Whittington Center

[Don McDowell]

There's a real question in the shooting ranks about how well the Whittington staff is taking care of the target ranges.. There was an awful lot of weed growth on the target butts on the Tubb range that caused a bit of problem.
Here's a view from the 300 yd line


Here's what it looked like from the target platform, as you can see spotting bullet strikes was a bit of a problem.

[Kurt]

Don I shot on that range and I thought it was pretty good compared to the ranges here in the Midwest short of Lodi that has heavy green grass on the back stops where you only see a impact if you catch the grass moving. At least at the Whittington you can see the low hits when the dust kicks up. Around here you might see some green sod fly up. Maybe>

[Don McDowell]

Kurt, those weeds were waist high or a bit higher. You couldn't get the low or side hits very well in the midrange, and on the Creedmoor it was virtually impossible. That's why they changed the system on target pulling and put two people on a target. At one point we had 3 people on the target and couldn't find the hits. It was pretty terrible, I know it affected scores, because if you had a bad wind switch in the middle of the scoring string, getting back on the target would liked as not take the rest of your scoring string.
If you look at the 1000 yd scores, there's quite a number of expert and master class shooters with 30-40 pts..

[Kurt]

A little weed spray in he spring would do a lot of good there. That would be a hour job maybe for one man.

[Don McDowell]

Yup, if they'ld of took those 5 employee's ,give them each a gallon jug of the premix roundup from Tractor supply , 2 hours time those weed's would not of been a problem from any of the groups that shot there and complained about them..

[Ironramrod]

Mulhern could have the whole job done in probably 10 minutes. One pass down each berm w/ a spray plane on a calm morning and it should be a done deal. A good prairie dog shoot would be a lot more fun than shooting in a national match in a weed patch like that; that is really inexcusable.

Regards

[bruce moulds]

don't miss the target.
never fails.
keep safe,
bruce.

[Kurt]

Ya Bruce there is no excuse to miss a 7 MOA frame LOL

[J.B.]

don't miss the target.
never fails.
keep safe,
bruce.

... For sure...but not much good if the wind is taking you off into the scrub though. We've one range with similar 'attributes' down here. For many years...whomever was lucky/ good enough to hit the plate and had a good placement call, stayed on the plate. If however...your bullets were high/low or left/right... it took a minor miracle to spot fall of shot. Not good for novices to get interested in...and very frustrating for the more experienced. Doesn't really reflect the true skills of the shooters who do compete either. Thankfully this year the mound had very little vegetation on it...and the ground was 'as dry as a dead dingoes d***er'. Some good spotters kept most everyone on target and it was a close one. Seeing this sort of 'lack of detail' on a range of this status seems a shame. Roundup and a short time under a hat would have this fixed.
J.B.

ps. ..I'd still like to give it a go though... maybe one day

[Don McDowell]

don't miss the target.
never fails.
keep safe,
bruce.

Yeh that's good advice, but how many places have you ever shot that from 900 yds with a right to left wind at around 5 mph, and the mirage agreeing, have you had to put in 1 1/2 minute left to get into the 7 ring at 3 oclock? Then have the wind roll over, the mirage at the top of the target running left to right, the mirage at the bottom going right to left and the wind flags on the 600 yd berm laying down and the flags at 300 pointing at each other, and the one in front of the 200 yd line pointing straight away?
When ever someone thinks they got this long range stuff all figured out about all they need do is go shoot the Tubb range at the Whittington..