So, the folks at Bug A Salt sent me a couple of, uhm, Bug A Salts. Their webpage is here and you can buy one from Amazon here. So, here they are:

Operating operationally in operations for operators: Long story short, you shoot bugs out of the air with table salt. To operate, you fill the chamber, I guess it’s called, with salt and close the lid. This is important to remember in case you’re having Sangria. Then, you pump what I guess is called a pump, like a shotgun. Then, you disable the safety and this brings the sights up. You then aim the gun at a critter and pull the trigger.

A few things:

It needs a rail. I mean, I have no place to mount my EOTech. That is not tacticool at all. And if I want to shoot buzzie bugs at night, I have no place to put my tactical 1000 lumen flashlight. And lights, I know, draw bugs.

The safety struck me as an unnecessary addition, no doubt thunk up by lawyers. And I would scrap that.

Given my thoughts on AR or AK pistols and how they’re unwieldy, I think it would help to put a stock on the weapon.

It clearly needs a trigger job or snazzy after market trigger to improve accuracy. There was not a clean break and reset required operating the pump thingie.

Needs more range. An effective range of 3 feet is limiting when it comes to laying down suppressive fire in case of attack by mosquitoes, which are Tennessee’s state bird.

Ballistic testing: I tried a variety of ammo in the Bug A Salt, including table salt, sea salt and kosher salt. Performance with table salt was weak. I mean, why put bird shot in a shotgun when buck shot is there. The sea salt was a bit better but the cost per round substantially increased. Testing revealed that the kosher salt was the best ammo to run the gun.

I didn’t break out a chronograph and record the FPS and make little markings about groups or take notes or anything scientific like that. I operated operationally and shot fucking bugs with it. So, the bugs I shot:

Housefly: No problem. A blast of kosher salt within the weapon’s effective range dispatches these with no problem. Larger flies, like horseflies often required a follow up shot.

Ants: No problem.

Fire ants: No problem. But up against an entire ant hill, you’re hosed.

Stinkbugs: One shot to stinkbug would knock it down to the ground. If you knock stinkbugs to the ground 100 times, 99 of those times they will land soft side up. Two follow up shots to their squishy underbellies did the trick.

Hornets, wasps, dirt daubers: One shot would disorient them and often send them to the ground. A second shot on the ground would disable their wings. Then, you’d pretty much have to step on them to end their suffering.

Bees: One shot grounds most bees but, again, finishing the deed often required a tactical squishing.

Carpenter Bees: Definitely the most fun thing to shoot with a bug a salt. The first shot would make them shrug as much as an insect can shrug, I suppose. And then, they’d get very curious about the Bug A Salt. They’d fly right up to the red tip (red for safety, you know) to check it out. Then, I’d blast them again. And they’d again shrug and become more curious about what was coming at them. Eventually, they’d get bored and fly off. For carpenter bees, I recommend the usual: a tennis racket.

Your own blue jeans covered ass: Had my wife shoot me in the butt just to see how damaging it would be if, say, my kids shot eachother with one. Hardly noticed.

Your wife’s running shorts covered ass: This will result in an “ouch, WTF” and a dirty look.

All kidding at tactical gun writers aside, it’s a great toy. I had a lot of fun playing with it and still do. You will too. I recommend it and kids especially love it. But don’t put pictures of your friends using it on the internet because gun nutters gonna nut. Mostly, I use it for bees and flies but, after a few drinks, I find myself hunting carpenter bees because it’s seriously funny.

Thanks to Bug A Salt for the samples. You can get one here.

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