Cuddeback shares hunting wisdom with junior high

    A group of junior high students is getting a lesson on the ins and outs of hunting safety and ethics. Longtime hunter Jim Cuddeback of Washington has taught a hunter safety course for 32 years. Cuddeback took a number of guns with him to show the class on Monday, the first day of the week-long class. The guns he took are bright orange and not ?real guns? in the sense that they do not fire projectiles (because they have no firing pin) but apart from that they are just like real firearms.

    The Department of Natural Resources recently ordered these educational guns and lent them to Cuddeback to use in his safety class. The carrying case comes with five guns. Each gun is a different model with a different action, referring to the way in which a cartridge enters the barrel. The five actions the students learn are bolt action, lever action, pump action, break action and semi-automatic action.

    Young hunters often mistakenly refer to a semiautomatic as an ?automatic,? although Cuddeback said that is incorrect. A fully automatic firearm continues to fire while the trigger is held down, whereas the trigger must be released after every shot in a semiautomatic weapon. 

    For added safety, Cuddeback does not take live ammunition to the class. The students learn how to load the educational guns with dummy ammunition. The kids must demonstrate an understanding of how to load and unload a gun, how to pick out the correct shell for each gun, and how to work the action to bring the shell into the firing position.

    Prior to this year, Cuddeback taught the safety class with his own guns or guns the DNR confiscated. The confiscated guns often didn?t work and were not ideal instructive tools. He said the new guns are much better, and he especially likes that the case they come in has wheels on it.

    The money for the educational guns comes from a tax enacted in the 1930s as part of the Pittman-Robertson Act. The act established a 10 percent excise tax on sporting arms and ammunition to go toward training hunters, which continues to this day.

    On the first day of the hunting class, the students focus on safety. Cuddeback reminds them to always keep the muzzle pointed in a safe direction. He tells the students that under no circumstance should they point their gun at another person, whether it?s loaded or not.

    Cuddeback read newspaper articles about young people getting shot while hunting. In one article he read, two boys got shot in the leg with a .22 pistol.

    ?We talked about why pistols are so much more dangerous, because they?re short and you can?t control the barrel as well,? said Cuddeback.     ?If you?re carrying a pistol in a holster, where is the barrel pointed all the time? At your leg, and that?s where both of these boys were shot. They probably got in a hurry and started cocking it before they got it out of the holster, and then their pistols went off.?

    Cuddeback stresses that all firearms are dangerous, not just shotguns and high-powered rifles. He showed the class a photo of a little girl with a glass eye. Her eye was shot out by a BB gun.

    The students got to see Cuddeback?s six-shot revolver that his grandfather gave him. He said the gun could easily be 60 years old, and yet it looks brand new. Cuddeback said the gun looks so nice because he keeps it spotless.

     ?We talk about cleaning guns when you?re done using them,? he said. ?I?ll ask them how long a gun will last if you clean it. This pistol looks like new because it was taken care of. Tonight when I get home, I?ll wipe all the fingerprints off of it so it won?t rust. It?s the salt from your perspiration that ruins a gun.?

    After every hunt, Cuddeback cleans his guns inside and out. He advises the young hunters to do the same.

    Cuddeback gives each student a hunting textbook that contains instructions and diagrams on all manner of subjects such as how to align the sight on a rifle. The book includes an illustration of how to carry a gun, too. The students learn to use a shoulder carry when no one is walking behind them, a trail carry (with the gun pointed at the ground) when no one is in front of them, and a sling carry to use on long walks.

    The kids learn about the safest way to climb a fence. Cuddeback urges them to unload their guns whenever they climb a fence, cross a ditch, or get around any obstacle. He said if there is a group of hunters, one hunter hands his gun to his friend and then crosses. That is an acceptable maneuver, although Cuddeback added that unloading the gun is still the safest method.

For more, see our March 10 print edition.