Left eye dominant and shooting from right shoulder

fitzy_fitzy

Lads some advice please. Lads are yee familiar with the term “ left eye dominant”.
It is the eye that does the final focusing on an object or something like that.
You can check whether you are left or right eye dominant quite easily.
Point at an object in the distance with both eyes open . Close your left eye first and if your right eye
Is still on the target you are right eye dominant and if it is not you are left eye dominant like me .
You can check it also with your right eye closed.
Basically i shoot off the right shoulder and my left eye is dominant.
I was told by putting an eye patch on my left eye, that in the time my right eye would become dominant.
Since then I have been told this is impossible. So recently I have been shooting off my left shoulder at the range .
I am struggling to say the least. Went out shooting rabbits the other night and could not get use to holding the shotgun left-handed.
Have any off yee encountered this problem and if so have I any other options.

Sparks

Yeah, I'm cross-dominant. I just shoot away (I have a small blind that covers the foresight from the point of view of the left eye when I'm in position, but that's all). Over time, your mind learns to use the non-dominant eye when aiming. It's not really worth switching over sides when you've been shooting for a while; but it is worth starting a newbie out on the dominant eye at the beginning.

IRLConor

Sparks wrote: »

but it is worth starting a newbie out on the dominant eye at the beginning.

Only if - and it's a big if - they're comfortable doing it.

For example, I'm cross-dominant (right hand, left eye) but any time I've tried shooting lefty it's been an absolute disaster. I don't know how many people I've come across in DURC who've been told to shoot lefty when they're clearly more comfortable shooting with their right. Switch them to shoot with their non-dominant eye and their scores improve a lot.

With a shotgun it's a little different but with a rifle and iron sights my experience is that the hand dominance is much harder to overcome than the eye dominance.

Sparks

Yeah, it's no picnic - but if the dominant eye has better eyesight (which tends to happen for some reason), it's worth it. Maybe it's different for prone, but for standing we keep seeing better results for the newbies we start off using the dominant eye instead of the dominant hand. I couldn't tell you why it would be different though (maybe the younger you start them the easier they switch over?), and we can't really experiment all that well with it (too small a sample size amongst other problems). And we've had air rifle shooters in the past who switched over as established adult shooters - it took them quite a while for their standards to come back up, but they seem to wind up doing better afterwards - one won the nationals and went international after doing it, if I remember correctly.

I'm still not so sure if it's worth it for pistol though - I shoot pistol cross-dominantly as well, just using my dominant eye. I keep wondering if it would help to switch back so that the alignment of the pistol and the aiming eye was more in-line...

It wasn't me!

Right handed, left eye dominant here. Shoot all rifles and shotguns from the left side, because I have done since I was a kid, but when training people from scratch, I tend to encourage right handed shooters to use the dominant hand. You can overcome all the eyesight stuff with blinds and lenses, but the hand dominance is much harder to beat.

deerhunter1

It wasn't me! wrote: »

Right handed, left eye dominant here. Shoot all rifles and shotguns from the left side, because I have done since I was a kid, but when training people from scratch, I tend to encourage right handed shooters to use the dominant hand. You can overcome all the eyesight stuff with blinds and lenses, but the hand dominance is much harder to beat.

+1

IRLConor

It also depends on the strength of the dominance of both handedness and vision. I'm very strongly right-handed but weakly left-eye dominant. I'm sure if I was strongly left eye dominant and weakly right handed I'd be more open to shooting left handed.

SureHowBad

fitzy_fitzy wrote: »

Lads some advice please. Lads are yee familiar with the term “ left eye dominant”.
It is the eye that does the final focusing on an object or something like that.
You can check whether you are left or right eye dominant quite easily.
Point at an object in the distance with both eyes open . Close your left eye first and if your right eye
Is still on the target you are right eye dominant and if it is not you are left eye dominant like me .
You can check it also with your right eye closed.
Basically i shoot off the right shoulder and my left eye is dominant.
I was told by putting an eye patch on my left eye, that in the time my right eye would become dominant.
Since then I have been told this is impossible. So recently I have been shooting off my left shoulder at the range .
I am struggling to say the least. Went out shooting rabbits the other night and could not get use to holding the shotgun left-handed.
Have any off yee encountered this problem and if so have I any other options.

You can get your shotgun stock cast specially for this. Attached a few photos from google

fitzy_fitzy

Cheers lads for youe responses.
It is only a shotgun i shoot. I have been shooting 3 years only.
But figured i better do something to get the number of birds i shoot up.
I have been getting varying advice. One instructor told me told me to keep shooting on right shoulder
and i couple of weeks later he told me to change to left shoulder.Another guy told me it would fix itself.
Holding the shotgun left handed seems very weird. In the range its not too bad, but out shooting recently it felt very awkward.
I like the idea of the cast stock. Can this be made to my stock, and does it have any disadvantages.
Is there any other shotgun adjustments that can be made so you can shoot off your right shoulder.
Finally is there a good shooting instructor out there that could size me up and see what would be best for me.

Cupid__Stunt

I just close my left eye for both rifle and shotgun, its not ideal but its the only way I can do it, tried shooting left handed as a teenager when shooting DTL but was better off right shoulder with left eye closed.

One shot on kill

I was the same. Awkward switching side I shoot off because of a dominant eye.
Two ways

Try keep the other eye close

Switch sides

I switch sides and it was very uncomfortable for a while but you do get use to it. Now I can shoot of both shoulders no problem.

My right is a good as it always was or as bad which ever way you want to look at it. But my left is my better side and its solely down to vision.

fitzy_fitzy

Lads, a little feedback.
Went to Eddie Daly's in Rathkeale Limerick 3 times over the last two weeks shooting clays.
There has been some improvement, probably gone from shooting 20% to 60% in the 3 sessions.
Just need to get use to walking the fields holding the gun as a lefty.
Definitely recommend switching shoulders for those with the same predicament.
I still have alot of practice to do, but am glad to see an improvement in two weeks.
Would recommend Eddie to anyone in Limerick Area.
Cheers for the advice lads

cookimonster

There's a few of us who shoot together who also teach basic shoot gun shooting skills and we always encourage people like yourself to shoot off the dominant eye shoulder regardless of their dominant hand. There can be initial resistance or awkwardness but that is soon over come when those clays start breaking.
This is true for experienced shooters we have quite a few who changed shoulders after many years of shooting with huge improvements in hits and consistency.
The results won't be instantaneously but with persistence you will greatly improve.

Johny_cash

If i wore an eye patch how long would it take to notice any difference in my eye dominance? Is there any better methods in helping change dominance

Scrappy600

Cross dominant here too, right hand left eye, not so much a problem that I notice with a shotgun or pistol but with the rifle and scope I have to keep the left eye closed and have to make a serious conscious effort to do it which leads to some very weird screwed up faces!

fitzy_fitzy

Johny_cash wrote: »

If i wore an eye patch how long would it take to notice any difference in my eye dominance? Is there any better methods in helping change dominance

If you are older than 12. Well Then its too late.
Buddy of mine is a Doctor and he said it is impossible to change eye dominance once your an adult.
In a young kid you could.
I had to go to left shoulder.

deerhunter1

fitzy_fitzy wrote: »

If you are older than 12. Well Then its too late.
Buddy of mine is a Doctor and he said it is impossible to change eye dominance once your an adult.
In a young kid you could.
I had to go to left shoulder.

Correct, I am the same, Right handed but shooting left handed all my life with no issues

Wildcard7

I'm in the same boat, left handed and right eye dominant. I only recently started clay shooting and have so far shot with my left hand, closing the right eye. I'll try shooting right handed with both eyes open next and see how that goes.

Anyway, since noone mentioned it before, I read today about something called "easy-hit bead" which is supposed to help. I can't comment on whether this actually is a good workaround or not. Sorry if it sounds like advertising, especially since this is my first post, but I'm only throwing this in as another option since noone else mentioned it. Here's a little excerpt on how it's supposed to work:

"Whilst looking down the rib with the ‘shooting’ eye the foresight appears as a red bead.
However, it is designed so that the fine retaining bars and shroud are so placed that when
the cross-dominant eye tries to take over and look down the side of the barrels none of the
red of the foresight is seen at all. The Easy-Hit red bead in effect becomes invisible to the cross-dominant eye."

I'm intrigued by this because it sounds like it might work (as long as you use a gun that has it). If I can't get used to shooting right handed I might give it a try.

I can't post links, but if you google for "MasterEyeDominanceArticle.pdf" you'll find the complete article (mind you it's hosted by the company who sells the thing, so take what you read with a spoon full of salt).

Or maybe there's a good reason noone mentioned it because a few people tried it and it's crap. In this case ignore my post, I wasn't here :-)

Oisted

Wildcard7 wrote: »

I'm in the same boat, left handed and right eye dominant. I only recently started clay shooting and have so far shot with my left hand, closing the right eye. I'll try shooting right handed with both eyes open next and see how that goes.

Anyway, since noone mentioned it before, I read today about something called "easy-hit bead" which is supposed to help. I can't comment on whether this actually is a good workaround or not. Sorry if it sounds like advertising, especially since this is my first post, but I'm only throwing this in as another option since noone else mentioned it. Here's a little excerpt on how it's supposed to work:

"Whilst looking down the rib with the ‘shooting’ eye the foresight appears as a red bead.
However, it is designed so that the fine retaining bars and shroud are so placed that when
the cross-dominant eye tries to take over and look down the side of the barrels none of the
red of the foresight is seen at all. The Easy-Hit red bead in effect becomes invisible to the cross-dominant eye."

I'm intrigued by this because it sounds like it might work (as long as you use a gun that has it). If I can't get used to shooting right handed I might give it a try.

I can't post links, but if you google for "MasterEyeDominanceArticle.pdf" you'll find the complete article (mind you it's hosted by the company who sells the thing, so take what you read with a spoon full of salt).

Or maybe there's a good reason noone mentioned it because a few people tried it and it's crap. In this case ignore my post, I wasn't here :-)

The easy hit beads really do make a difference, they are definitely brilliant. I am a clay shooter myself and since putting one on my gun there has been a tremendous improvement in my shooting. The problem with them is they are around €30. If you are right handed it is so much easier to shoot with your right eye. Obviously you need both eyes if you have a target coming from the left because it gives you little or no time to react. Open both eyes while finding the target and then close your left eye just before you pull the trigger, this is your best bet. If you start off shooting with one eye always closed like I did it is nearly impossible to break the habit. I can't even mount the gun as well as I with one eye open as with both eyes open. Hope this helps.