coon hunting rifles (marlin papoose)

[maesy]

hahaha well we don't have bears, or moutain lions. I'm tidewater area...everynow and then a bear will follow the river down but not often enough to worry about them.

and about my 10 milers...my dog is insane for the most part. I don't always know what she is doing out there but she's never jumped a deer, treed a possum, and I have no proof she has ever run a fox.

Sometimes she's treed real close, and sometimes she'll pick a bottom far out and tree there. 10 miles a night doesn't neccessarily mean the coons run 10 miles or her but rather I have to walk around about 10 miles at least to get to her and back to the truck. most places I have hunted don't have much access for a vehicle so I do lots of walking which is why I want a light gun.

 

[Schoen]

10/22 they have all kinds of sizes and styles . short to tall its a grate gun ,and im 6'4 "

 

[Goldengoose]

hahaha well we don't have bears, or moutain lions. I'm tidewater area...everynow and then a bear will follow the river down but not often enough to worry about them.

and about my 10 milers...my dog is insane for the most part. I don't always know what she is doing out there but she's never jumped a deer, treed a possum, and I have no proof she has ever run a fox.

Sometimes she's treed real close, and sometimes she'll pick a bottom far out and tree there. 10 miles a night doesn't neccessarily mean the coons run 10 miles or her but rather I have to walk around about 10 miles at least to get to her and back to the truck. most places I have hunted don't have much access for a vehicle so I do lots of walking which is why I want a light gun.

I am from southwest part of Virginia, Bristol, Marion, Troutdale, and most of that is still Government land 10's of thousands of acres that was bought up during the Vietnam War since the munitions plants where down there. And yes there are Black Bears and Cougars in that area and they always stayed close to streams for the trout, Laural & Pines is where we always found the Cats lurking ....we always put the insane dog with a sane dog to try to even that out!lol Doesn't always work, but most of the time it did. I guess the tidewater would be easier to navigate instead of running up and down the mountain sides!!!

 

[Biggfoot44]

A Papoose w/o scope will wiegh about 3.5lb. A Marlin M60 is also lighter and slimmer than a 10/22 . . Going w/o a scope will let you carry it with one hand wrapped around balance point.

 

[maesy]

ha! well I was at Virginia Tech living off campus near the New River on a side of a mountain..the Jefferson was my back yard and those mountains weren't too bad to hunt. I never saw a bear or mountain lion or yote but had been warned about them being present. The Radford Arsenal wasn't far up the river .

the locals I hunted with had seen plenty enough big cats and bear and packs of yotes for me not to hunt alone out there. I didn't take a gun with me on the move and there wasn't no way I was hiking out there with no cell signal or gun; I wasn't going to have my own "where the red fern grows" experience lol

 

[Old Gaffer]

Consider the Ruger 10/22 Compact Carbine. DW has one and it's perfect for her, and it's the favorite rifle on the firing line on our club's Youth Sundays. The Marlin 60 IS slimmer, and may be lighter depending on how it's dressed out, but the barrel and tubular magazine makes it front-end heavy, and there's no real good way to get around that without involving a gunsmith and more money than the gun cost.

Marlin makes a nice bolt action youth rifle. the XT-22Y http://www.marlinfirearms.com/Firearms/xt/XTY.asp that's also well worth considering.

Happy Hunting!
Rob