Last night a friend called to tell me that he read in a local paper that a skeet field has been approved by the county for West of Wetaskiwin. It is supposed to be constructed around highway 20 this spring. He is trying to contact the name listed as the developer. The name posted was not Johnson, but I can only wonder if this is referring to the same facility.
Possible Skeet Field For Sherwood Park
- Thread starter stubblejumper
- Start date
- Location
- Fort St John BC
Was it listed under Carl Brewster? That is who is managing and working on all the aprovals for the range that has been reffered to. There is 3-4 people involved in it. I beleive Carl has been doing the majority of the leg work as i understand.
Yes we are talking about the same range. Hopefully it happens soon, as Camrose is closed for trap and skeet as of today.
Yotarunner
CGN Regular
- Location
- Eastern Alberta
There is also a skeet and 5 stand range at the nose hills gunclub in consort.
the spank
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Planet Earth Wearing My Tinfoil Hat
I find it so hard to believe in the land of wide open spaces and so many sportsman that their are so few skeet ranges and that the few there are seem to be void of shooters? I know from speaking with some of the exec of the SK Sportshooting Assn that they too are suffering drastically with low recruitment of registered skeet shooters. Personally I think the biggest issue is how far and widely scattered the ranges are. I know for myself unlike southern Ontario where a person can go to a multitude of ranges within an hour of their home here you have to travel as much as a full day which means motel rooms, meals and fuel costs are much heavier. It was a major limiting factor for me last year in ATA shooting and the clubs each host about one shoot per season to accommodate each other so that puts an end to multiple shoots at one's home club. When I looked after the ATA shoots years back at The Rockcut Shooting Club I would schedule 4-6 shoots per season and we would do the 3 day notice call in shoots allowed a few evenings each summer as well if a few guys were looking to get enough targets to get classified at the larger shoots. I honestly missed that last summer. As well the skeet director always booked two registered skeet shoots each season and they were generally well attended. The skeet fields were quite busy on most regular shoot days in summer too, much more so than the trap fields but the trap fields were always busier in winter. Just a different crowd I guess?
Water treatment expansion. But we have come to an agreement, and we are open again.
It's all part of the CSSA.
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We have an 18 month deal, which gives us two summers, after that , who knows. The city does not give long term leases.
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BattleRife
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- of No Fixed Address
I had no idea this thread was in here. I don't visit this forum often, so that is probably no surprise.
People will be interested to know that at the SPFGA executive meeting of September 13 the question of the skeet range proposal came up. The proposed range location on the property was described, and we were told that letters of permission were received from adjacent landowners whose properties would be considered part of our shot fall template. Also the CFO inspector had evidently visited the site and stated that he saw no reason a range approval would not be granted. The gentlemen who handles most of our dealings with contractors and equipment purchasing estimated the cost of clearing and leveling the site, building the trap houses and other infrastructure, and buying the trap machines at $60,000. This is well within our means. Then the question was asked, do we want to proceed?
After some discussion, the vote was no, and the skeet range proposal was "shelved". The reason for most members of the executive was that there is virtually no evidence that a skeet range is in demand. We have seen some dedicated advocacy from a single person, whom I presume is the same person as stubblejumper here on the forum. The club president, a regular on the trap range, has asked some members about their interest and a few have said that sure, if there is a skeet range built they would shoot it sometimes, but there has been no convincing outpouring of support. We also saw no plan of how it would operate, what schedule it would be on, or who the volunteers would be to take care of it. This is crucial, as since the death of Les Barry we have been struggling to find volunteers to run the trap facility, and adding in another volunteer-dependant program based on nothing but hope just seemed like a bad idea. Especially since even the Edmonton Gun Club, which had a well established program for years, eventually let their skeet program dissolve due to lack of interest.
After the vote, we had some further discussion about shooting programs at the club. The SPFGA has the shortest program of "organized" shooting events of any club I have ever been a part of, and I think it would be a great thing to have more. But these programs need to be pushed for, and we on the executive need to see that there is a strong cadre of support. It seems inevitable that after a couple of years interest in any events will drop off, therefore a strong level of interest, say from 40-50 people, is probably needed to get a program started.
I would love to see a skeet field at the range, but no way I am going to vote to spend 60 grand of club money to find myself and stubblejumper standing out there all alone, week after week. If people are truly interested put together a petition, get 100 names on it, and get a list of a half dozen volunteers willing to be there every weekend to open it up (or come up with a plan and budget to automate it) and bring it to us again. All the basics are there, and we can afford it, we just need to know someone is going to use the damned thing.
People will be interested to know that at the SPFGA executive meeting of September 13 the question of the skeet range proposal came up. The proposed range location on the property was described, and we were told that letters of permission were received from adjacent landowners whose properties would be considered part of our shot fall template. Also the CFO inspector had evidently visited the site and stated that he saw no reason a range approval would not be granted. The gentlemen who handles most of our dealings with contractors and equipment purchasing estimated the cost of clearing and leveling the site, building the trap houses and other infrastructure, and buying the trap machines at $60,000. This is well within our means. Then the question was asked, do we want to proceed?
After some discussion, the vote was no, and the skeet range proposal was "shelved". The reason for most members of the executive was that there is virtually no evidence that a skeet range is in demand. We have seen some dedicated advocacy from a single person, whom I presume is the same person as stubblejumper here on the forum. The club president, a regular on the trap range, has asked some members about their interest and a few have said that sure, if there is a skeet range built they would shoot it sometimes, but there has been no convincing outpouring of support. We also saw no plan of how it would operate, what schedule it would be on, or who the volunteers would be to take care of it. This is crucial, as since the death of Les Barry we have been struggling to find volunteers to run the trap facility, and adding in another volunteer-dependant program based on nothing but hope just seemed like a bad idea. Especially since even the Edmonton Gun Club, which had a well established program for years, eventually let their skeet program dissolve due to lack of interest.
After the vote, we had some further discussion about shooting programs at the club. The SPFGA has the shortest program of "organized" shooting events of any club I have ever been a part of, and I think it would be a great thing to have more. But these programs need to be pushed for, and we on the executive need to see that there is a strong cadre of support. It seems inevitable that after a couple of years interest in any events will drop off, therefore a strong level of interest, say from 40-50 people, is probably needed to get a program started.
I would love to see a skeet field at the range, but no way I am going to vote to spend 60 grand of club money to find myself and stubblejumper standing out there all alone, week after week. If people are truly interested put together a petition, get 100 names on it, and get a list of a half dozen volunteers willing to be there every weekend to open it up (or come up with a plan and budget to automate it) and bring it to us again. All the basics are there, and we can afford it, we just need to know someone is going to use the damned thing.
Actually I spoke to several members that were very interested in having a skeet field at SPFGA. I myself committed to volunteering to running the field on a two day per week schedule, and a good friend had committed to helping me to run it. I did overhear a couple of executive members that had absolutely no personal interest in skeet stating that there would be no interest in a field, but I belief that their opinions were based on personal bias more than on actually canvasing the members to see who would use it. However, at that point, I pretty much gave up on the field every being built, and it appears that I was correct in that regard. For that reason, I have not bothered to follow up on the topic since.
You are still going to have to do some clearing, you need more target throwers to build a decent field, the shot fall area is similar if you have targets that are flying broadside, and you need to construct lockable enclosures for each target thrower. And you still need a volunteer to run the field. And if you overcome those obstacles, you still have to convince the people that have no interest in any clay sport except trap to approve the expenditure.
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the spank
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Planet Earth Wearing My Tinfoil Hat
Why not put in a skeet/5-stand combination range. The Nanaimo Fish & Game Club did it back in the early 90's when I was out there visiting. It was a great idea. They incorporated the skeet houses into the 5 stand and in the bottom of the high house they installed a rabbit machine and added a few machines around the field. That way the skeet range pulled double duty. I thought it was a great idea! I'd like to do it here but it won't happen until there is a change of the old guard.
