass, and found that they didn’t do enough damage to kill or even seriously injure a human.
Now, I know nothing about about guns. So I’m not saying the OP should go ahead with his plan if others with more experience with weapons advise against it. I’m just saying that if, as Scumpup says, the pellets are about one tenth the mass of a 9mm round, and if the Mythbusters’ experiment is even roughly accurate, it seems to me that, from a theoretical physics point of view, there’s very little chance that a pellet striking someone could do much harm. Except perhaps in the extremely unlikey case that it hit someone’s eye.
I realize you didn’t ask, and I hate to put a damper on the discussion of how to kill the bird, but you might do well to investigate exactly what kind of bird it is before you pursue your plan. Under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, it’s against federal law to kill a migratory wild bird.
You might try calling your local Humane Society to see if they can give you advice or put you in touch with a wildlife rehabilitator who might be able to get it out of your hair.
It doesn’t matter. Firing a weapon into the air without proper clearance is dangerous, and from the standpoint of gun safety it is absolutely verboten.
It is bad practice because it is bad practice. That being said, your insistence on equating a .177 air gun with a 9mm sounds very much like the kind of thing I associate with Handgun Control Inc. Everything that is a gun is not the same as every other thing that is a gun.
I didn’t insist on anything. I used the muzzle velocities to demonstrate that an airgun is still a gun, and asked the question as a matter of principle. The only one being insistent here is you. I submitted that post early this afternoon and never revisited it. That’s been all you. Hell, I never even argued with you.
I have never seen anyone killed with a pellet gun. However, I have seen three people blinded by a pellet gun.
Dr_Pap, ER Doc
Good sweet god, just get a bb gun, walk up underneath it and shoot it in the ass. Done and done. Peeps have been doing same for most of the 20th century without wetting their pants or even taking any precautions and most of us are doing OK still. If you blind or kill someone, buy a lottery ticket as chances of winning are about the same.
I think Mythbusters even did a show where they tested 9mm and .3006 rounds shot straight up in the air, and showed even they couldn’t hurt anyone coming down, so good hunting fellow, just use common sense and don’t lower your aim.
Did you miss the part about the pellet ricocheting off the wire and back down into someone’s yard?
A pellet falling from the sky is almost harmless. There’s just not much mass there, and the terminal velocity will be low. Think about dropping a small pebble off a high-rise. That’s what we’re talking about. So let’s just put that strawman to bed.
The real risks here are:
- a ricochet hitting someone or breaking something.
- breaking the law by firing a pellet gun within city limits. Depending on the city, this could result in a a pretty severe charge (or it might not even be illegal)
- killing a bird you shouldn’t kill
- damaging public property (stripping insulation off a wire, for instance)
- Making your neighbors think you are a wacko
A much more significant risk compared to those in this case is somebody seeing you kill a bird and getting angry. This can result in a small verbal confrontation, or somebody coming at night and killing your entire family with a pick-axe, you never know. :rolleyes:
Of course you’re not wrong. I’m sure several tens of thousands of assorted birds go to the great big nest in they sky every year at the hands of 10 year old boys with BB/pellet guns, and I’m sure that there is a decent percentage of Dopers who’ve creased a few feathers before too.
However, I’m sure most of the shooters on this board know of at least one outdoor firing range that’s been closed due to someone making a poor choice with regards to a backstop. One of the ranges I used to go to with my dad as a kid is forever closed due to someone deciding it would be more fun to shoot bottles and cans off of the top of the backstop. The resulting errant rounds were sufficient to irk the public opinion to the point that the closest outdoor range is now almost an hour away.
Safe and responsible firearm use (even pellet guns) is key to helping protect what few oppertunities still exist in most sizable urban and suburban areas.
So Mythbusters did a show about this? You don’t say!
Hehe, d’oh! :smack:
I have killed a few rabbits and a 'possum with a hand-pumped pellet rifle, so I can firmly say it was seriously dangerous to the rabbits. Now, human flesh is much larger than rabbit flesh, but it’s no sturdier. A pellet would probably get an inch or more into a human. :eek: There’s no human I’d want to do that to.
I had a bird problem, and solved it (non-violently) with these plastic spikes that you glue to the gutter and keep birds off.
It works.
But you don’t get the thrill of killing something.
I respect the opinions and concerns for safety mentioned here.
That being said, have you killed that damn blackbird yet?
Using common sense and a little caution, you can certainaly get a clean shot at a bird that lives in your gutter. Much of the hyper-cautious info in this thread strikes me as mamby-pamby hand wringing.
Set up your shot. Make sure there is nothing behind the bird you don’t wanna hit. Shoot.
Fer crying out loud…
Fer crying out loud indeed. Just shoot the durn thing. It would be a one in a million chance to hurt anyone. You’re more dangerous to more people driving your car while talking on a cell phone.