Last week, we did an introductory article on airguns. This week, let’s go a little deeper and assume that you’re interested and want to get into airguns and see what it is all about. If you listen to me, I’ll talk you into buying one of everything! But everyone has some kind of budget that they have to live within so, here’s what I’d recommend to get started.

Buy a decent break barrel to get started. They’re relatively inexpensive, at least as compared to a decent PCP (precharged pneumatic) and way less expensive to operate than a CO2 or a PCP. One word of caution, though: Don’t buy a cheap piece of junk spring-action from China, or you’re just going to get frustrated with its inaccuracy and give up on airguns. I know that about happened to me. You can spend as much as you want, but you should be able to get a decent one for around $225.

Actually, I have two words of caution: Of the airguns that I’ve tested, many of them come with a cheap piece of junk for a scope. I understand their reasoning. Companies are trying to keep the price point down so people buy their airguns, but if it is a super cheap scope on your gun, you’re going to get frustrated and not have fun. It is a dilemma. You don’t want to spend $1,000 on an airgun scope but at least buy a functional one. My Sig Sauer and Crosman/Benjamin have all come with good scopes. If yours doesn’t come with a good one, then check out the Riton Optics Primal X1 3-9×40 or, better yet, their Primal X1 4-16×44. But whatever scope you buy, make sure that it is airgun compatible because a lot of scopes aren’t.

Next topic: Pellets. We all know that it is important to buy not only good ammo but also exact ammo to get good groups and have the ultimate performance out of big game rifles. It is just as important to do the same when selecting pellets.

Some airgun companies are trying to make them cheap pellets so they’re affordable, but many are lightweight and flimsy and impossible to get a good group with. I don’t usually rag on companies because everyone is trying to make a living, but one popular airgun company makes horrible pellets. You might as well throw rocks at your target. The best is made by JSB, but Sig Sauer and Crosman also make good pellets. And then I am about to start testing pellets for two companies out South America: Rifle Ammo and Air Boss. To adequately cover pellets will be a whole article in and of itself, so for now let’s move on.

So what are the opportunities to use airguns? Limitless. I see a lot of options. Let’s list out a few.

Airguns are a great avenue to get your kids into hunting if they’re non-hunters. If they don’t want to hunt, just shoot, then airguns are a great place to start. They’re real guns so kids need to be taught gun safety rules because they can hurt or kill you, but hopefully if they make a mistake it won’t be as dangerous as with a big caliber gun. The good deal about starting out kids on airguns is that they don’t kick and don’t make a loud report. So they’re less intimidating.

You’ll need something to shoot. Sig Sauer makes a lot of cool airgun targets, but if you’re a kid on a paper route budget, don’t forget the all-time favorite: tin cans! Or bottles filled with water.

Hunting options abound. Groundhog hunting is about to hit full speed ahead, and opportunities to shoot pigeons in agricultural settings abound. All farmers and ranchers need them thinned out. They poop in their barns, on their equipment and in their livestock feed bunks and spread diseases.

I saw a video of an airgun guide in Africa and they hunted rats at night while spotlighting. That’d be a blast in a barn, wouldn’t it?

Also, now that a lot of people are buying ranchettes out in the country, there are always varmints to thin out. Starlings, pigeons, rats, etc. It is probably not prudent to blast around your neighbors with your ole 30-06, so why not use an airgun?

Well, once again those pesky editors are limiting my word count so I had better shut down, but you can see why airguns are so popular. Plus, some companies are making some cool ones that your kids would love. Sig Sauer makes some cool modern sporting rifles on the AR platform. Ruger made one that mimics their ever popular 10/22, and Springfield made one that mimics the old .30 M1 Carbine.

Tom Claycomb lives in Idaho and has outdoors columns in newspapers in Alaska, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Colorado and Louisiana. He also writes for various outdoors magazines and teaches outdoors seminars at stores like Cabela’s, Sportsman’s Warehouse and Bass Pro Shop.

Last week, we did an introductory article on airguns. This week, let’s go a little deeper and assume that you’re interested and want to get into airguns and see what it is all about. If you listen to me, I’ll talk you into buying one of everything! But everyone has some kind of budget that they have to live within so, here’s what I’d recommend to get started.

Buy a decent break barrel to get started. They’re relatively inexpensive, at least as compared to a decent PCP (precharged pneumatic) and way less expensive to operate than a CO2 or a PCP. One word of caution, though: Don’t buy a cheap piece of junk spring-action from China, or you’re just going to get frustrated with its inaccuracy and give up on airguns. I know that about happened to me. You can spend as much as you want, but you should be able to get a decent one for around $225.

Actually, I have two words of caution: Of the airguns that I’ve tested, many of them come with a cheap piece of junk for a scope. I understand their reasoning. Companies are trying to keep the price point down so people buy their airguns, but if it is a super cheap scope on your gun, you’re going to get frustrated and not have fun. It is a dilemma. You don’t want to spend $1,000 on an airgun scope but at least buy a functional one. My Sig Sauer and Crosman/Benjamin have all come with good scopes. If yours doesn’t come with a good one, then check out the Riton Optics Primal X1 3-9×40 or, better yet, their Primal X1 4-16×44. But whatever scope you buy, make sure that it is airgun compatible because a lot of scopes aren’t.

Next topic: Pellets. We all know that it is important to buy not only good ammo but also exact ammo to get good groups and have the ultimate performance out of big game rifles. It is just as important to do the same when selecting pellets.

Some airgun companies are trying to make them cheap pellets so they’re affordable, but many are lightweight and flimsy and impossible to get a good group with. I don’t usually rag on companies because everyone is trying to make a living, but one popular airgun company makes horrible pellets. You might as well throw rocks at your target. The best is made by JSB, but Sig Sauer and Crosman also make good pellets. And then I am about to start testing pellets for two companies out South America: Rifle Ammo and Air Boss. To adequately cover pellets will be a whole article in and of itself, so for now let’s move on.

So what are the opportunities to use airguns? Limitless. I see a lot of options. Let’s list out a few.

Airguns are a great avenue to get your kids into hunting if they’re non-hunters. If they don’t want to hunt, just shoot, then airguns are a great place to start. They’re real guns so kids need to be taught gun safety rules because they can hurt or kill you, but hopefully if they make a mistake it won’t be as dangerous as with a big caliber gun. The good deal about starting out kids on airguns is that they don’t kick and don’t make a loud report. So they’re less intimidating.

You’ll need something to shoot. Sig Sauer makes a lot of cool airgun targets, but if you’re a kid on a paper route budget, don’t forget the all-time favorite: tin cans! Or bottles filled with water.

Hunting options abound. Groundhog hunting is about to hit full speed ahead, and opportunities to shoot pigeons in agricultural settings abound. All farmers and ranchers need them thinned out. They poop in their barns, on their equipment and in their livestock feed bunks and spread diseases.

I saw a video of an airgun guide in Africa and they hunted rats at night while spotlighting. That’d be a blast in a barn, wouldn’t it?

Also, now that a lot of people are buying ranchettes out in the country, there are always varmints to thin out. Starlings, pigeons, rats, etc. It is probably not prudent to blast around your neighbors with your ole 30-06, so why not use an airgun?

Well, once again those pesky editors are limiting my word count so I had better shut down, but you can see why airguns are so popular. Plus, some companies are making some cool ones that your kids would love. Sig Sauer makes some cool modern sporting rifles on the AR platform. Ruger made one that mimics their ever popular 10/22, and Springfield made one that mimics the old .30 M1 Carbine.

Tom Claycomb lives in Idaho and has outdoors columns in newspapers in Alaska, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Colorado and Louisiana. He also writes for various outdoors magazines and teaches outdoors seminars at stores like Cabela’s, Sportsman’s Warehouse and Bass Pro Shop.

You may have noticed a lot of articles written about airguns by grown men recently. And if you’re like me, your first thought was that you had outgrown airguns when you were 9 or 10 years old and had graduated to the real gun club.

That’s the boat that I was in. When my brother-in-law proudly whipped out a break-action pellet gun, I thought that he’d lost it. Why would a grown man digress back to his early grade school days?

Then I got into them. Let me cover that process. I was at a Professional Outdoor Media Association Convention in Columbia, South Carolina, years ago and met Susan, the marketing guru for Winchester airguns. I’d been hearing a lot about airguns and thought that it’d be a good topic to cover. I publish about 325 articles a year, so I’m always scrambling for new topics.

But I had a rocky start with airguns. With my first one, I could only get a 1 ½-inch group at 15 yards. Since we hunt small game with airguns that have a small kill zone, it’s imperative that they be accurate. So it’s a miracle that I even stuck with them. But for some reason I did.

Then in 2014, I got invited to the first GAMO Squirrel Master Classic. I didn’t have much better results there or in their 2015 event. Then I started testing other airguns. Walthers, Ruger, Springfield, Umarex, Benjamin, Crosman and a plethora of other manufacturers.

Because of their inaccuracies I about gave up on airguns numerous times. Then I went on Prostaff with Crosman. I got introduced to some decent break actions and some super accurate PCPs. By now I was all in.

Since then I’ve tested most of the new Sig Sauer airguns. More to come on Sigs later. For this first airgun article I want to cover the basics. So let’s start at the beginning. There are various models available but here are the top three designs.

CO2 AIRGUNS

Sig Sauer makes the coolest CO2 airguns. I think they were smart in that they made airguns that mimic their real guns. They have the same features and are the same weight as their real guns so they’re great training tools. I think this was ingenious.

The Sig airguns are also super cool looking. They have pistols and ARs that your kids would love. I had two “Hunting Small Game with Airguns” seminars in Reno the other day and the young people loved the AR replicas that Sig makes.

If you’re wanting to get your kids into hunting, airguns are a great avenue. I say that they’re great because there is no recoil and they aren’t loud. They are especially great for introducing little girls into hunting. The downside of CO2s is that they aren’t very powerful so they are not really good for hunting small game.

But Sig makes some super cool targets — spinners, box flippers, etc. — which further enhance a kid’s enjoyment in shooting airguns. Or it is fun to shoot the old tried and true tin cans. And CO2s are semi-automatic, so that’s fun. The CO2 pistols are great if you want to run off pest and not kill them.

BREAK ACTIONS

These are the most popular models. Some of the manufacturers boast speeds of up to 1,450 feet per second. Remember, your trusty ole .22 only spits out bullets at 1,250 feet per second, so they’re powerful enough to hunt small game with.

Break actions get their power by compressing a spring or a gas chamber, usually nitrogen. While these may spit out pellets fast, some of the cheaper ones aren’t very accurate. And to me, accuracy trumps all. We’re hunting small game with pellet guns with small kill zones so it is super important to be accurate.

Break actions have a unique recoil system. They kick forward and backwards. Because of their unique recoil, they will destroy a normal rifle scope so you only want to use scopes that are airgun compatible.

Because of their unique recoil, you need to use the artillery hold. Here’s how that works. Hold your right hand tight but with your left hand, cup the forestock loosely and let it slide back/forwards. It’s important to hold the forestock in the exact same spot or it will change the point of impact. Trust me, shoot it in this manner and your groups will tighten.

PRECHARGE PNEUMATICS (PCP)

These are my most favorite because they are the most accurate. These operate by using a charge of air. The rifle will have a tank that will hold 3,000 PSI — that’s right, 3,000 PSI, not 30 PSI like your car tires. The bad deal is, you’ll need an air tank to re-charge your rifle.

So where can you fill your air tanks? You’ll have to go to a skin-diving shop. Or Air Venturi came out with two compressors. One is a plug-in model or recently they came out with a portable model that hooks onto your truck battery so you can fill your tank while out in the field.

Ugh, I can’t believe it but we’re out of room and have hardly gotten started. Standby; there’ll be more upcoming articles on airguns.

Tom Claycomb lives in Idaho and has outdoors columns in newspapers in Alaska, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Colorado and Louisiana. He also writes for various outdoors magazines and teaches outdoors seminars at stores like Cabela’s, Sportsman’s Warehouse and Bass Pro Shop.