Sporting clay courses, woods walk for smoothbore shotgunners?

[Gkarp429]

I did a search and most of the recent posts that include a reference to shooting sporting clay courses were posted by yours trully. Haha.
So, I thought I would start a thread re shooting sporting clay courses with our muzzleloaders.
I think that shooting muzzleloading smootbores at 5 stand does not work, unless you are with a group of all muzzleloaders. The pace does not work.
Probably the same for trap, and at trap, alot of the shots are too far out for barrels that aren’t really choked beyond modified.
Also, there seems to be interest on the forum regarding muzzleloading side by sides.
Unfortunately hunting seasons are short and it would a shame to see those guns sit in a closet waiting for next year.
These sporting clay courses that are obviously new to me, seem perfect for muzzleloading.
You can walk and shoot the course at your own pace. You can select the station you want to try. Don’t have do do them all. Targets come from many directions and angles. It involves loading from the bag. It’s excellent exersize. And at 38 to 52 cents per clay, most courses don’t charge any other fee to shoot, it’s fairly cheap.
Whether your shooting a Fowler with wasp nest and swan shot or a percussion or flintlock shotgun,
it’s great fun, challenging, and an opportunity to shoot your muzzleloader at moving targets! It’s like a woods walk for smoothbore shotgunning
Give it try. And let us know how you did. Sorry for rambling.

Greg

 

[Rock Home Isle]

Get a couple guys with smoothbores, and hit a sporting clays course…to me it’s a woods walk for smoothbores. I go every summer multiple times…it really makes a noticeable difference.

 

[rafterob]

We used to shoot at thrown clays from a table top machine at our range but then the owner decided we weren't supposed to do that. We had an opportunity to then use a shotgun range where they had a couple of stations off to the side that were under-used. We would shoot at bids thrown from a single house. This worked well. Since some guys were shooting single barrel or smoothbores, we would shoot one clay at a time. I am setting up a shoot at another club and we are going to try Skeet. I will report back after that happens.

 

[biliff]

Our club has skeet, trap, 5-stand and sporting clays, all set up on a key system with automatic pullers. The skeet and trap are voice activated, the 5-stand and sporting use push button controllers with the option of setting a time delay. Basically you can go out and shoot by yourself on your own schedule. Makes it nice for muzzleloaders.

 

[nhmoose]

Ones my buddy shoots at said no ML they slow it up to much this in ME and NH

 

[Sparkitoff]

Most of the courses I see set up for ML's are 20-rounds.....

 

[Ninering62]

Most of the courses I see set up for ML's are 20-rounds.....

I didn't know that. I've shot a lot of sporting clays, but never with my BP shotgun. Nor have I ever seen or even heard of a woods walk sporting clay course for BP shotgunners. Thats really cool & I'd love to go to one. I can easily see ( after being a ML shooter for 35yrs ) why the ML course would be a 20 round instead of the normal 50 round course. It would take 2 dang days to complete with ML's. I use to shoot around 8K 12 rounds a yr just between trap, skeet & sporting clays, I'd love to do all that now with my Pedersoli BP12 ga SxS.. He!!, I'd love to be able to afford to shoot like that nowadays.

 

[andy52]

I do this on a regular basis at the sporting clay club I shoot at. The only thing they ask is that if a group comes in with modern firearms you let them shoot through due to the time taken to load our type of guns...

 

[Rock Home Isle]

Most of the courses I see set up for ML's are 20-rounds.....

Is that 20 stations…or 10 stations at 2 rounds per station?

 

[Sparkitoff]

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