No Guns Here mentioned practices in Germany. I remember riding a bus through Thuringia and being surprised at how close to the road the shooting houses were. They have really strict requirements for getting a license, including tests on the anatomy of game animals and actual shooting tests.
Last night, I had a shot at six deer, who were standing, looking at me about 80 yards across an open field. In the background were a windbreak and some houses. I was using a .30-06 with 150 grain bullets. I took the shot standing and dropped a button buck.
Hunting takes a lot of discipline and split second decision making. I have done a lot of offhand shooting, in the field on game, and in competition. I was comfortable with the shot and had no intention of spraying and praying. If for no other reason, I prefer meat that has been taken from an animal that has not been pumped full of adrenalin.
Now if I had used a smoothbore shotgun, the shot would have been beyond the range that my Mossberg 500 will handle. My Marlin Slugmaster would have handled it with no problems, but then the houses would have been in range. A Foster slug might have reached them, too. Buckshot would have not, but the distance was way beyond the range I would consider using it.
Most people hunt in my area, and if locals hunt, we don't worry much about careless shooting. The ones who do that tend to use each other as targets. If we worry, it is about people who come into the area to hunt. Virginia requires that one have permission to hunt, even on unposted property, so that keeps down the number of people who just park behind a barn and then take to the field. A similarly sized county to the east of us is shotgun only (muzzleloaders also allowed for deer hunting). There are no more or less instances of houses or livestock being hit in either county, so I don't see that requiring shotguns only helps.
