A rifle is a long-barreled firearm designed for accurate shooting, with a barrel that has a helical pattern of grooves (rifling) cut into the bore wall. In keeping with their focus on accuracy, rifles are typically designed to be held with both hands and braced firmly against the shooter's shoulder via a buttstock for stability during shooting. Rifles are used extensively in warfare, law enforcement, hunting, shooting sports, and crime.
A shotgun is a long-barreled firearm designed to shoot a straight-walled cartridge known as a shotshell, which usually discharges numerous small pellet-like spherical sub-projectiles called shot, or sometimes a single solid projectile called a slug. Shotguns are most commonly smoothbore firearms, meaning that their gun barrels have no rifling on the inner wall, but rifled barrels for shooting slugs are also available.
In firearm designs, the term single-shot refers to guns that can hold only a single round of ammunition inside and thus must be reloaded manually after every shot. Compared to multi-shot repeating firearms ("repeaters"), single-shot designs have no moving parts other than the trigger, hammer/firing pin or frizzen, and therefore do not need a sizable receiver behind the barrel to accommodate a moving action, making them far less complex and more robust than revolvers or magazine/belt-fed firearms, but also with much slower rates of fire.
Shooting sports is a group of competitive and recreational sporting activities involving proficiency tests of accuracy, precision and speed in shooting — the art of using ranged weapons, mainly small arms and bows/crossbows.
A muzzleloader is any firearm into which the projectile and the propellant charge is loaded from the muzzle of the gun. This is distinct from the modern designs of breech-loading firearms. The term "muzzleloader" applies to both rifled and smoothbore type muzzleloaders, and may also refer to the marksman who specializes in the shooting of such firearms. The firing methods, paraphernalia and mechanism further divide both categories as do caliber.
In the United Kingdom, access by the general public to firearms is subject to some of the strictest control measures in the world. However, fulfilment of the criteria and requirements as laid out by the laws results in the vast majority of firearm licence applications being approved. Laws differ slightly in Northern Ireland due to Northern Ireland having its own firearms legislation. Concerns have been raised over the availability of illegal firearms.
An elephant gun is a large caliber gun, rifled or smoothbore, originally developed for use by big-game hunters for elephant and other large game. Elephant guns were black powder muzzle-loaders at first, then black powder express rifles, then later used smokeless powder cartridges.
Sporting clays is a form of clay pigeon shooting, often described as "golf with a shotgun" because a typical course includes from 10 to 15 different shooting stations laid out over natural terrain.
Rabbiting is the sport of hunting rabbits. It often involves using ferrets or dogs to track or chase the prey. There are various methods used in capturing the rabbit, including trapping and shooting. Depending on where the hunting occurs, there may be licenses required and other rules in regards to methods being used.
The term express was first applied to hunting rifles and ammunition beginning in the mid-19th century, to indicate a rifle or ammunition capable of higher than typical velocities. The early express cartridges used a heavy charge of black powder to propel a lightweight, often hollow point bullet, at high velocities to maximize point blank range. Later the express cartridges were loaded with nitrocellulose-based gunpowder, leading to the Nitro Express cartridges, the first of which was the .450 Nitro Express.
Clay pigeon shooting, also known as clay target shooting, is a shooting sport involving shooting a firearm at special flying targets known as clay pigeons, or clay targets.
The double rifle, also known as a double-barreled rifle, is a rifle with two barrels mounted parallel to each other. Synonymous with big game hunting found primarily in Africa and Asia, the double rifle is a sporting weapon with very little military heritage.
Waterfowl hunting is the practice of hunting ducks, geese, or other waterfowl for food and sport.
In the United Kingdom, the term hunting with no qualification generally refers to hunting with hounds, e.g. normally fox hunting, stag (deer) hunting, beagling, or minkhunting, whereas shooting is the shooting of game birds. What is called deer hunting elsewhere is deer stalking. According to the British Association for Shooting and Conservation (BASC) over a million people a year participate in shooting, including stalking, shooting, hunting, clay shooting and target shooting. Firearm ownership is regulated in the UK by licensing. Provisions exist for those without a Firearm or Shotgun certificate to shoot under the supervision of a certificate holder.
Popinjay or Papingo, also called pole archery, is a shooting sport that can be performed with either rifles or archery equipment. The object of popinjay is to knock artificial birds off their perches. The rifle form is a popular diversion in Denmark; a Scottish variant is also known. The archery form, called staande wip in Dutch language and papegai in French, is popular in Belgium, and in Canada among descendants of 20th-century Belgian emigrants; it is shot occasionally in the United Kingdom under the governance of the Grand National Archery Society. In Germany a traditional shooting at wooden birds placed on a high pole is called "Vogelschießen". These are carried out either with small bore rifles or crossbows.
50 meter rifle prone is an International Shooting Sport Federation event consisting of 60 shots from the prone position with a .22 Long Rifle (5.6 mm) caliber rifle. The time limit is 75 minutes for the entire match, including sighting shots, or 90 minutes if there is a need to compensate for slow scoring systems. In the 2013 ISSF rules the 60-shot prone match consists of 15-minute preparation and sighting time, followed by the match – 60 shots in 50 minutes for electronic scoring, and 60 shots in 60 minutes for paper targets.
50 meter rifle three positions is an International Shooting Sport Federation event, a miniature version of 300 meter rifle three positions. It consists of the kneeling, prone, and standing positions, fired in that order, traditionally with 3×40 shots for men and 3×20 shots for women. In January 2018, the number of shots was equalised between genders with the Women's 3x20 being abolished in favour of a 3x40 match identical to the men's event. The caliber is .22 Long Rifle (5.6 mm).
The rook is a member of the family Corvidae in the passerine order of birds. It is found in the Palearctic, its range extending from Scandinavia and western Europe to eastern Siberia. It is a large, gregarious, black-feathered bird, distinguished from similar species by the whitish featherless area on the face. Rooks nest collectively in the tops of tall trees, often close to farms or villages, the groups of nests being known as rookeries.
Game preservation is maintaining a stock of game to be hunted legally. It includes:
The rook rifle, originally called the rook and rabbit rifle, is an obsolete English single-shot small calibre rifle intended for shooting small game, particularly rook shooting.
