Discharging Firearms - Your Advice

My advice is to buy more land so you can insulate yourself from your neighbor's constitutional rights. I think 3-5 acres is plenty of room/land on which to shoot. How long have you lived there vs the neighbors? Did you check out the neighbor's activities before buying your place? Just wait a few years and discharging a firearm there will probably be against the law-but then your livestock odors and noise will be too. Getting the law/govn involved to solve every issue or probably most any issue is counterproductive.

My only concern in a situation like you describe is safety-as long as they have proper backstops and keep their bullets on their place let them enjoy their most basic freedom. TnTnTn

Every time I go to my brothers house I take my guns and we spend a couple hours shooting a whole lot of rounds. Every time his neighbors will call the police who come out "because they are required to when it is called in" and tell us we are fine and totally within the law to shoot. Some people just should move back to the city. If a neighbor came over and asked us to "limit" our shooting or only do it on certain days, Im sure after we stopped laughing we would nicely say no thanks. We both live in the country to enjoy our rights. Like a poster above said, do we get to limit how often and when you mow your yard or play music outside or use a chainsaw or rev your engine or ride your atv or any other thing that makes noise? There are plenty of subdivisions with homeowners assoc. which govern things like that and if that is the life you want, why not move to one of them? One of my biggest peeves is when someone lives or moves to the country and then complains about country things. Im not trying to be harsh or make this completely directed at you. No offense in my comments is meant at all.

Why would you want to getting into it like this with your neighbor? These p*ssing contests never go well. How about trying to work it out like adults and good neighbors.

Michelle, if you're going to tell people about the regs in NY, please try to get the info right. I'm constantly correcting people (including hunters) about this.

From - http://www.dec.ny.gov/outdoor/28182.html

If it is just noise and they are shooting in a safe manner on their own property I'd ignore it as long as it isn't going on all night.

On the other hand, I'll recount an incident that happened to me/DW this Saturday. It was raining fairly heavy for most of the day. I was in the barn cleaning up woodenware and preparing for some packages of bees that arrived yesterday.

Later in the afternoon it cleared up some, a few drops here and there. DW decided to take our dog for a walk in our woods and see if she could find some morel mushrooms.

After a bit I heard some shotguns going off and they sounded like they were on our property. As I was walking through the hay pasture I saw DW come out of the woods. We came over the hill and there were two !%!$# standing at neighbors back fence shooting randomly into our woods.

DW wife called to them and asked what they were shooting at. They just stared at us and walked away after a bit. I was going to go over and have words but DW said go to the sheriff and avoid a confrontation (we've had problems with this neighbor before).

Did the sheriff thing. Deputy spoke with them. They said they didn't realize they were firing into someone elses property (uh huh, can't see those bright yellow tyvek no trespassing signs).

I've given fair warning at this point that if someone fires at myself or DW when we are on our property I will take measures I deem necessary to protect ourselves.

This is one reason I am absolutely supportive of a castle law being passed in Ohio.

Mike

You don't need to explain to me about the differences between city living and country living. I've done both.

But on this board, there's no excuse for snarky "go back to the city comments".

The original OP never said "they were from the city" - probably a good thing or they would've been first in line at target practice!

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Some of us live in the country, and have lived in the country for decades, because we enjoy the peace and quiet. The comment below illustrates what is wrong with this country today -- a total lack of consideration for others. The idea that "it's my right to do whatever I want and I don't care about your rights". Not very neighborly.

On the other hand, I have neighbors that like to shoot and after speaking with them, we've arrived at a compromise where I, my family, and our livestock (mostly our big, brave, livestock guard dog who tries to get into the house whenever a gun goes off) are not disturbed too often, and they get their target practice in. Hope you can find just such a solution.

The problem is the Dad passed away a couple of weeks ago. I believe someone must have had a talk with him and his buds because for the last few days there hasn't been any shooting.

The noise part doesn't bother me, grew up with guns. When my brother got his first gun (single shot 22) it was taller than he was.

It is the safety factor that scares the you know what outa me.

My neighbors including the son-in-law next door (on a one acre lot) target practice frequently terrifying local pets/livestock and disturbing everyone in the neighborhood.

I personally feel it is mighty rude and inconsiderate to target-practice with firearms within 1/8th. of a mile (660') of a neighboring residence.

Don't say that to SIL, though, or be prepared for a speech about this being Amurka where its a man's right, in fact his obligation with his children present to teach them, to stay in practice. At age 5, the SIL's son, would walk up to me and poke his finger right behind my ear and say that's where you shoot something.

This is the same SIL who has done nothing with his property for 10 years but let the house degrade (both porches are falling off the house) and the yard grow-up in weeds.

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There is a scumbag bike club that took up residence in the area a few years back. There clubhouse is located along one of the main highways.
In the summer months, gunfire has been known to take place 24/7. Gunfire is most common after midnight on weekends, no doubt fueled by a belly full of beer.

The scumbag bikers know that they have the law on their side, and continue to exercise their constitutional rights.

The cops do nothing, even though it is illegal in Wisconsin to discharge a firearm while intoxicated.

Let this be a lesson to potential property buyers in the area. Be aware of what type of neighbors you're going to have.

I am not anti-guns. That doesn't mean I want to hear gunfire 24/7.

Agreed. Among other things I like to shoot, I like to drink, I like loud music and I like to ride motorcycles and ATVs. I don't like any of it 24/7. My neighbors don't have to listen to me shoot high volume more than once a month. I think they can deal with it.

On the other hand, there are times I prefer solitude. I am not foolish enough to expect that because I am in the country I will never be disturbed. I don't complain on the semi-rare occasion that my neighbor will tune one of his race cars on what could have been a peaceful evening. If this were to occur every night I might be a bit less neighborly.

Mike, I'd check with your local police dept. As far as I am aware (and I have asked for Franklin County) if you are being fired upon while on your property you are legally permitted to respond with reasonable and like force. As I was told by one deputy, a cannon or missle would be unreasonable but another firearm is reasonable.

What can I say, I have the right to shoot guns off on my property, As long as the bullets stay on my property. The neighbor has the right to run his 4 wheelers down the property line at 11:00 pm. Then their is the farm equipment, that runs 24/7, Harvesting time. It's a different lifestyle.

Let's look at the flip side of this issue. Suppose the neighbor was the newby to the area. What if he came over and said he found your amimals to be smelly and noisy, and your barking guardian dog annoying.

And since the smell and noise are an on-going nusiance, and the dog barks all night, not just 3 or 4 hours at a time, what if he asked you to get rid of your smelly, noisy, animals and barking dog?

Would you do the "neighborly considerate thing" and comply with his request, and dispose of your animals and dog, or would you be inconsiderate and exercise your right to do as you pleased and keep your livestock and dog?????

So where is the original poster? Lots of question were asked and no answer. Guess he didn't like our answers.

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Let me pose a question. If folks can't shoot their guns on their own property in the country, where are they going to do it? In the city?

My theory is that, if you want to control how a piece of property is used, buy it.

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Dispatches From The Conservative Underground

Jim,

Unfortunately in some cities there is more gunfire than there is in many rural areas.

I would like to think that it's being considerate of other people to wind things down later in the evening. My neighbors are about half a mile away on either side of me and if I"m doing anything noisy that's what I do. You can't compare the noise of shooting off guns to the noise of a farm. The guns are recreational and the farm is making a living. I"m not anti gun either but where's the need to fire them off 24 hours a day? These people must be pretty well off because last time I checked ammo wasn't cheap, specially some of the larger calibers. I'm all for protecting people's rights but I support being considerate of others too.

It's actually happened. My dogs had decided that all the neighboring pastures were their teritory to patrol and the niehbor brought it to my attention that they were causing his dogs to bark at 3 AM. Rather than pointing out that there are no leash laws where we live, I repaired holes in the fence and put up electric wire to keep the dogs in. Neighbors complained about the smelly animals, I castrated the excess bucks, moved them further away, and I make sure that the pens stay clean.

Also, shooting off guns for recreation because "it's my right" is a little different than someone raising animals for food or livelihood. And the barking of an LGD benefits anyone in the area that has livestock (although my daughter and I were camping out in our back pasture, and the barking of the dogs [not ours] from the neighboring places made it difficult for her to get to sleep).

I'm not talking about a total cease and desist, but people need to be considerate of their neighbors. Most of these things can be worked out. If I had been insistent on not containing my dogs, I'd hate to think what would happen if I needed my neighbor's help in a pinch. Likewise, if they insist on disturbing quiet times "because it's their right", then they can expect absolutely no help from me if they have a problem.

Something that baffles me:

On the trash thread, most everyone seemed in agreement that they don't want to have to look at their neighbor's trash, deal with it drifting onto their place, etc.
With guns, on the other hand, the OP is told to go back to the city... Yet it would seem the "drift" from guns would be a bit more concerning than that of trash...
(BTW, from my perspective most of ya'll would fit my definition of "suburban". )


I'm not really figuring out what the difference is, I guess. In both cases, the neighbors are being obnoxious...

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