The death of trap in BC

It's not just trap it's all the shooting sports in Canada. Our club is fortunate to be hanging on but for how long? Our youngest member is 30 and he is one of maybe 4 in the 30-40 year old range that participate. They are with the exception of 1 occasional shooters and have zero involvement outside of shooting a few casual rounds each summer. We probably have 20 members on the clubs FB group for every shooter we have on the range on a given night.
Seems like sitting on a laptop, tablet or phone is how most want to or only can afford to participate in things nowadays. Those of us carrying the load to keep the club doors open, machines maintained, ranges maintained, run shoots etc are all 50-80 years of age and there isn't alot of us at that. I'll keep participating as long as I can and if the club should be unable to continue on while I still can well then I'll hang my guns up with the exception of travelling to the odd larger registered shoot and do more fishing in summer. If I have to give up one of my three favorite hobbies(hunting, fishing, clays shooting) it's going to be a tough call as I like each equally. I guess age, health and finances will dictate which ones suffer and which endures...
 
Economics would be the major factor. I'm well established in my prime earning years and I struggle with the concept of how much my weekly cost will be to practice more than a few rounds daily. Those who are competative in skeet must have deep deep pockets.
 
jckstrthmghty said:
Economics would be the major factor. I'm well established in my prime earning years and I struggle with the concept of how much my weekly cost will be to practice more than a few rounds daily. Those who are competative in skeet must have deep deep pockets.
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This also true of IPSC and even hunting.
After expenses deer meat is about $200 a pound
 
There's more to the story than simply the expense of Trap.
Sporting Clays still seems to be attracting new participants.
One can shoot Trap at a recreational level for a modest price, when compared to a round of Sporting Clays.
 
bunny said:
most shotgunners are shooting sporting clays.
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This is just not correct. The two largest clubs in the GTA that probably throw the most targets (Hamilton GC and TITSC) don't even have sporting clays. It's strictly trap or skeet (or Olympic trap). The other larger clubs like Oshawa and some of others that have sporting still have trap and skeet too.
 
With old-stock Canadians not reproducing and our government bringing 500,000 immigrants per year to increase the population to 100 million, trap shooting, gun culture and hunting are all finished. We are finished, betrayed by our leftists self hating leaders!
 
The influx of people was supposedly to guarantee truedumb would get himself re-elected it not go according to plan . Barely got elected
As for trap and skeet shooting I started in about 73-74 at the height of the game the decline started in the late 90's but since about 2010 has really dropped off
 
Westward1 said:
Skeet is in its death throes in Alberta. Registered shoots can’t make a full squad. Not sure how Sporting is making out..
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We have the only skeet field actually being used for skeet, in a couple of hundred kilometers, and we are stable, but aging. Sporting Clays was growing fast, and is still growing, despite having slowed the growth in our area, due to cost.
 
I will say we are seeing an asian influence with a surprising number of younger ones showing up on weekends.Only bright spot on a dismal landscape.
 
stubblejumper said:
We have the only skeet field actually being used for skeet, in a couple of hundred kilometers, and we are stable, but aging. Sporting Clays was growing fast, and is still growing, despite having slowed the growth in our area, due to cost.
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Our skeet field is in use two evenings a week, we are about two hours from you. I believe Nosehills has a skeet field as well? I know they have trap for sure with doubles capability and is operational as I sold them a Promatic ATA Signature Series machine and a set of Canterbury wireless mics this past winter and they got it installed and operational about a week or so ago and are very happy with how it is performing.
 
10% inflation, 5% interest on $1m mortgage for a starter house...yeah no wonder nobody in their 20-40s participates...don't know how guys have any $ at the end of the month
 
the spank said:
Our skeet field is in use two evenings a week, we are about two hours from you. I believe Nosehills has a skeet field as well? I know they have trap for sure with doubles capability and is operational as I sold them a Promatic ATA Signature Series machine and a set of Canterbury wireless mics this past winter and they got it installed and operational about a week or so ago and are very happy with how it is performing.
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Nosehill does have skeet , and Olds does as well, but nothing around Edmonton at all. We have members coming from Edmonton , because we are the closest skeet field. Tofield still has trap, but Sherwood Park isn't running their field this year, because nobody wants to run the field under the current executive. A new group is steering the Sherwood Park club in a different direction, and the former volunteers, aren't interested in working with them.
 
I'm only in my second week of shooting trap, which I've gone 5 times, only twice has anyone else been there at a very easy to access range in a highly populated area, Stittsville. I don't anticipate anyone else being there today but I'm still going and will continue to do so but I'll have to keep it to 2 rounds a visit if I want to go 3-4 times a week. I'll likely buy a textureVR stock for the ClayVR game on the Occulus to get in the extra rounds needed for the hundreds of shots I need daily to become proficient. Live practice is just too expensive to do anymore, at least for me.
 
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