Looking for Unique Target Ideas

[Versanaut]

I've been shooting at our clubs monthly matches for a couple years now and I'd like to contribute to the challenges we've had thus far and also gin up some new challenges. I've scoured the forum a good bit back and have gone through the postal match forum and picked up a few.

So what kind of target challenges have you run across lately?

Some unique ones of ours:

1) Shoot your phone number into a phone target (Pts per hit)

2) Shoot the 'maters off a vine (paper target with multiple tomatoes on vines, Cut the vine completely to 'drop' the 'mater(s). Hit the 'mater and you loose points.

3) Large Flower, different sized petals, different sized points and penalties

4) Pie chart / dart board. Lines were penalties, points were bigger in the smaller areas

5) Battleship (5 shots) Choose wisely which ships to sink (Pts to hit ship, more points if you sink it.)

6) Cards. Card centered on 8.5x11. Center card= 10 points each hit. hit face cards around it and loose face card value in points.

7) Hanging Water bottles

8) Hanging Flour filled plastic easter eggs

Thoughts and ideas?

Thanks a bunch!

 

[Phil Coffins]

Split a ball on a axe blade to hit a card on each side at once.
Tac a balloon by the tail then shoot over the shoulder with a mirror. (More fun on a breezy day)
Small block hanging from a string, cut the string.
Under the table with hand gun at a close target with out being able to see the gun.
Shoot a plastic bucket at a unknown range. The ball must enter the bucket and stay there so you have to guess the charge to get in and not go threw or knock the bucket over.
These are some I’ve shot and enjoyed at various places.

 

[Blogman]

Split a ball on a axe blade to hit a card on each side at once.

Guess I'll be target shooting tomorrow!

 

[zimmerstutzen]

Hang a weight (about 2 pounds) on a string and over a horizontal bar to a one gallon plastic jug. at say 75 yd. two of them for two shooters. Each shooter takes a shot at the jug. first one to empty enough to let the weight on the other end fall wins the duel. One club permitted two shots, which made for a quick load competition that some clubs do not allow. Then the next two shooters duel. The idea is to put a hole as big and as low as possible to let the jug drain. Another one, I saw for 22 rf, was a picture frame without picture. a nail in each corner. white coarse string a few feet long was tied in a loop on each end. and then hung on the picture frame so the string made an x across the empty frame. the shot must break both strings at the same time. They would tie a fishing sinker to the middle of the string that had a card with a prize listed wrapped around the sinker. Who ever cut both strings and dropped the sinker got the prize listed on the card.

 

[Loyalist Dave]

1) Take a 2"x2"x8' piece of pine. Duct tape a brick to the side at the top, and stand this upright. A small hole 1 to 2 feet deep works fine to hold this upright by simply placing the stake into the hole, OR you can sink an 18" piece of PVC pipe in the ground. 1 per "stake" for as many stakes as you need. Mark a spot on the standing stake(s) at 4 feet. Shooters stand at 25 yards, and on command they try to "cut" their assigned stake by shooting holes through it. IF your club doesn't allow fast reloading, then use two stakes, and five person teams, each member steps up and takes one shot. The brick at the top helps the stake to break when enough wood has been shot away, AND helps it stay in the hole in the ground if some water has pooled inside the hole.

2) All of my target steel has two hanging points. So I can hang them by chains. What is fun, as it bothers the shooters no end...is I bolt two large plates inverted on a 4x4x6 wooden post, with a gap between them, and hang a third plate to the rear of the two on the post. They have to shoot between the two larger plates to hit and "ring" the plate behind. Hit either of the larger plates and you get a "thunk!". Hit the center plate and it gives a satisfying "ping" and swings a bit. Not exactly cheap, but you don't need to use AR500 armor if the targets are only used for muzzleloaders and round ball.


3) IF you want biodegradable targets...but don't want to use bio-clay, clay birds..., You can make the targets any shape and size out of whole wheat flour and water, with a little bran. Just leave a hole in them so they can be hung on a nail in a tree or post downrange. Use orange or red food coloring not paint on these. It's 3 parts flour to 1 part bran, and add water (and food color if you wish) to make a stiff dough. Roll out and cut into shape. Poke holes in them with a fork to help with drying and dry at 200 degrees in an oven for about an hour, maybe two. They will break up when hit, and the bits and pieces won't hurt any critters that munch on them after the match is over and the humans have departed. So because you can make them any shape, they are more fun (imho) than always shooting round bio-clay birds. The drawback is you need some dedicated bakers to produce a bunch of these for a match.

LD

 

[Ames]

Reverse the numbers on a standard ringed target. Hitting the bull scores a zero. To get a high score you have to have the biscuits to aim at the outer 10 ring. Hitting just outside the outer ring will score zero as well because that shot missed the target completely.
Harder than it looks.

 

[Grimord]

More biodegradable targets: Potatoes hung from a string using drywall screws to hold them.
Carrots hung the same as above. (difficult target as your gun must be on for windage).
Charcoal briquets hung using the dry wall screws. Necco wafers or animal crackers for close shots.
loli pops stuck in a log at 25 yards, and for a real challenge for a close shot try aspirin tablets taped to a board.

 

[sawyer04]

We take charcoal briquets and hang by a string at different heights on the trail walk, Use live squirrels most of the time, then have a squirrel fry. Going to try the lolli pops sounds good.

 

[Grenadier1758]

Wish my eyes were as good as they once were. At a match with the lollipop targets, I regularly shot the stick and the whole lollipop went flying in the air. They refused to count the hits since I didn't shatter the lollipops. Wish I had those eyes back.

 

[buickmarti]

Going to have the 4H kids chop down the cherry tree ( 8' 2x4 stuck 2 feet in the ground with a red line painted 3' up the board) tomorrow. 50 yards with 50 cal. 10 shots is my guess for best one.

 

[pa woods roamer]

Going to have the 4H kids chop down the cherry tree ( 8' 2x4 stuck 2 feet in the ground with a red line painted 3' up the board) tomorrow. 50 yards with 50 cal. 10 shots is my guess for best one.

Wood Shims , with a hole drilled in the middle of the thin end, and hang them from a piece of string. On a windy day, they will twist and spin and drive the shooters nuts...He He...

 

[Versanaut]

Reverse the numbers on a standard ringed target. Hitting the bull scores a zero.

I especially like this idea. I saw one in the postal matches where you had 5 shots to shoot the 4 edges of the paper and one for the center.

I like the Framed string and brick & 2x2 idea as well! How many well aimed 45-54 caliber shots would break one? We don't speed load, but I could see this as a 5 or 10 shot string.. Points for each ball left over... Can amend the distance to make it work out.

 

[Loyalist Dave]

and brick & 2x2 idea as well! How many well aimed 45-54 caliber shots would break one? We don't speed load, but I could see this as a 5 or 10 shot string.. Points for each ball left over... Can amend the distance to make it work out.

There are lots of variations.

You can have two "stake" positions, and several teams. With say eight, 5-shooter teams, you get four matches against two stake positions in the initial round (and you have 40 shooters beginning the match...not too shabby). Then two matches from the four teams that won (winning = which team cut the stake first) in the first round. When that is done, you have a single pair of teams vs. 1 stake in the final round. Left over shots you use if there is the odd chance of a tie. Standing off-hand at even 15 yards a 2" wide target is pretty hard to hit. THEN if somebody knocks a chunk off the stake that equals 1/2 the width, you have a 1" target at that distance. So it can be pretty entertaining.

You take the team that lost the final match..., and they stand-by while the remaining six teams begin again. The winner of the six team second set of matches shoots against the team standing-by for second second place, and the loser of that match gets third.

LD

 

[Pete G]

Take a regular bullseye target & cut in half.

 

[hangfast]

How about a dueling tree (4 plate) with two shooters "dueling" to see who could knock their plates over to their adversaries side first. It would test marksmanship and reloading under pressure.

 

[dave951]

You really need to go to a North South Skirmish Regional. We shoot as a team and reload on the line just like during Civil War combat. So you can see our matches have a balance between speed and accuracy. There is a saying in the NSSA- you can't miss fast enough to hit anything.

Some of our memorable novelty targets all hanging on string or wire-

plastic Easter eggs filled with flour
cheesy Christmas ornaments
ping pong balls
1/2 in plastic marbles
individual coffee creamers (date expired of course!)
poker chips
playing card on backer- hit on backer +1, on card +2 on bike +5
mustard and ketchup packs on drywall backer
the ladder- imagine 3 pieces of wood like ladder rungs between two wires, gotta breakem all, fastest time wins.
ceramic tile (oughtta see them get hit by a 69 smoothie)
surgical gloves filled with water, all fingers but one tied to glove, guess which finger extended.....
junkyard- all manner of stuff from trash can
the Stake- piece of wood suspended between wires, gotta cut the wood in half, clock's running, no pressure, fastest time wins.
poker shoot- put deck on sheet of drywall face down, everybody shoots five cards, best hand wins.

I'm going to have to brag on my 85yo dad here. In the event with 6 ping pong balls and 6 marbles, he got all 6 ping pong balls and 4 of the 6 marbles with an 1863 Sharps carbine. His entire squad only hit the other 2 marbles.

 

[spudnut]

We did citrus fuits once, nicest smelling targetsj I ever shot

 

[Brokennock]

Haven't tried it, the idea just came to me, but, how about a "bark the squirrel target," based on the squirrel hunting technique of hitting the tree so close to the squirrel that the concussion kills it? Tape a clay pidgeon, or similar, to a target paper (maybe graph paper?) and the winner is the shooter who can come the closest to the fragile target without breaking it.

For what it is worth, with shooters who do most of their shooting on a regular range at fairly standard targets, I find they often are challenged to hit odd shaped unsymmetrical targets, that target can be bigger than the bullseye they normally hit consistently with ease, but, depending on how their gun is sighted in, they have a hard time figuring out where to hold.

How about a standard bowling pin match. Maybe at 30 yards instead of the 30 feet we usually shoot them with unmentionable pistols. Old pins are usually cheap, sometimes free, from bowling alleys when they change out pins. It would be the slowest bowling pin match ever, but, should be fun. Accuracy and reloading would be tested. I would even keep the "man on man," format to keep the match moving. One shooter at a time using a timer and recording the time it takes for each shooter to clear 5 pins would drag on.

 

[SamTex1949]

Lots of fun ideas here ! Im trying to recall one were we hung a 6 pack of beer by strong string and had to shoot a string but not break any containers, anyone hitting a container bought for all after the shoot ! Also here is a target we used at the Alamo muzzleloading Gun club back in 70s, 3 shots either L2R or R2L your choice , I won !!

 

[Versanaut]

Some more great ideas here. There aren't many of us in our club. The size waxes and wanes with the season (FL). We typically only have 4 to 6 show. I'd be hesitant to put too much time pressure on some of our posse.

Haven't tried it, the idea just came to me, but, how about a "bark the squirrel target," ...
... I find they often are challenged to hit odd shaped unsymmetrical targets, t

One of our guys talks about barking squirrels all the time.. I'll take your idea and see what we can gin up. Too funny and so true about the shapes! I find most folks don't like 'horizontally' oriented targets (The battleship target) Harder to align that front post!

Any other paper ideas like SamTex suggested?