[robotrout]

I think you have never met any eight year olds, if you think they are really that stupid that it would be a problem. Unless you sheltered the poor kid to the point of making him a mushroom, he's more than rational enough to understand any hazard you take the time to tell him about. My daughter is 8, and I would have no worries with her encountering ammunition around the house because I would tell her how it works, which part of it causes it to explode, and how to handle it.

A kid that does stupid things has probably not had the 5 minutes spent with him, telling him the possible hazards.

Kids (and adults) also do stupid things because they know the hazards but feel like they are smart enough to overcome those hazards. Doing hazardous things that are known to be hazardous is no more likely at 8 than at 18. In fact it's less likely at 8. We get braver and do stupider things ("Hold my beer for a minute and watch this") as we get older.

[bigiain]

This probably seems strange to non US readers.

Not that we couldn't get access to "ammo" at all here in Australia in the 70's, but my sources were mostly nail gun cartridges (stolen from building sites) and shotgun blanks used for the local sailing club's starting cannon. We'd also steal those explosive things rail workers put on tracks to warn of inbound trains.

One thing living in a country with somewhat stricter control on guns and ammunition (at least for us "city boys") - it meant we learned how to make our own explosives. We'd steal pretty much any sodium ad potassium nitrate the chemistry labs had for making gunpower - and there was significant "liberation" of nitric and sulfuric acid from the school chemistry labs too, and we had more or less success in producing home made gun cotton, tnt, and nitroglycerine. It eventually led to careers in chemistry for two of my high school co-conspirators from the time.