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Guttys(catapult)...anyone still use one?


novice cushie shooter
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It’s almost like a lost art. When I was a kid everyone that wanted one used to cut a fork branch( Strod) and cut it down to a Y shaped catty. The bark was peeled off and the wood air dried. The tops were made into holes by burning through with a red-hot meat skewer and which the catty lastic was tied through. We used to buy catty lastic by the yard from the local bike shop. There were two sizes available >> 1/4 and 5/16ths and each size had it’s ardent followers. Somewhere I've got a couple of those Milbro jobbies and I hated them with that thumb mark in the frame. Some people of the golden earring brigade were really accurate with them and used to head shoot sitting rabbits and hares right between the ears. Some liked the strod to be very narrow and others liked em wide. Somewhere I have a catty that I made for one of the girls about 35 years ago so you can see that they lasted a long time, stones like pea beach were a bit of a favourite. My brother in law was so good with one that he used to put two Swan vesta red matches up out of the side of the sliding bit of the box and put another across between like a goal post and shoot the one out in the middle which caught fire with the friction.

when I was at school in the 60s we never went any where without our cattys , out toilets at school were outside with a small rookery that nigh on joined them, and as far as I know the teachers never twigged why I wanted to go to the loo every time I saw a Rook sitting on the branches , with having a beach on out doorstep with shingle, we were never short of ammo then the railways were being reduced and the trucks were cut up just down the road from mine leaving half inch rivets lying about all over the place and like one of the other posts said ,if one of them hit you in the right place they could easily kill you.

 

We were never as good as your brother in law with lighting a match but we could stack tins up like they do at the fair ground and knock one off at a time without disturbing the others and also chuck a tin above you and hit it on the way down .

 

The pouch was made from the tongue of a shoe and if I remember rightly the elastic was a 1/4 inch and 3/16" , but you might be right with 5/16", moving on from rivets I started to cut up lead into thin strips and then cut small squares out of the strips which ended up like lead shot . We had a allotment on the edge of the marsh that was a magnet for Starlings and during our younger days quite a few came to grief with the catty.

 

Where the lead came from , I cant remember or if I can I aint telling you :lol:

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I just looked on auction site and there is an old Milbo ally strod on there for sale with no lastic or pouch and it is up to £19 + £3 postage with 7 bids from 3 bidders and there is still a dy to go. somewhere I've got a couple of these that haven't seen the light for many years. I'll have to see if I can find them. I hated the blooming things anyway.

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