The 12-foot, 200-pound punt gun could kill up to 100 ducks at a time — nearly annihilating America’s waterfowl population by the 1860s.
Though comically large , the pound gun was no laughing matter . The 10 - foot , 100 - pound arm was so deadly to North America ’s waterfowl that it was outlawed by 1918 , as just a single shooter from the one - gauge gun could kill 50 to 90 duck — or an entire flock .
Wikimedia CommonsA hunter sits with a Irish pound torpedo or duck’s egg shooter in a pound boat made specifically to accommodate the monolithic weapon .
Sometimes spanning up to 13 feet long , the massive weapon was unremarkably handle from a specially design punt boat .
Wikimedia CommonsA hunter sits with a punt gun or duck shooter in a punt boat made specifically to accommodate the massive weapon.
Professional duck hunter made a literal killing in the late 19th and early twentieth C off this weapon , with one American market Orion claiming to have take 1,000 ducks in a unmarried night .
The Punt Gun Satisfies The Duck Demand
Throughout the early 1800s in both the United States and the United Kingdom , duck hunt was a coarse practice . Demand for meat had rear as well as the requirement for feathering for women ’s chapeau , so in monastic order to make hunting easier , hunter begin look into ways to pop multiple duck at once , and with much more ease .
Enter : the punt gun .
customs - built andclocking in at overeight foot long and two inch in diameter , the shotgun packed a puncher . Firing over a pound sign of ammo at once , the gun could kill between 50 and 100 waterfowl with one injection , leave behind their soundbox float on the surface for the hunters to pile up .
RedditA colorized image of two young men carrying a punt gun or duck shooter, a weapon outlawed due to how severely it depleted North America’s population of waterfowl.
The artillery unremarkably featured a exclusive barrel instead of a dual , though dual barrel version did survive , they did n’t fire intimately as many sinewy snapshot as their single - barrel counterparts .
RedditA colorized image of two young men carry a punt hitman or duck shooter , a weapon outlaw due to how severely it depleted North America ’s universe of waterfowl .
But even though the gun was wildly in effect , it was too big for one hunter to use by himself . So , the hunters modernise punt boat that could obtain the weight and size of the artillery . These gravy boat were long and slender with enough room at heart for one hired gun and one human being . And when the guns give notice , the boat would actually be mess up back several feet .
Wikimedia CommonsThe powerful weapon proved too deadly to North American duck populations and was eventually outlawed for use by 1918.
Soon , hunters develop a method that lead in maximal search net income .
Working in groups of eight to 10 boats , the hunter would encircle around an intact flock of waterbird . Coordinating their shaft , they would fire at once . In under a minute , a fistful of hunting watch could take out an integral flock of birds , sometimes 500 at once .
Too Effective For Its Own Good
Wikimedia CommonsThe powerful weapon try too deadly to North American duck’s egg populations and was eventually outlawed for employment by 1918 .
alas , the punt gun was n’t destined to last . The weapons industriousness did n’t support the oversized , ill-chosen design , and it was never mass produced .
to boot , the guns proved to be too pestilent . As one American market hunter named Ray Toddclaimed , he and three other hunters once kill an integral batch of ducks “ over a half - international nautical mile long and nearly as wide . ”
He add that by break of day , “ We had drink down over 1,000 ducks … it was the best Nox ’s piece of work we had ever done . ”
It almost hold out without saying that before foresightful , waterfowl populations in the United States begin to fall dramatically .
Their number had drop off so much due to the effectualness of the hired gun , that the U.S. political science worked to pass legislation that would make both market search and the transport of game across country lines illegal . In fact , it was hunter for sport and not for market that pushed this legislation forward .
Between 1900 and 1918 , a serial of federal laws were enacted that effectively criminalise the punt triggerman , along with Irish pound boats . Though it is still legal to own a punt gun in the United States , it is not permitted to use one .
The Use Of Punt Guns Today
Today , punt guns are a novelty item , with less than 100 in employment around the humans . In the United States , they exist mostly as a gatherer ’s item or a composition of story for hit man collectors with a penchant for the unusual . In the United Kingdom , however , they get a piffling more use .
Less than 50 of the guns are still in use in the U.K. , and when they are , it ’s usually ceremonial . There are restrictions on pound gas usage across the country , most of which insist upon small barrel size and less ammo . In ceremonies , the gunslinger are used mostly to observe royal house .
Upon her 1897 Diamond Jubilee , for instance , Queen Victoria requested a Irish pound gunslinger salute . Since then , every coronation and jubilee in the United Kingdom has been honored with such a salute . Indeed , during the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II in 2012 , a 21 - Irish punt gun salutation was fired .
Though North America ’s water bird are dependable from punt gun , ducks across America are disappearing today due to far-flung home ground going and climate change .
After reading about the pound accelerator , control outthe killdozer , another outsize artillery of mass death . Then , read about some of thecraziest Nazi weaponsever created .
