Son is right handed, left eye dominant…….right or left handed rifle??

I am looking for some advice from the gun gurus. I was a rifle range instructor in the Mairnes, but am not sure what way to go. I took my 8 y.o. shooting for the first time last weekend. He is right handed, and I discovered he is left eye dominant. I have two years until he can mentor hunt deer, but want to keep my eyes open for a 243 in the mean time. Thoughts?

Thanks,
Nut

My 16 year old is the same way. He shoots left handed. He is an amazing shot with both rifle and handgun.
DT

I was blessed to have neither a left or right dominance and I have to shoot with both eyes open – regardless of right or left handed. However both of my daughters are right handed and left eye dominant. They started day one with shooting right handed and closing their left eye. Unfortunately it’s something they had to work at and as much range time as possible. I’m 10 plus years down the road now and I want to believe we did what we should. Lindsey my oldest shoots very little and she is good to about 200 yrds. Olivia shoots the most and is holding 3 to 5 inch groups sitting with her bipod at 400 to 500 yrds. She’s missed one deer in 6 years of whitetail and antelope hunting

well I’m right handed, left eye dominate and I shoot right handed….always have! I’m been a pretty good shot over the past 50 years of hunting. Not sure how much better I would have been shooting left handed??

Left handed writing, left eye dominant, and shoot everything right handed. I grew up with right handed guns and bows. I shoot fine with everything. Don’t sweat it.

I’m left handed writing only, but ambidextrous in a lot of other things, shooting (firearms) one of them. Moderatly left eye dominant. I’ve shot right hand rifles, mostly because they are so readily available, but all but my shotgun are either bolts or single shot so it’s not too tough to shoot them lefty either. Kinda nice really, if you want to keep a stand to yourself, set it up so the primary shooting lanes are left handed shots.

Oddly enough I can’t fish(cast/retrieve) right handed worth a hoot though.

I’m Rt. handed left eye dominant and feels natural to shoot left hand gun and bow.

Right handed and left eye dominant for me as well. As a young kid I found myself shooting right handed and I would literally look across the gun to use my left eye. Needless to say, I was not a very good shot.

As I aged I realized why I was a poor shot. I have shot left handed for the last 20 years and am a pretty good shot.

The prevailing thinking now is to diagnose the situation early and teach the young person to shoot with the same hand as their dominant eye.

In shooting there is no particular benefit to shooting with your non dominant hand vs dominant hand.

Grouse

I definitely want to set him up for success and not failure. Looks like I will be looking for a left handed 243 in the future. I will be having him practice left handed from here on out. Thanks for the replies, IDO never disappoints.

Any thoughts on bows? I would lean toward right handed, and have hime close his left eye.

Nut

wiswalleyenut wrote:

I definitely want to set him up for success…

Any thoughts on bows? I would lean toward right handed, and have hime close his left eye.

Nut

My 6 yo son just started archery lessons last week. The first thing that the instructor did was check each kids dominant eye. She then gave them the bow to match regardless of if this was their dominant hand.

She said with kids it takes 2 lessons and then the kids with cross dominant eyes are completely used to it.

Grouse

Train it out of him. When shooting, stick a clear piece of packing tape over his shooting glasses on his left eye. He will still be able to see out of it but not as clearly as his right. If done repeatedly, this will change his dominant eye to his right. There is a ton of info online about how it works. When attending the acedemy, my buddy was right hand but left eye dominant. The instructor put a piece of tape on the left side of his shooting glasses and boom, he was right eye dominant in a few weeks.

I’m right handed and left eye dominant as well. I would highly recommend shooting both rifle and archery left handed. Less room for error. When the moment of truth comes it takes a ton of practice to not close the wrong eye. Only downside is I started shooting right handed. Been much better since switching to left hand shooting. Make sure you get him a left handed shotgun as well. Otherwise he will get a face full of powder/gas in the face.

I’m the same way I shoot left handed.

I am the same way. I shoot just as accurate shooting left or right.
Just look for either semi-auto rifle or pump. I have 30-06 Rem. 7600 that is a pump so I can shoot either hand and it doesn’t make a difference. I do have some right hand bolt action rifles and shoot them either way its just takes some getting use to. Shooting the bolt left handed works well if you have bi-pod then your hand never has to leave the trigger, but if your a true rifleman none of that should matter since “its a one shot one kill.”
It all just takes some practice, I would say to start him out left handed but really that comes down to what ever is natural for him.
Bow I shoot right handed.

Aaron wrote:

Just look for either semi-auto rifle or pump. I have 30-06 Rem. 7600 that is a pump so I can shoot either hand and it doesn’t make a difference. I do have some right hand bolt action rifles and shoot them either way its just takes some getting use to. Shooting the bolt left handed works well if you have bi-pod then your hand never has to leave the trigger, but if your a true rifleman none of that should matter since “its a one shot one kill.”

In general, I think it’s better to make a choice and then have the young hunter stick with it.

Keep in mind that it’s not just the action and port that’s on the opposite side. On a true left-handed rifle or shotgun, the stock will be cast off to the left as well. Now I’m aware that not every rifle or shotgun in today’s standardized and mass produced world will have a cast, but if it does…

Fortunately these days we are spoiled for choice when it comes to rifles that are a)both affordable and accurate and b)come in left-handed versions. Even finding a rifle–any rifle–in a left handed format used to be a challenge and many, like you, just made due with the rifles they had available.

Now with the number of really good rifles you can get for under $500, there’s a lot more options for getting even the young shooter a decent rifle that fits them both in terms of overall fit and for the correct hand for them.

Grouse

I will be going the left handed route on a rifle for him. We will see about right or left handed for a bow. Thanks for all the replies!

Nut

All left handed and left eye dominant but shoot right handed. Started at age ten with a bolt action single shot. Didn’t take long to figure out it was awkward to operate the bolt. Switched to the right shoulder and it worked much better and been shooting right handed for over 50 years.