[bloodhound31]

Small Arms ammunition. It started with a couple of .22 bullet shells I found on the ground on the farm. I used to comb the area with a stick trailing behind me so I could see where I had covered. I found some with different head stamps on the base and started to catalog them. Then I started finding .22 shorts, .22 magnums, .22 bird/rat shot, and the silver stingers.

When I collected lots of the same ones I traded them at school for other bullets. My teacher was a keen shooter so I would give him some coins and he would bring me different bullets one at a time. I would polish them all up with Brasso, pull the projectiles out and empty out the gunpowder. I spent hours polishing and developed metal stains on my fingers. My hands got very strong as a result and I remember doing a squeeze test in class at school with a set of bathroom scales and was the second strongest in the class. I was so stoked.

I made a long display box, lined with polystyrene and used a Stanley knife to cut out the shapes of the bullets, mount them and label them with all their info.

Once, I found a WWI artillery shell which became the centerpiece pride and joy of the collection!

I had all the shotgun shells in their shot variations, colors, sizes, calibers. I had .50 cal military rounds, Japanese WWII .303 rounds, exotic hand-crimped Zulu war cartridges, elephant gun rounds, hollow points, dum-dums, full metal jackets, armor piercing, tracer, you name it.

My walls were covered in posters from gun magazines and displays from gun shop brochures.

I even found a rifle in the bush once, all rusted and termite eaten. I oiled it up, smacked the mechanism around with a hammer until it started moving, got the firing pin moving again and cleaned it up. I test fired it and got it working with live ammunition. Mum and dad must have been watching with a mixture of trepidation, and pride, but eventually made me turn it in to the local police. I framed the receipt in the lid of my display box.

One day my mum crested the hill only to see me throw and detonate a home made explosive and took the whole collection off me and ditched it.

That was the end of that hobby.