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Are there any clays facilities with courses set up to simulate grouse and quail hunting, where all of the shots are 25 yards or less?...sorta like skeet in the woods...

IIRC there used to be a clays setup called Quail Walk that was supposed to simulate Quail hunting....sans the pooches of course. Haven't heard of anything like it for years. Don't worry about long shots ed.....most range owners only set up feel good targets to avoid hurting feelings (and ensuring repeat business).

Our course down here has long and short targets. One could skip the long targets and just shoot the short ones.

Elk Creek has three courses. Two which are setup like hunting conditions with a lot of gimme targets. Those are for beginners or people more interested in high scores than increasing their shooting ability.

Their third course is setup with targets which can humble you at times. Small windows in the woods, high quartering targets with a cant to them, long distance targets or my favorite a rabbit target which is charging and is only in view for a very small time until it is so close you just have no chance to hit it.

Point is since Sporting Clays has no hard and fast target rules like Trap or Skeet the only limitations on targets are terrain and imagination. Clubs will change targets if you can make a suggestion that sounds interesting. That charging rabbit was a suggestion that people love to hate. New targets always add interest and clubs like keeping shooters interested.

Here in Amarillo we shoot crazy. It is like quail coming out of a plum thicket and grouse leaving a tree, and NOT easy.

Skeet/Trap overlay

Shoot doubles from the 16 yard line at stations 1,2,3,4,5 and from the skeet station 8 referees mark ( half way between trap post 3 and station 8 skeet, and then a single just below station 8, the trap station 3 side of station 8.

Double are thrown from the skeet houses.

First double is Trap 16 yard station one, high house taken first
Second double is same station low house taken first.

From the time you close the gun, you have a short grace period and then the 0 to 3 second delay for the pair to be released.

You do not say pull, never seen that said in hunting

The pullers job is to be STINKY.

Low gun.

When you first try it, you may want mounted gun and Pull just to orient yourself to the game

Mike

https://images.app.goo.gl/QQvJjWc35ENPcM8Y9

p.s. gotta give credit where credit is due,
JOE WOOD shot the last perfect score that I know of

There are hundreds nationwide.

They�re only shortcoming, is that they are easy.

They are great to build up your game when you�re a beginner or rusty, but they leave you under skilled for the more difficult presentations.

Which is fine if you�re just a casual shooter, but if you move into the competitive arena , you�ll understand what I said.

They become a bit of a bottleneck for clubs, because they�re not hard enough for the tournament shooters, and they get a bit boring for the non-tournament shooters that shoot regularly.

And clubs are in the business of selling clay targets, so when people quit buying, the revenue is not there.

A common solution to this conundrum, is a heavy investment in automated traps, 4 to 6 per station, at about $3000 per unit.

ed good

As to skeet/trap overlay fields in New Hampshire??

It appears that the Major Waldron Sportsman Association does,
are they still functional?

Club Type: Public/Member
Contact: Bob Sherwood or Dave Landry
Location: 339 Franklin Pierce Highway Barrington, NH 03825
Phone: (603) 742-6866
Website: http://www.majorwaldron.com
Club Hours:
Skeet - Sunday 9am -1PM / Tuesday 5PM (spring to fall) Trap - Saturday 9am -1pm / Wednesday 5P (spring to fall) Five stand Saturday 9am - 1pm Open to members and non-members


https://www.claytargetsonline.com/location/major-waldron-sportsmens-association/

https://www.claytargetsonline.com/new-hampshire/

Mike

skeet, thanks for info...re major waldron club...

type of course i am looking for may not exist...

clapper, it is been my observation that competitive shooters dont do well in the grouse woods, where shots are more instinctive... and unpredictable...and it works vice versa...low gun skeet seems to be the best practice for grouse shooting...

but alas, as grouse shooting in thick cover seems to be a sport of the past these days, i was hoping there were clays courses set up in areas where grouse used to be...where us old bird hunters could go and try to simulate the glory of times gone by...

the northeastern states own thousands of acres of wonderful grouse covets, aka state game lands...problem is, grouse are on the edge of extinction...it would be nice if the states converted some of those covets to clay shooting facilities, staffed by game wardens who have nothing much to do these days, except patrol for deer and turkey poachers...and harass fishermen....

Ed, I don�t know anything about the gun clubs in New Hampshire.

But I do know the safety parameters that sporting clays range operators have to operate under if they are going to allow the public to shoot on their ground.

Grouse walks, quail walks, require very careful attention to safety, as you have people walking with loaded guns down the tree lined path.

That works OK in the woods, but on the gun range it carries safety problems with it.

Additionally, the gun knows where the traps are. At least the second time he walks down the lane. So, 20 yard shots with an open choke shot gun that you know where the targets are coming from, they get pretty easy pretty fast.

And that doesn�t sell tickets.

Same with sitting in a boat, climbing up on a stand, or any of the other more in usual set ups clubs offer.

Oddly, shooting at incoming driven targets is almost as rare as a grouse walk, because, the clubs don�t want clay targets (or their fragments) sailing past the stations. Yet in the UK, a club couldn�t survive without them. Go figure.

clapper, simulating grouse shooting could have some safety and liability issues, which most likely is why such courses do not exist...

like the old saying says, if it is fun, it is probably dangerous or illegal, or both...

You sound like just another one of a myriad of non-competitive shooters who make up crap to feel better about their missing. Tell us more details about your observations, ed.

SRH

Stan I was purposefully avoiding that remark.

I don�t even think Ed shoots.

Ernie Hausmann of Hausmann's Hidden Hollow Sporting Clays in Friendsville, PA caters to upland hunters, primarily those who shoot ruffed grouse and woodcock. The type of traps and targets they throw in wooded and brushy areas of his courses and called "hunters clays" because of their close simulation of actual bird hunting situations.

I'm a member of two of the three clubs that host the Wisconsin Iron Man. 400 targets, 4 different courses. The two where I've shot a lot, since they're located in northern Wisconsin, have plenty of trees. No problem simulating grouse shots. Matter of fact, shooters will occasionally encounter a grouse or two as they go around the course. The thing about courses like that is that they can be challenging without a lot of long shots. Think short windows--which is also the name of the game when you're hunting grouse and woodcock.

The Iron Man is interesting in that the higher class shooters don't dominate the entries. Although there's no shortage of them, there were more Hunter Class shooters this year than any other class. Matter of fact, out of the 290 entrants, there were more Hunter Class (95) than there were M, AA, and A combined (89).

It's not easy to set up courses that are sufficiently challenging for serious competitive shooters while not scaring away those who are there just for the fun of it. But the Wisconsin Iron Man clubs are located in a relatively sparsely populated part of the state, yet still succeed in drawing around 300 shooters every year.

L, that sounds like a lotta fun shooting...

Dam, did make the trip down to hausmann's years ago...it was in september, as i recall and it was the first year of his ne pa sxs shoot...set up a table of sxs guns for sale, shot the course, met some good guys...had fun, made new friends, did not sell any guns, still have the hat...

I work it as a volunteer at one of the clubs. Shooters do seem to enjoy it. Personally, a round of 100 is usually enough for me in a day. Especially since one of the two days involves driving the 60 miles that separate the two clubs. The third club has two courses, so that's an easier day.

What would make a course more interesting is including a few stations with a live quail in a pigeon trap.

nah...killin aint my thang no mo...

an killin jes fur fun...well dats jus wasteful an crual...

Understand that,
To each his own, sure wish we could do
catch and release as I do fish

Do you think that you will try Crazy,
or was that a hypothetical question?

Mike

Wait, Ed, no one said you have to shoot at the quail.

crazy sounds too crasy for me...

Wut?!

Glad someone forget to tell these grouse that last year





There is a Pa. SGL not far at all from Hausmann's that holds a few birds.



That is the furthest East I hunt back in the Northern Tier of Pa. Woodcock flights can be hit or miss depending on the year. I would take my son back "home" for youth bird and deer season and looking at the date on the picture it was 2004. Hausmann's hadn't opened yet or was just getting ready to. We would go down to Rock Mountain for sporting clays. Been a few years since I have been back East.



Larry I'm guessing there aren't a lot of SxS guns at the Ironman? Thinking about doing it next year. This year on the Thursday before the weekend of the Great Northern I did the $100 all you can shoot with a pretty good sized group of guys. Shot 350 rounds with my Win 23 20 ga. and was physically and mentally whipped when I was done. But believe could do 200 a day. Have an ISIS recoil reducer on my Dickinson 12 ga. and that may be the way I go although the Win 23 obviously works well for me and clays too. Then again I'm not getting any younger...

Getting ready to pack up and go shooting this morning. Yesterday a Sportsman club setup traps and threw clays for youth and new hunters. Very soft targets. At day break the evil trap setters will show up and crank the springs but more importantly use background, sun and trees to make the birds much more difficult. But still shootable, although that is open to debate by some. I do know that it will be a great time, and grouse opener is a month away.

Ed, some of the guys that I shoot with that exclusively hunt Ruffed grouse, drill on the skeet field.

What they do is hold their shotgun in a low gun ready position, and then call for the bird, with the intention of shooting it as fast as they can, before the Center stake. That�s sort of snap shooting prepares you pretty well for the quick shots in the woods. Our club allows you to do it anywhere on the skeet field that you want to stand as long as there aren�t any other people on that field.

You are however prevented from stepping past of the pads of station eight toward the center steak so from the furthest out line of station 8, to 4 or 5 yards outside the arc of the normal stations.

If you can bust a couple hundred rounds before they hit the Center stake in practice with the low gun preseason and you continue to shoot that way through the season you�ll be in the 30% plus kill rate for your Ruffed Grouse.

Remember, 10 birds pointed
4 shots presented
1 kill

That�s nearing elite status.

agreed, "low gun skeet seems to be the best practice for grouse shooting..."

those of you in mi, wi and mn who are lucky to still have enough birds to hunt...enjoy... and do post pictures of your time in the woods with your doggie friends...

OK, Ed, gotta ask

You wanted a course to help shoot grouse and quail, but you do not hunt anymore.

So a few suggested local clubs to shoot clays.

But you said that would not suffice or was crasy.

What are you really wanting?

Mike

You're correct on that, Cold Iron. The last time I worked a station at the Iron Man, I don't think I saw more than 2 or 3 sxs. There are quite a few of us who live in that part of WI and shoot sxs pretty much exclusively. We shoot SC at both Medford and Wausau, but several of us are usually working the Iron Man as volunteers.

skeet: like ah said in the beginning...

i am looking for a place to shoot skeet like targets...but, in the woods...and with three throwers, one at three points of the compass w, s, and e, instead of just high house, low house...and of course, a programmable electronic release controller that would throw birds randomly, without calling "pull"...with an optional beeper alarm for the trap about to be activated...sorta like ah doggie on point...

the only consistency would be that shooters would shoot only two rounds from stations 1 thru 7, twice, for a total of 28 shots...with no station 8, for the safety of others...

sounds like fun, eh watt?

and speaking of grouse...

what is the situation in the pacific nw...

are there enough birds left out there to make hunting worthwhile?

did get to visit newport, wa, north of spokane around 2000...

lots of grouse hanging out in gigantic evergreens...