Hey guys can anyone tell me if a muzzleloading smoothbore is considered a shotgun and/or just a muzzleloader regarding ct hunting laws for state land.  I would assume if it’s loaded with shot it would be safe to use as A shotgun during shotgun only season, and with roundball during muzzleloading season?


If it’s also considered a shotgun, anyone use a flintlock Smoothbore with shot to take deer?


*Edited to make more sense*

text incoming

While DEEP may have their own rules, its important to note that the state defines a shotgun as follows:

“Shotgun” means a weapon designed or redesigned, made or remade, and intended to be fired from the shoulder and designed or redesigned and made or remade to use the energy of the explosive in a fixed shotgun shell to fire through a smooth bore either a number of ball shot or a single projectile for each single pull of the trigger;

Note the part about "a fixed shotgun shell".

Its both.
U can use shot for birds & small game. Patched Roundball for deer.  
Now you can use a muzzleloader during shotgun season AND muzzleloader season.

Shot size & material laws still apply.

My question is wrong in a few parts and Bikerman corrected me....as I was thinking of shot for use on deer, forgetting that it’s only slugs out of a shotgun for deer hunting.

Hunting laws in CT make firearm laws in CT look like a cakewalk!. But then again I’m just new, and it probably becomes much more clear over time.

So it does seem like a smoothbore muzzleloader would keep many options open, with the drawback being a little harder to be successful with.

Oh and thanks to Bikerman for spending a while helping me out today!

Yea. No shot for deer.  In CT anyways.

I'd love to get a smoothbore muzzleloader. Preferably a repro trade gun. Especially if I threaded it for chokes! I love hunting with my caplock, but dont really deer hunt anymore.  
Would provide alot of enjoyment and practice.  

I've thought about finding a 2nd barrel for my rifle (54cal T/C Renegade) and having it bored out to 20ga.  I know they offered a smoothbore 56cal at one time.  So maybe there is enough meat in there to go 62cal.

As far as difficulty in harvesting. I look at it like loud archery. Nearly the same ranges as with a smoothbore & PRB.  I've shot some surprisingly accurate smoothbore guns thou.  BUT you really have to put your time in a narrow down your load & components.

Supposedly Jim kibler will have an English trade gun kit available sometime soon.  Seems like a great universal long gun, but with increased difficulty, which is why it might note be the wisest choice to start out with.

Swapping barrels does sound like a good way to add options too.

I've used both, my fusil de chasse (62 cal) and my 50 cal leigh  for rifle season and muzzleloader season for the last few years. I don't carry a centerfire rifle at all anymore. The fusil does better in turkey and squirrel seasons due to using shot. Ineed more time behind it with patched round ball. They are the bottom two.

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Very nice varg!

Do you use the fusil with round ball for deer as well?  Or just the .50?

I've tried the fusil with round ball, every combo of patching (from no wadding to pillow ticking and different ball sizes). and I struggle with getting a decent grouping, more like a pattern. Smoothbores are very different from rifles, more like pointng a shotgun than aming a rifle. I stick mainly to shot  in the fusil, i need lots more time behind it, I tend to shoot low. I catch myself not looking down the barrel,  The 50 shoots lights out to about 75 or so yards, then it begins to drop off quick.,

Pretty much what Bikerman was telling me as well.

I don’t think that would be the good do it all gun that I thought it would be.

I have a kibler colonial .50 that has the accuracy your talking about as well, but I spent way too long and finished it too damn nice to bring out in the field.  

I’m kinda stuck with which direction to go, and it’s sort of because I don’t know exactly what I want to do.

Seems like it’d be wiser to not look for a do it all firearm though.

I felt the same way when I first got my Leigh. A couple bumps and a scratch there brings character. The first one came from pulling the cock back to far and dented the stock, then I bumped the door jam in the bedroom and left another mark. They are meant to be used and enjoyed. You can always build another one. Find a smoothbore and shoot the hell out of it.