Cross eye dominance.

[Arpee]

Hi all, 

I've recently started shooting been out rough shooting behind my pointer and done maybe 300ish clays. 

I went clay shooting with some friends as I wasn't hitting alot to get some reps in. 

Didn't go great so I booked a lesson and it appears I'm extremely left eye dominant. The instructor put a patch on my glasses and things improved whilst under his expert eyes.

I've been back a couple of times since with my friend's O/U as my SxS is in for repairs and had varying amounts of success. 

My end goal is to compete locally in some hpr comps in which you go out for 20mins with the dog and need to shoot 2 items of game with 4 cartridges which the dog has pointed. 

As I'm at a early stage in my shooting life would I be best to persevere right handed with my patch or go back to the beginning and get a left handed gun. 

[scarecrow243]

if your gun has a straight stock try using it left handed or try training your self to swap your vision from one eye to the other i done this years ago and i can shoot left or right handed with shotguns or rifles

ps i forgot to add this will stop you from using binos or 3d glasses

[Arpee]

Thanks! I know my gun has a fairly hefty cast but not sure about the 525 my mate has been lending me I'll ask him. 

How did you start retraining your eyes? 

[hod]

Just shut the left eye.  Changed my life!  Mine maybe not as dominant though. 

[Genghis]

I often close my left eye while shooting. Some will tell you that it’s the worst idea in the world, but it improves my shooting to a level that I’m happy with.

[hod]

 

I’ll never be as good a shot as Jonny Carter (shooting less than 10 years and don’t have the time or finances!), so if it’s good enough for him, I’m content with it. 
 

[enfieldspares]

Hello. So as we can be sure, so as to best help, please explain what's what. I assume that you are right handed and yet your left eye is your master eye?

That you are asking should you

1 Persevere shooting from the right shoulder with a "standard" gun (stocked for a right shoulder with right master eye).

2A Persevere as 1 but by "doing something" to or with your left eye.

2B Use the gun as if it were a rifle with the left eye shut.

3 Still shoot from the right shoulder but get a gun with a gunstoick known as a "crossover" stock.

4) Just learn to shoot left handed?

Here's my 2p.

1 You'll give lots of lead for birds crossing right to left, probably hit birds going away and be behind birds going left to right. So I'd scrap 1.

2A The GENGHIS solution is the best. NOT THE SILLY DAFT TAPE ON A SPECTACLE LENS SOLUTION! In truth we only need two eyes to estimate distance the item we are looking at is from us. The old party trick of closing one eye then trying to touch index finger to index finger at arms length and failing. Once we know that distance we don't need two eyes. Just shut the left eye. This to my mind is the quickest, easiest and cheapest fix.

2B For a cost of about £150 buy a Greener GP gun and use it as if it were a rifle. Why a Greener GP? It has a notch in the receiver that you use as the backsight. However we don't all have £150, or room in the gun cabinet, or need can make do with just one shot. So try this. Get a piece or tin, bend it into an "L" shape, file a half round notch, use black electricians tape and tape it to the rib of your O/U gun using the handy slots in the rib. That's now your new back sight to shoot with your right eye as if a rifle. So both eyes open but as you mount to take the shot close the left eye. If that works make a permanent equivalent by having a "mid bead" installed. FWIW some American trap O/U guns had or have a "mid bead" as standard. 

3 Too bloomin' expensive, looks ugly, and the recoil can be unpleasant. Last secondhand nobody wants one. Look at Holt's present Unsold Lots Sale there are a couple of side by side crossover stock boxlock ejectors for a fifth or what the work to make the crossover would have cost the first owner. But one other thing one man's crossover may not fit the next man or fit you. In my opinion 3 is the worst of all choices. It is only a sensible solution for a older aged right master eye with right handed shooter who has shot from his right shoulder all his life but has now lost the sight of his right eye through illness or wound.

4 The second least expensive as left handed guns are not too difficult to source. Can it be done? One of the best pistol shots I saw was a natural left hander but his job required him to shoot right handed as he was issued with a 9mm pistol. His party trick was to shoot a target with his pistol in his right hand whilst making notes on a paper pad on he shooting bench with his left hand.

Edited December 24, 2023 by enfieldspares

[hod]

enfieldspares clearly has a wealth more experience than myself.  
 

I should add though that my Browning O/U has a mid bead, which would appear to help. 

[enfieldspares]

3 hours ago, hod said:

Just shut the left eye.

This above. 100%.

My 2A I described as the GENGHIS method. But in fact is the GENGHIS and HOD method. And I agree the mid-bead is a real help as it makes you keep the gun line to path of the fired shot the exact same as you eye line to path of the fired shot.

Edited December 24, 2023 by enfieldspares

[hod]

31 minutes ago, enfieldspares said:

This above. 100%.

My 2A I described as the GENGHIS method. But in fact is the GENGHIS and HOD method. And I agree the mid-bead is a real help as it makes you keep the gun line to path of the fired shot the exact same as you eye line to path of the fired shot.

I take no credit for this! 
 

I’ve had a good few clays lessons (not enough) and after a box of cartridges pretty much wasted at one stand, my instructor said to shut the left eye.  Difference was nuts. Been wasting my time prior. 

[TIGHTCHOKE]

Ultimately rather than soldiering on and asking for help on a shooting forum, go find an instructor who knows what he is doing and seek his help. It may well be money spent in finding a working answer, but without someone actually looking at you shooting will be rather difficult to pin down.

How long have you been shooting?      NOT very long by the looks of it.

Do you have a consistent mount that an instructor can work with?       Probably not yet.

Do some research on local instructors, visit some shooting grounds and see what is available.

And finally, fill in your location on your profile so that someone nearby might be able to meet up and help you.

Happy Christmas.

[Charliedog]

Shoot off the left shoulder

[Weihrauch17]

3 hours ago, Charliedog said:

Shoot off the left shoulder

This absolutely.

[Old Boggy]

3 hours ago, Charliedog said:

Shoot off the left shoulder

Easier said than done if you`ve been shooting for many years.

I am the opposite to the OP Arpee as I`m left handed and have a right master eye. Had my cross eye dominance been from an early age, then perhaps changing shoulders may have been the answer, but it changed mid life, so for me I found it almost impossible.

I therefore adopt Enfieldspares 2A approach and shut my left eye immediately when taking the shot. This I find works best for me, although sometimes I feel shutting both eyes would have a better result

OB

[Scully]

A BASC coach told my nephew at the age of about 10, to pick up the target with both eyes and as you mount the gun, close the left eye until after the shot has been taken. 
He’s in his early 30’s now and is still doing it; he’s a good shot, both at clays and live quarry. 

[Arpee]

I've got a lesson booked at Grimsthorpe for the New Year and a friend of my father's who shot for England 15 years ago is going to come with me weekly to my local ground to help with letting me know where I'm missing as sometimes I just can't tell where I'm missing or where I need to be. 

All game I've shot over the dog has been going away. I actually think I'm better in the field as my priority is making sure the dog has sat to the flush. 

In terms of clay shooting I'm very much a beginner. Nothing has ever come particularly easy to me. I've played sports at a elite national level due to making sure my fundamentals and technique were near flawless to make up for my lack of natural ability compared to others around me. 

My friend has a old ambidextrous Midlands O/U non ejector he'd lend me to practise left handed. 

@enfieldspares thanks for all your detailed information. I think the GENGHIS method is definitely going to be the way forward if it feels too alien left handed.

Happy Holidays all! 

I'll update you on how I get on. 

[enfieldspares]

Good Luck! Try the bent tin (or "L" shaped plastic) and electrician's tape "rearsight" and see if that works but be careful not to cut yourself on the metal.

Edited December 25, 2023 by enfieldspares

[TIGHTCHOKE]

6 hours ago, Arpee said:

I've got a lesson booked at Grimsthorpe for the New Year

Hopefully Steve can sort you out.  

[McSpredder]

For a newcomer who has not yet developed any particular habits, is there any reason why it wouldn’t be equally easy to shoot off either shoulder?   

I would find it almost impossible, but that is after nearly 70 years shooting from the same shoulder.

Most left-handers seem able to cope easily with a RH top lever.    Is it just a matter of finding a gun with a stock of the appropriate cast?   Lots of people can shoot well without any cast.   Are there other known snags for a person wishing to shoot off the 'wrong' shoulder?

[Westley]

Just as a slight 'aside' to the thread, I attended at a Christmas shoot last Wednesday.  Although a mini competition, there were several newcomers to shooting there too. We were squadded in groups of 6, 3 of whom were relatively new to the sport. I had taught 2 of them to shoot, but had never met the third guy. After a couple of stands, I noticed he was shooting to the left of everything. As he had forgotten his shooting glasses, and I had nothing else to hand, I told him to close his left eye. He was adamant that he was. As he was wearing a Father Christmas hat with a turnup around the rim, I folded the turnup down over his left eye. His shooting suddenly improved three fold, he went on to shoot his 'personal best' score. I told him when he returned the hat to Father Christmas,  to ask him for a pair of shooting glasses and a roll of surgical tape. 

[enfieldspares]

There used to be a thing for SBS shotguns which was like a conventional leather handguard to which, at its left side front, was attached Mickey Mouse's ear. The purpose was that as the gun mounted the "ear" blocked the left eye from seing anything beyond the "ear" leaving only the right eye with a view of the bird. I have made this image from a picture I saw on the internet. The black is to represent the outline of usual handguard and the Mickey Mouse ear. Again I guess that one could be made from suitable thin metal and then suitably attached to the handguard? The other thing I recall id a similar handguard but that on the top in line with the rib was a crude red clear plastic dot type arrangement. That you aligned the plastic red dot with the bird, allowed suitable lead, and fired. INMO neither do the jib any better than the method of closing the left eye as the gun mount is started.

Edited December 25, 2023 by enfieldspares

[enfieldspares]

5 hours ago, McSpredder said:

 Are there other known snags for a person wishing to shoot off the 'wrong' shoulder?

On a standard double trigger SBS off the shelf the triggers are set wrong. You are then left reaching too far across for the front trigger to fire it. And when on a SBS a single shot is fired you are reloading the barrel furthest from your hand holding the cartridges if (an assumed if) that you reload from cartridges held in the same hand you use to pull the triggers. Why an assumed if? If you watch a skilled shot shoot a self-opening side by side they'll often reload using the hand that holds the barrels. However others use the one had if a single shot is fired and the other hand if two shots are fired which if not using a self-opener is what I tend to do.

Edited December 25, 2023 by enfieldspares

[Gordon R]

I shoot right handed, but my left eye takes over at mid to far distant. I have had a piece of tape on the left lens of my glasses for over 30 years. My shooting isn't anything like as good as in my prime, but in that time, I have beaten British and European Champions, plus a World FITASC silver medallist.

[London Best]

2 hours ago, enfieldspares said:

If you watch a skilled shot shoot a self-opening side by side they'll often reload using the hand that holds the barrels.

I only ever shoot SxS guns. 
I have always loaded with my left hand (RH shot), even before I bought a self-opener. It is SO much quicker I have never understood why anyone loads using their right hand.

[enfieldspares]

26 minutes ago, London Best said:

I only ever shoot SxS guns. 
I have always loaded with my left hand (RH shot), even before I bought a self-opener. It is SO much quicker I have never understood why anyone loads using their right hand.

LOL! Yes! I watched the silly adverts for the not missed Monkey Loader where the "host" is reloading using his right hand (he's a right hand shot) and kept thinking the man is using a Boss gun yet he's not loading with his left hand from his left hand coat pocket? Just daft! Just daft! Monkey Loader? I think that PG Tips apes down the road from me in Leicestershire could give better loading advice. For pocket loading Robert Churchill's tip still has merit, Shake the pocket a few times at the start of the drive. Gravity will cause the cartridges to position themselves base upwards so making them orientated the right way for when you reach for a reload.

Edited December 25, 2023 by enfieldspares