I used to hunt a lttle with a muzzle loader. My only ML is a Lyman Great Plains 54 cal. rebarreled to shoot rifle bullets.

My old roping horse and ranch horse, and a good one he was, dead broke, and I could step off him and shoot any smokeless rifle and he'd just graze..So I figured I could ride right up on a deer or elk and shoot off his back with a close range muzzle loader, and I trusted him..but decided to try it out at the house just to be sure...

I saddled him up and shot the rifle and he just flinched as I knew he would, then the smoke floated back and he got the smell of BP I guess and the SOB bucked for 100 yards down the road to the mailboxe on the highway , and I mean bucked, I let the gun fly and grabbed everything I could and probably left finger indentions in the saddle horn, but I got him rode,( Ive been on lots of bucking horsed in my life ) but this was unexpected..got back to the house and the stock was in two pieces in the gravel drive way..

I put a threaded bolt thru it and refinished it and it doesn't even show.

Joe died about 5 years after that incident without ever having to deal with black powder again..He showed me his stuff and I tipped my hat to him and we roped a lot steers after that. That's what he liked. These days I hunt out of a pickup and do a little walking and muzzle loading season is sometimes during the rut and I'm handy with a bugle.

Dammit I told this story last year and its still on the same page?? oh well getting old ain't for sissies, Demensia is setting in I suspect, but my give a s---iter been in neutral for the last 20 years..so all is good.

I still like the story Ray. I call it Oldsheimers.