Brad Varney has spent a lifetime hunting birds and shooting clay pigeons all over New England. He has won so many shooting contests he’s lost count. Today, he’s a famous gunning guru, sharing his wisdom with anyone who wants to become a better shot.

“I can guarantee you that after one lesson you will shoot more birds in the field,” he says with a smile. I am standing in his rec room, which is stuffed with medals, ribbons and trophies, decoys, guns and books on wing shooting and skeet.

The 61-year-old Maine native grew up hunting and fishing and clamming in and around the Scarborough marshes. He makes his home now in Richmond, where he operates a world-class skeet and sporting clays range. “Spending time at a skeet range without good coaching is merely a game of chance, and not every good shot is a good coach. I’m still learning after all these years and am always looking for ways to become a better instructor,” he says.

I hired Brad for a fee of $40 an hour. I’m a decent wing shot but don’t always hit the birds I’m gunning for and wanted to see if I could learn how to shoot better. First, he tested my eyes to see which eye was dominant.

“If nothing else, that’s worth the trip right there,” says Varney, spry and fit and quick to laugh. “Most people don’t know what to look for in a shooter’s vision ,and I do. Without that knowledge, you don’t really know where your rear sight is. In the field that translates to misses.”

Varney said he taught one student who persistently missed grouse standing in the road, much to his frustration and his hunting buddies amusement.

“He had a cross dominance problem with his eyes, and once I identified that, he was able to hit what he was shooting at and his buddies stopped laughing at him,” he said. “If you don’t have a coach who knows what he is doing you can shoot until your shoulder is numb and you won’t necessarily improve.

“I see a lot of shooters who shoot skeet regularly but don’t get much better and that’s because no one has focused on what they are doing right and what they are doing wrong. I don’t try to re-invent the wheel. I look and see what a shooter is doing right and try to build on that. I don’t look to start from scratch always.”

Brad had me shoot several times while he closely watched my muzzle. He instructed me to focus “like your life depends on it” on the front of the clay pigeon and to avoid aiming.

“You aim a rifle to hit, and you aim a shotgun to miss,” he said. “If you stop to look at the sights on your shotgun you will slow down and the target will fly by.”

Varney uses the practical analogy of a carpenter using a hammer to strike a nail.

“That carpenter never looks at his hammer, he only looks at the nail,” he explains. “If he took his eyes of the nail to look at the hammer as he brought it down, well, what do you think would happen?”

Varney laughs loudly. “People try to make shooting more difficult than it is,” he said. “They talk about sustained leads and rate of drop and a bunch of other nonsense. It’s like tennis, or baseball. You’ve got to keep your eye on the ball. In this case, it’s the bird, or the clay pigeon. I say you have to focus HARD.”

Varney always carries two roles of what he calls “my magic tape.”

“The first one is Scotch tape that I used to cover one of the shooter’s pupils if he has an eye dominance problem. Some shooters are cross dominant, meaning one eye is stronger than the other, and some have monocular vision, where they are about equal. This factor can greatly influence how they see the target. “So I cover one pupil, it solves the problem, and they shoot better. I put the tape on their shooting glasses. Many shooters find this in and of itself dramatically improves their shooting and they no longer have to close one eye to shoot. That way their peripheralvision improves and that helps a lot.”

And his other magic tape?

“I use electrician’s tape to cover the front sight on 90 percent of my students’ shotguns,” he says. “That way they pay more attention to the target and less to the sights on the gun. That in itself works wonders, too.”

I found that after Brad had done both of these things my shooting improved a great deal, and I was happily powdering targets that, in the past, had left me frustrated and angry.

“I take responsibility for the misses and you can take credit for the hits,” he says. He carefully explains every shot and how to “sweep through” the target for consistent success.

“Most of this game is mental,” he said. He points to his head and says “this is your best sight.”

Varney told me that Americans are a nation of riflemen and are thus deeply influenced by rifle “sight picture.”

“I have to teach people that you can’t aim a shotgun and hit birds, but you can POINT a shotgun and hit birds. There is a big difference.”

Varney is adamant about his first love, which is wing shooting.

“I have never met a good wing shooter who is a not a decent skeet shooter, but I have met plenty of good skeet shooters who were not very good wing shots,” he said. “I try very hard to work with hunters whose first interest is in bagging more birds in the field.”

So whether you hunt ducks, geese, partridge, woodcock or pheasant, you might want to consider sharpening your skills, and if you are an accomplished shooter who has had bad luck teaching your kids or friends to shoot, you might also want to think about hiring Brad for some personal tutorials.

Located on the Langdon Road in Richmond, just off Route 201, Varney can be reached at 737-4993.

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