The Maryland Department of Natural Resources is buying 550 disabled guns for $165,000 to help train hunters, The Washington Examiner has learned.
The Remington shotguns and rifles will arrive in Maryland next month with their firing pins drilled out, rendering the weapons inoperable.
The state’s roughly 1,000 volunteer hunting instructorswill use the nonfunctional firearms to teach beginning hunters how to handle a live weapon, said Maryland Natural Resources Police spokesman Sgt. Art Windemuth.
“They will learn how to safely cross a ditch and how to pass the firearm from one person to another,” Windemuth said, adding that students also would use dummy ammunition to load and unload the guns.
Prospective hunters born after July 1, 1977, are required to complete the safety course to obtain a Maryland hunting license.
Before the agency bought the disabled guns, hunting students practiced with donated weapons — also rendered inoperable — during the class’s several hours of hands-on training. Windemuth said training with once-functioning guns is more dangerous, even though no accidents have occurred during training. The other reason for buying new disabled guns, he said, is to standardize the hunting classes.
“We need to have consistency,” he said, adding that the program graduates about 7,000 students a year. There is no minimum age to enroll.
Windemuth said the federal government paid for the guns through the Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration Act, which levies excise taxes on the sale of firearms and ammunition.
Paul Helmke, president of the national Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, questioned the agency’s use of $165,000 in federal money.
“I’m all for training, but I’m sure there are other ways to do it that don’t cost as much,” Helmke said. “Can’t they use wooden toy rifles, or something of the same weight?”
Maryland residents enroll in the safety course — which includes classroom instruction and one day of “field practice” — to obtain a hunting license, which in turn helps curb the growing deer population.
Some areas in the Baltimore-Washington corridor average 80 deer per square mile, said Robert Beyer, associate director of the state’s Wildlife and Heritage Service. Twenty deer per square mile is considered manageable, Beyer said.
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