mikek207
Well-Known Member
Hi,
My name is Michael and I moved to the Inverness area a few years ago from Northern Ireland. About 20 years ago I found myself living in Ireland working on a small estate where a neighbour and a colleague introduced me to shooting shotguns and rifles for vermin control which started my love for shooting. I quickly progressed to owning my first rifle a Bruno cz .22 hornet and a beretta extrema semiauto 12g shotgun and after starting to get to grips with those around the estate for a while I realised I should look for a range to hone my skills. The only place I could find at the time was the Midland rifle club which as nearly 2 hours drive from where I lived but everyone was really friendly and the club had a great open format on a Sunday so my regular Sunday became driving down, shooting clays for an hour or two then onto the range for a few more hours before driving home. After a while in the club I progressed to a 6.5 x 55 to make the most out of the clubs range but after a few years I had to move back to NI for family reasons so I sold my guns with the intentions of finding somewhere to shoot in Northern Ireland but I got sidetracked because of my other passion motocross which took up all of my free time. Fast forward 20 years and after my mother passed away and covid hit, my girlfriend and I had been looking for a new home, we looked all over NI and even put in some offers which all fell through and nothing seemed to be working out but then we came across an advert for a small farm just outside Inverness. By this stage the restrictions were beginning to lift and we were allowed to travel for the purposes of buying/moving house so we felt safe enough to take our camper (to limit exposure by sleeping in the camper) and come and view the farm. As soon as we saw the place we fell in love with it and Scotland and everything about the sale just worked out making us think it was meant to be. Once we got here and got our heads around keeping sheep the natural progression made me remember the fun and function of shooting so I applied for my license’s and got them a short time later. I was fortunate to find a great rifle club with some really nice and helpful people and a neighbour who stalks suggested I did my DSC1 course where I met another friend that introduced me to some open hill stalking and I’ve been fortunate enough to get out on some of the local estates. The gentleman I bought the farm from is in his later years but we make a point of getting out to an estate together once a year for a days stalking. I have been fortunate to meet some great people through shooting and most of my best friends that I have met in Scotland have been through the rifle club. One in particular has been amazing and is always willing to share his vast knowledge and experience with me, he has been showing me the ropes with reloading ammunition and is very good at explaining the subject and safety aspects. Reloading is how I actually found out about this platform, I was collecting some reloading components and got chatting to the seller just telling him how I’d come to live in Scotland and we got chatting about stalking and how much I was enjoying learning about shooting and stalking and he told me about this site saying he uses it all the time for advertising his business and that he suggested that I should join as he thought I’d find it very useful so here I am giving you a bit of my story so far.
I just realised that I’ve written this with the thoughts that only a moderator would be reading it but not knowing how this forum works and after reading further down and it saying post thread I’m thinking that may not be the case so if this is posted on the public thread and if you’ve read this and are thinking “This guy really overshares” then I can assure you I don’t usually bombard people with this much information about myself and if you’ve gotten this far that it hasn’t bored you too much.
My name is Michael and I moved to the Inverness area a few years ago from Northern Ireland. About 20 years ago I found myself living in Ireland working on a small estate where a neighbour and a colleague introduced me to shooting shotguns and rifles for vermin control which started my love for shooting. I quickly progressed to owning my first rifle a Bruno cz .22 hornet and a beretta extrema semiauto 12g shotgun and after starting to get to grips with those around the estate for a while I realised I should look for a range to hone my skills. The only place I could find at the time was the Midland rifle club which as nearly 2 hours drive from where I lived but everyone was really friendly and the club had a great open format on a Sunday so my regular Sunday became driving down, shooting clays for an hour or two then onto the range for a few more hours before driving home. After a while in the club I progressed to a 6.5 x 55 to make the most out of the clubs range but after a few years I had to move back to NI for family reasons so I sold my guns with the intentions of finding somewhere to shoot in Northern Ireland but I got sidetracked because of my other passion motocross which took up all of my free time. Fast forward 20 years and after my mother passed away and covid hit, my girlfriend and I had been looking for a new home, we looked all over NI and even put in some offers which all fell through and nothing seemed to be working out but then we came across an advert for a small farm just outside Inverness. By this stage the restrictions were beginning to lift and we were allowed to travel for the purposes of buying/moving house so we felt safe enough to take our camper (to limit exposure by sleeping in the camper) and come and view the farm. As soon as we saw the place we fell in love with it and Scotland and everything about the sale just worked out making us think it was meant to be. Once we got here and got our heads around keeping sheep the natural progression made me remember the fun and function of shooting so I applied for my license’s and got them a short time later. I was fortunate to find a great rifle club with some really nice and helpful people and a neighbour who stalks suggested I did my DSC1 course where I met another friend that introduced me to some open hill stalking and I’ve been fortunate enough to get out on some of the local estates. The gentleman I bought the farm from is in his later years but we make a point of getting out to an estate together once a year for a days stalking. I have been fortunate to meet some great people through shooting and most of my best friends that I have met in Scotland have been through the rifle club. One in particular has been amazing and is always willing to share his vast knowledge and experience with me, he has been showing me the ropes with reloading ammunition and is very good at explaining the subject and safety aspects. Reloading is how I actually found out about this platform, I was collecting some reloading components and got chatting to the seller just telling him how I’d come to live in Scotland and we got chatting about stalking and how much I was enjoying learning about shooting and stalking and he told me about this site saying he uses it all the time for advertising his business and that he suggested that I should join as he thought I’d find it very useful so here I am giving you a bit of my story so far.
I just realised that I’ve written this with the thoughts that only a moderator would be reading it but not knowing how this forum works and after reading further down and it saying post thread I’m thinking that may not be the case so if this is posted on the public thread and if you’ve read this and are thinking “This guy really overshares” then I can assure you I don’t usually bombard people with this much information about myself and if you’ve gotten this far that it hasn’t bored you too much.
)
