An effort by a loose alliance of hunters to allow telescopic sights on muzzleloaders doesn’t hit the target with traditional black-powder devotees.

“I like the challenge of the flintlock,” blacksmith Jerry Rodri said recently as he displayed the smooth-bore rifle he has hunted with since the 1970s.

“You have to be a woodsman with tracking and stalking skills and be able to get within 80 yards of your quarry,” Rodri said. “You don’t need those skills when you shoot at several hundred yards with a modern rifle with a telescopic sight.”

Rodri’s brother, Mike, who also hunts with a muzzleloader, is of like mind.

“You’re testing yourself against an adversary,” Mike Rodri, a machinist, said. “This is what America is all about.”

The flintlock is the original muzzleloader – a smooth-bore long gun in which black powder, wadding and a round ball, in that order, are rammed down the muzzle of the weapon. A tiny pan of powder, touched off by striking flint and steel, ignites the charge of powder that propels the bullet.

The flintlock has seen numerous improvements through the years, but in Colorado and 10 other states, telescopic sights are prohibited on the belief that a muzzleloader should retain its primitive nature.

That prohibition doesn’t sit well with scope-sight supporters, who say it discriminates against sight-impaired muzzleloader hunters.

They’ve told Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar that the agency is violating its anti-discrimination policies by funding state wildlife agencies that don’t allow telescopic sights on muzzleloaders unless the hunter gets a physician’s certification of need.

Older hunters and hunters with impaired eyesight who can’t use open-sight rifles should have the option of a telescopic sight without jumping through hoops, says the complaint, sent by Toby Bridges, an outdoors writer from Missoula, Mont., and host of a website – www.namlhunt.com – with muzzleloader information. Bridges said the Department of the Interior provides $700 million to state fish and game departments each year. Colorado receives $24 million to $26 million, he said.

Since the original complaint was filed against Minnesota in 2006, four states have authorized the use of telescopic sights on muzzleloaders, he said.

Bridges has allies, among them Andy Lightbody, a Gunnison-based writer and former editor of outdoors magazines; and Judd Cooney, a Pagosa Springs resident who runs a guide service for hunters in Iowa.

The three say traditionalist claims that scopes encourage hunters to try to kill game at too great a distance with too little firepower is unfounded. They also say telescopic sights aren’t a recent addition to muzzleloaders but were used by snipers during the Civil War.

As for the rationale that muzzleloaders represent primitive hunting, they ask: What’s primitive about expensive weapons, plane fare to hunting areas, the use of off-road vehicles, GPS orientation and hiring an outfitter?

Colorado Parks and Wildlife groups archery and muzzleloader hunting together in a primitive-weapon season, agency external relations manager Theo Stein said.

“There was lively debate on whether compound bows qualify as primitive weapons,” Stein said. “But archery and muzzleloaders require a higher level of skill, so we created a primitive-weapon season.”

Compound bows employ cables and pulleys for additional force and have sights for more accuracy.

Seasons for hunters using modern rifles using metal cartridges are plentiful, Stein said. But conditions for muzzleloaders and archery hunting are limited, he said.

Wade Horn, a Bayfield concrete worker who has hunted deer and elk with a muzzleloader since 1982, agrees.

“Hunting with a muzzleloader and open sights is an art,” Horn said. “You have to watch the wind and where you step in order to get close. You don’t always get a shot.”

Horn said he has bagged two elk in the last five years.

Darrell Tomberlin, a plumber and Horn’s hunting buddy, said stalking quarry with a muzzleloader creates an emotional connection to the quarry.

“It takes you back to connecting with the elk,” said Tomberlin, who has hunted with a muzzleloader since 1990. “I’d like them to keep one part of America’s heritage in its original form.”

Jerry Rodri tried to be diplomatic.

“I won’t criticize another man’s way of putting meat on the table,” Rodri said. “But using a weapon other than the basic muzzleloader is the easy way out.”

daler@durangoherald.com