Something of a spin off from the topic of eating pigeons. Obviously Little Ralphie was at risk of losing an eye from his Red Ryder. But many a pop culture reference was a classic TV moment of Opie, the Beaver, who ever, killing a bird with their BB gun and feeling guilty.

The box of the trusty Red Ryder suggests a max velocity in the 350 fps range. Pellet guns for tree rats used to be, if memory serves, suggested as adequate for pests only at 700 fps or more, and that with a heavier lead projectile.

Thus a simple question, can a BB gun, particularly the humble Red Ryder, actually deliver clean and reliable kills on birds? And what about big game such as the ever devious busy tailed tree rat?

Note that man song bird species are protected by treaty, but "invasive" species like the house sparrow are exempted. Here in Wyoming you can shoot them to your heart's content...be it with a pellet gun or a .50 BMG

Many a grackle and squirrel has fallen to the mighty Crosman Pumpmaster. 4 or 5 pumps is all that's needed... or so I hear.

As a youngster I killed a few birds with my Daisy. Nothing bigger than a blue-jay though. Squirrels, nope, no way. I don't think you could kill one of them with a spring operated BB gun even if you hit them in the eye.

Birds have very light, fragile, hollow bones, light musculature (except for the breast muscles they use for flying), and thin, exposed skin between their individual feathers. This makes them enough of a soft target for the BB to penetrate.

Rodents are mammals and have much denser bones, heavier musculature, and thicker fur-covered skin - especially once they get above a certain size. A lever action spring powered BB gun just doesn't have enough penetration to kill a rodent bigger than a field mouse.

They'll sure send 'em scramblin though. Nothing like a BB to the butt to scare one into the next county!

Red Ryder- small birds, absolutely.
Larger birds like pigeons- my FIL had a Benjamin pump-up that took many flying rats off his house.

Red Ryder was from Pagosa Springs, CO.
At least his creator Fred Harman was.
Little Beaver was a Jillarilla Apache from nearby Dulce, NM.

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NRA LIFE MEMBER

Your post sounds strange to me. I think everyone I grew up with killed birds with a Daisey BB gun. I don't know about the RR, but the longer same type lever Daiseys and the Spittin Image 94 and 22 were no problem for small birds. Robin or Jay sized is about max and you might need to polish them off. Crows, fuggetaboutit. I've shot a Crow with a single pump Chinese pellet gun, square in the breast, made a good thump when it struck. He just staggered a little on the limb, lost a feather or two, and flew off.

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Wayne
Torn & Frayed

Pretty sure the statute has run its course, so... Yes, the Crosman Pumpmaster has sent many a grackle to its maker. Being there's no forensic evidence is merely a plus.

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50 Years of Wish You Were Here

When it falls on the ground check its heart beat. If it's not beating, then yes, it can kill a bird. If it's still beating, call a vet.

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Thirty characters. Exactly...

As a kid on the farm, I constantly stalked sparrows with my deadly Daisy Red Ryder lever action. The BB will kill them. The problem is accuracy and distance. I found ways to get close.

Happy Hunting.

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Bob.
SWCA 1821

Got many a bird and squirrel with my Crossman

Speaking from experience, a Red Ryder will take down small birds but it's ineffective on geese...

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"Shall not be infringed"

I know a BB will penetrate my little brother's lip and cause a bright discoloration on my backside.

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Music/Sports/Beer fan

Thanks to the TV and media of the era, I was not allowed a BB gun under the theory that it was dangerous, losing an eye and all that being the parental hysteria in that pre internet area. Though my mostly absent father gave me a bolt action Remington .22 when I about 12, I mostly had to wait until I was 18 whereupon I promptly purchased a Chinese AK clone of the type once cheaply and widely available. They cost less than a German magnum air rifle at the time. Thus I missed out on all the first hand hunting of snakes, mice and birds otherwise so common in rural Michigan.

The Red Ryder, now made in China, is a recent purchase for my own children who shoot it at paper. It replaced a multi pump Crossman that discouragingly did not want to feed BBs well at all. Curiously, there was a picture of a crow with crosshairs over it on the Crossman box with pest control a listed application.

I actually would have thought a Red Ryder being able to kill anything were a myth initially, were it not for accounts here and elsewhere of it being the terror of sparrows on many a farm.

Another farm boy here to testify that BBs are sufficient to bring flying pests down. As has been stated, there are size limitations. My experience was largely confined to sparrows and starlings.

Andy

I killed multiple birds up to pigeon size, many chipmunks and small snakes with my Daisy pump gun.
Jim

My wife claims to still have a BB lodged in her leg thanks to the nefarious mischief of her cousin Turkey.

Sparrows, Blue Jays, Robins, and other similar sized birds were susceptible to 'death by BB' when I was a boy. If it moved, I'd shoot at it. I inadvertently killed one of my neighbor's chickens when I meant to shoot it in the butt to hear it squawk and shot it in the eye instead. I shot at squirrels a lot and got them nervous enough to move to other neighbor's yards and leave our pecan tree alone. So, YES, BBs can kill, or put your eye out. Look Out, Ralphie!

This little guy had chewed his way into my downdraft stove outlet and made it into the kitchen. He was eating blueberry bagels on the kitchen floor and scared the **** out of my wife in the morning. Tried to trap him to no avail and the next day he tried to make it back in to the newly repaired outlet and refused to be scared off, just sat chittering on the deck rail. So he was taken at about 25 feet with a Crosman on 4 pumps, right through the heart...

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While guiding, we had a competitive air rifle marksman come out. During the afternoon lull, we would shoot ground squirrels. He had consistent kills at 75 yards, using his Walther match rifle.

Also, two guys on the next ranch over consistently shot cottontails with Blue Cross rifles at 40-50 yards (head shots only).

Lewis and Clark took air rifles with them. I think they took some deer with them.

Red Ryder? Probably not as consistent but at close range?????

Back in my childhood days, many sparrows fell to my Red Ryder Daisy. I don't think I ever shot any birds larger than that. For sure, a BB gun will not kill a rat. I have tried many times to do that. A rat just keeps going.

Thread Drift:

Funny never had a BB gun....Dad started me with an old Steven's Favorite and at 10 got a Remington 511X Scoremaster......for Christmas.

Never shot birds either........ "chippies" by the thousands........but never birds.......

seems strange now................never owned a BB or pellet gun.....

Now; back to our regular programing........

Ashamed to admit how many fine feathered friends departed this world due to my BB gun. In fact I still have one by the front door for certain unwanted fowls and to just shoot something that does not cost an arm and a leg. Mostly leaves and wasps are my targets these days.

Absolutely killed many a bird with my Daisy single lever action. It also was deadly on the old style street lights

For bigger game in the neighbor hood the Crossman pump up 10 times pellet gun took care of those,

Yes, we were rotten, bad kids, lets not go into what cherry bombs and M 80's (real ones) could do,

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Still Running Against the Wind

Yep, but often a coup de grace is needed. (Um... Or so I heard as a youngster....)

I remember BBs being used go calibrate ballistic gelatine. Does anyone know how far a Red Ryder shot BB will penetrate, and possibly a comparison to a Crossman with ten pumps behind it?

Red Ryder is going to be to be less than the Crossman.
And the high end European pieces (+P - high priced spread?) mentioned above will out penetrate the Crossmans- Benjamin's and most all US air guns.
Some of the high end European guns are pushing up into 22 short territory.
My Bro and I had a lever and a pump Daisey.
The pump had More power than the lever action.

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NRA LIFE MEMBER

I had a Daisy pump (model 25?), the kind that held 50 BBs under spring pressure. I had killed a couple of sparrows with it before I was out in the yard with my grandfather. I started to shoot at a redbird when he asked me if I was having redbird for supper. The lesson was, unless it's a pest, you don't shoot it if you don't intend to eat it.

CW

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μολὼν λαβέ

Always good advice and worth repeating. I don't believe anyone would suggest shooting birds indiscriminately without reason and I would certainly hope nothing herein would suggest otherwise. In some areas non native species such as the house sparrow are considered legitimate pests (I think Wyoming lists at least a half dozen invasive bird species).

Took a number of small birds with a crossman as a kid.Pigeons were iffy,they would fly away and drop after 30-40 yards.

Yup. My grandfathers Red Ryder will take starlings. Used it to knock black rats off the bird feeder so my hunting dachshund could finish them off. Need the pellet rifle for tree rats though.

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Even older, even crankier....

I killed one sparrow at about 20 feet with a hit right behind the eye, with a plastic-stocked Red Ryder BB gun.

I felt bad about it, a needless death. I still hunted doves and ducks (with a shotgun), but not sparrows.

But I can understand why people shoot grackles, starlings, and crows as pest control.

Yep still got my Daisy 25 from 1962. Don't know if it had any more oomph than a Red Ryder but recall popping a few birds and soda cans. Would penetrate at least one side of the cheapo aluminum cans.

Many moons ago my son and another boy killed an Angora goat with a Benjamin 22 that has taken a lot of squirrels and rabbits. Luckily the goat belonged to the other boys Dad but they were still in hot water. They were about 9 or 10 at the time.

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Hue 68 noli me tangere

By the time I was ten I had a couple dozen guns, but was not
aloud to have a BB gun. A county politician lived across the street
from us. He had a ongoing war with the birds. They were making
a mess of his cars, he had a beautiful yard with all kinds of trees
and bushes. He wanted to give me a bounty on birds shot in his
yard. He talked to my dad and it was decided that he would buy
me a BB gun, but it would be kept in his garage and only for use
on his birds. He took me to the Hardware store, which had the
Daisy display in window. Told me to pick out any one I wanted.
I picked the Eagle Hunter. He bought me a whole carton of BBs,
the ones in little cellophane packs. Then he gave me the pay scale: penny for sparrows, Nickel for Starling size, Dime for
Pigeons. I did alright on anything that I could get within 15',
after that it was iffy. Didn't get rich but kept me in Popsicles
all summer. Dad would never let me have that BB gun. About
20 years ago the neighbor passed away, at the Funeral his wife
ask me to stop by she had something for me. So at the age of
45 I got my very own BB gun.

The model 25 definitely has more oomph than the Red Ryder. When I was a kid some of the macho Red Ryder shooters in the neighborhood liked to prove there manliness by holding their muzzles against the toe of their shoe and pull the trigger then lift the gun up and the BB would roll off onto the ground with no noticeable discomfort suffered by the shooter. I had the Model 25 pump and decided once to give it a try with that. Can you picture a boy hopping around clutching his foot whilst squealing like a girl? Yep definitely more oomph. The model 25 is advertised at 450 fps which is considerably greater velocity than a Red Ryder. No problem quickly killing any bird smaller than a crow I ever ran across.

Still have a Model 25 but no toe shooting these days.

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S&W Armorer
Lost in the 50s

I can't tell you how many hundreds of birds I killed with a couple of Daisy lever actions over the years. I started in 53 or so when a small pack of BB's was a nickel.

I remember when I was about 12 or so when I was staying at my grandparents. I brought along my Crosman BB/ pellet gun, don't remember the model number. I was allowed to explore the woods and they had 70 acres of woods and a mountain to root around on. I was after squirrels but I got up really high and was sitting down when a grouse landed on a branch that while the tree was below me, the branch was eye level. Well, I took aim at that grouse with that Crosman and whacked him with a BB, much to my surprise, the BB you could actually see bounce off that bird's butt and he took off for parts unknown and in a big hurry. I know a BB gun didn't work on that bird's hide.

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Vaya con Dios

= Rustyt19 53;138 686255]I know a BB will penetrate my little brother's lip and cause a bright discoloration on my backside.[/QUOTE]

You too eh?? Mine penetrated just under the skin like a zit just above my brothers belly button. The ol' Man's leather strop sure got a workout that evening.I learned a very valuable lesson that day. ...The hard way

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I reckon so

The shot of my life with my Daisy, was a barn swallow flying. When I told grandpa I lost the gun and got the a&& whipping of my life. Do not mess with his swallows.

I also had a Daisy 25, during WWII the only BBs available were lead, unfortunately the spring pressure on them in the magazine tended to distort the shapes.

Eventually I figured out that it would work fine loading 10 instead of 50.

There was a Pigeon that I hunted everyday for one summer, its nest was in the top of a barn and my shots were about 40 feet.
At 40 feet a Daisy 25 loaded with lead BBs, will not kill a Pigeon.

But Sparrows, yes.

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Ipsis Rebus Dictantitbus

My Daisy killed a bird or two when I was a kid.

I recently had a bird inside the store I manage. I asked the district manager what would be the best way to get rid of it. He said a BB gun.

So . . . I took my kid's Crossman Pumpmaster down before we opened one morning and dispatched him from about twenty feet while he perched on an aisle sign. One shot. I was really worried about the possibility of missing and taking out some lights, but I got him in one.

I've disposed of some birds and tree rats with my BB guns (of course as a kid though).

Don't laugh, but I have a cousin that lost his eye to a bb from his brothers Daisy. All accidental, the bb penetrated through an open window after it bounced off of a tree. I know, couldn't happen but, I was there inside the building when he hit the floor. This was about 1954 in Albemarle NC.

regards

yashua

As a kid we had a local farmer that would pay us to shoot red-winged black birds, I got a bonus once for bringing in a full nest of chicks. I had a Daisy, killed lots of leopard frogs with it, many black birds although I liked their song and felt a little guilty stalking them in the cattails. I graduated to a Benjamin pump .177 pellet gun and all it really did was increase my shooting range, the b.b. gun made a better hunter out of you, had to get deadly close with it.
Locally we are having a problem with the Asian Rock Dove, it is competing with the Mourning Dove and closely resembles it, although larger. They are fair game anytime, anywhere with whatever as long as your within the local shooting restrictions regarding proximitey to housing, etc. Pellet gun sales are up...

A Daisy can kill a bird. Not cleanly and quickly, though.

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"He was kinda funny lookin'"

A single pump Daisy Red Rider will also kill a large chicken stone dead if fired from below and it strikes directly under the chin. (Do chickens have chins?)
The backside discoloration appeared shortly thereafter, also.

Apparently, "You told me to keep those chickens from roosting in that tree by the front porch." was not an adequate defense.
Should've had CAJ representing me, he seems to be able to talk his way out of most anything.

I'm gonna go out on a limb here Gator and surmise that this will not be an issue with your boys! I will also go further ans surmise that your oldest has probably made his first kill under the watchful tutelage of his father standing slightly behind and to the right nodding sagely pipe in the corner of his mouth.

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Forum consigliere

I never had a Red Ryder but a Crossman pump, killed many birds and even a large carp (because the adults said I couldn't kill it) it was on the surface of the water. 1 shot to the head and belly up. My favorite was a CO2 powered pellet pistol I bought when I was 8 with lawn mowing money, that would kill most small critters easily

Chuckle, that is a topic in and of itself. It was actually my second oldest who got a bird first, before we left SC. He used a spear that he had wanted me to make him. He still brags about it. He also still prefers to have a spear.

For the most part I gave them clubs and throwing sticks. This, along with that spear, has them constantly trying to sneak up on rabbits, squirrels etc, and even run them down. I sometimes take my oldest down by the creek to "hunt".

They have yet to get a rabbit or squirrel, but succeed in getting ever closer and quieter in their approach.

I also made my son a slingshot. Oh, I have store bought ones, but cutting the branch, linking rubber bands, etc was more fun.

Yes, it can kill a bird. I think you are talking about the Andy Griffith episode where Opie killed a bird with a slingshot and raised its hatchlings in a bird cage on the front porch. After caring for them, he was reluctant to release them when it was time, until he saw them fly. My son takes after my in-laws so far, right now I suspect most of his hunting will be in the refrigerator.

Yup....Mom's little brother took a BB in the eye and lost his sight in that eye. When WW II came he enlisted with one eye. They took him but made him a shore guard in Massachusetts the whole war. He met a nice girl, got married and brought her back to IL.

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Bob.
SWCA 1821