November/December Newsletter – Dorman Range, by Ron Card, roncard@shaw.ca

November/December Newsletter – Dorman Range, by Ron Card, roncard@shaw.ca

Christmas is slowly sneaking up on us. Where did that year go?

We have had lots of activity at the range since the last newsletter. I will highlight some of the

events. The photographs will give you a good view of what went on.

On October 12 we hosted a group of 8 young people, both boys and girls, and introduced them

to trap shooting. They were students from District 69, participating in the ROAMS program.

Details follow:

ROAMS –

Darin Carmichael, the teacher, has had other students up to the range in the past.

Rivers Oceans and Mountains School (ROAMS)

Secondary School Apprenticeships

School District 69 (Qualicum-Parksville)

(250) 240-0662 (cell)

ROAMS is an outdoor career education and leadership program that introduces a multitude of

outdoor experiences (rafting, surfing, climbing, fishing, kayaking, and ski/snowboarding)

combined with industry recognized certifications: OFA 3, Radio Operator, Bronze Cross, Food

Safe, World Host, and more. The end result, through mentorship and work experience with

certified guides, develops students that have an appreciation for guide operations and the safety

and responsibility that must occur in the field.

The weather on the 12th was perfect. Darin brought another group of students on the 26th but

the weather was absolutely terrible on that day. It didn’t seem to deter the young people,

though.

The boys and girls enjoying the shooting . . .

There are future Club members here. (I just had to throw in the last photograph to show how

beautiful a rainstorm can be.)

On Oct.26 it rained very hard. There were very few of our regular shooters that braved the

rain but the new group of kids were out in raingear and enjoyed themselves immensely.

Bob Davenport provided guidance and direction on gun safety and shooting skills. The group

started at the patterning board, then went on to the shooting positions. Bob gave them

individual instructions. As is our Club policy to support youth shooters, we supplied them with

shells and clay pigeons. The group brought along a few shotguns and we loaned them some

others. They were also shown the mechanics of the trap machines and how the machines are

operated and how they get loaded. The kids shot the afternoon, and ended up with an Annie

Oakley. The kids became quite good and they had lots of fun.

“When you’re dead, you don’t know that you’re dead. It is only difficult for others. It’s the

same way when you’re stupid.”

October 22 – Sporting Clays

The overall scores were much lower, even for the good shooters.

Left: Richard Crossley, Dwayne Fujima and Barry Kallies on Station 2. Centre: Shooters on

Station 3. Right: Jim Cholin and Bill McNeilly at Station 5.

Left: One of the machines at Station 5. The column of red birds were the “muligans”. Centre

and Right: Shooters at the “sand pit”, Station 6.

Left: Shooters at Station 8. Centre: This is part of the “clean up” activities where the shell hulls

and cardboard boxes are picked up after the shoot. “Help” is always appreciated. Right: A

bald eagle, surveying his kingdom.

We had 63 shooters, with a few more in the afternoon; the lower 3 stations were a disaster for

most of us. The highest scores for the lower 5 stations were Steve MacDonald and Bob

Cerenzia with 36’s.

The scores for the upper 5 stations were much better with Fraser Campbell getting a 44; Bob

Cenenzia getting a 42, and Jamie Morgan and James Wicks getting 41’s. We will reduce the

degree of difficulty for next time. (After the food bank sporting clays, on November 26, see

below, many people will not agree with us.)

The high overalls were Bob Cerenzia with a 78; Fraser Campbell with a 77 and Steve MacDonald

and James Wicks with 76’s.

On October 24 we received two different shipments of clay pigeons from Caldwell Industries

and shotgun shells from Prairie Shot Ltd., Carberry, Manitoba. The unloading and storage was

helped/assisted by Andy Lemmon (our illustrious forklift driver), Dave Vaton and Rigger Wilson.

Left: Clay pigeons stacked in our warehouse. Centre: Delivery truck from Caldwell Industries

and extra pallets being returned from the previous shipment. Right: Our working crew (Rigger,

Dave & Andy), as noted above.

The shipment of shells totalled 495 cases on 5 pallets. This order was worth $35,000 and it

provided shells for the Club, Club members, and members from other Island Clubs. It is

rewarding when we can collectively help to reduce the cost to our shooting fraternity with a bulk order.

See photos below. Our fork lift was a real asset to accomplishing the unloading. Thanks Andy.

Left: Pallets of shells stacked in our warehouse. Centre: The pallets were very quickly reduced

in size as members picked up their order. Right: Hey . . remember summer? This is my

daughter displaying a huge sun star that made its way into a crab trap.

“I hate it when the voices in my head go silent. I never know what they are planning.”

Carroll, our former caretaker, has found a place in Parksville to move to. We thank her for the

years of service that she and her former husband put in, taking care of our range. We are in the

process of purchasing her mobile home, and will be doing some upgrades in preparation for our

next caretaker.

On Tuesday, November 1, a hearty crew of 7 sawed up some more logs and stacked the lumber.

John Oregan had pulled the logs out of the woods and stacked them in the field next to the

warehouse. Waste wood was piled up for future disposal. Rain held off until the last half hour,

then only a light rain. Stan Ziolkowski, who brought his portable sawmill, John Oregan, Rigger

Wilson, Phil Nuzam, Dave Vaton, Bob Davenport and myself formed the work crew. Andy

Lemmon provided a delicious lunch. Phil provided his dump truck so that we could haul the

waste wood over to the skeet field area. The sawn timber will be used for repairs around the

range, including replacing some of the walkway decking. Once again, thanks guys!!!!

Photos: Cutting, trimming, and stacking the lumber.

Photos: More photos of the sawmilling process, including handling/cutting some major size

logs.

On Wednesday, November 2, the weather was so bad that there was not a great deal of interest in

shooting. There was a heavy wind, and it rained so hard that we didn’t even set up the equipment. We

drank coffee while we waited for the rain to stop but it never did. We had lakes around the property,

even after John Oregan had filled a lot of the potholes (small lakes?) with gravel.

Our 90-year-old shooter, Bob Urquhart, has kept up his shooting ability. He shot a 25 out of 25, his first

as a 90-year old. This may be a record for our senior shooters.

Don Wilson has ordered, and taken delivery of, 100 turkeys for our Boxing Day & New Year’s Day turkey

shoots. He, plus a few others have loaded up our freezers. Thanks Don (and guys).

100 hams are to come in early December.

Left: Don’s trailer loaded with boxes of turkeys. Centre: A close-up of the turkeys. Right: There were 4

turkeys to a box. We very much appreciate the effort that Don (and Tina) have put into the Club over

many, many years.

“If I had a dollar for every girl that found me unattractive, they’d eventually find me attractive.”

We held our Club trap championships on November 13. The championship was won by Don Tiessen

(again) after breaking a tie with Bob Marr. Each had shot a total of 46 out of 50. The championship was

decided by a shoot-out; 10 shots at 16 yards, 2 at each station. Paul Sanderson and myself came second

with 45 out of 50. No fame for second place!

We rounded out the shooting day with a “Bushwacker”. Shooters line up right at the trap house. The

first person shoots and the second person tries to shoot one of the broken pieces. If he is successful,

the first person gets knocked out of contention and the second shooter goes to the back of the line.

This time, Paul Sanderson and myself were the last remaining shooters. Congratulations to Paul for

keeping me in second place. Apologies to those people who referred to our calendar on our website,

which listed the Club championship on November 27. With the Food Bank sporting clays on the

previous day, we felt that the weekend would be just too busy. (I was remiss in getting an e-mail out to

everybody. Sorry about that.)

Left: Turkey boards available. $2 per circle. They will be shot and the person that has the

highest number of holes in his circle will win a turkey. These boards are available at our

Clubhouse. Centre: Paul Sanderson with his trophy for winning the “bushwacker” shoot. Dave

Weaving is taking my position in giving Paul the raspberry for knocking us all out. Right: Skeet

shooters. They invite everybody to go and try “skeet”. They will give helpful hints on shooting

the clays.

Food Bank Sporting Clays

On November 26 we held our last sporting clays of the year. This shoot was for the local food

bank. We had a successful turnout from people all up and down the Island. There were 82

shooters all-together. Considering that we had the first snowfall of the winter on that day, it

did not seem to deter the shooters.

We had a lot of foodstuffs that people brought along, and we had prizes, some of them

donated by Cabella’s. We donated about 300 lbs of foodstuffs, and $1,642 cash to the food

bank.

Ron Stubbings was HOA (High Overall) at 94 (47 twice). Kelly Lance headed up Class A with an 87. The high for Class B was Dave Upper with an 81. Pat Patterson won Class C with a 78. Larry Gibbons was high in Class D with a 69. Class E was split by Dominic Corrado and Terry Benjamin, each getting 68. Kelly Lance won the “Chondel Annie” bottle of Christmas Cheer. Wholesale Sports gave me a discount on some purchases. As usual, it takes a great deal of effort by a volunteer crew to put on a Sporting Clays event. There is the planning of where the machines are to be located, filling all the houses with birds (which was done on the Thursday), setting up all the equipment, After the event there is the take-down of all the equipment, collecting all the shell hulls and cardboard boxes and disposal of same. Thanks go out to Diane Upper and Phil Charlebois for registration, Andy Lemmon and Joanne for cheffing, Don and Tina Wilson for filling in throughout the year, the setup guys: John Oregan, myself, Barry Kallies, Dwayne Fujima, Stephan Meinke, Dave Upper, Randy Flanagan, Pierre Cloutier, Frank Palmiere, and more.....

Our final event of the year will be the turkey shoot on Boxing Day. See the announcement

below. We will follow this up with another turkey shoot on New Year’s Day. There normally is

a large turnout for these shoots.

Left: Donated foodstuffs. Centre: Prize table including prizes donated by Cabellas. Right:

Station 4, looking out over snow and mud

Left: Snow doesn’t bother me a bit. Centre: Station 1, on the skeet field, with some snow

cover. Right: The rabbit machine at Station 2, with a plastic bag over its head to protect it from

the elements. At least with the snow it was easier to see how much you missed the rabbit by.

Left: Shooters up in the woods, at Station 9. Centre: Ideal piece of equipment to transport the

shotguns back and forth. Right: The warming shack at the skeet field.

HEAR YE! HEAR YE! ANNUAL BOXING DAY TURKEY SHOOT MONDAY, DECEMBER 26TH, 2016

FUN EVENTS FOR AGES 12 TO SENIOR AND ALL SKILL LEVELS TRAP EVENTS: 16 YARD, HANDICAP, AND SLIDER - FOR BEGINNER, INTERMEDIATE AND OPEN CLASS SHOOTERS - PLUS AN ANNIE OAKLEY (50/50 CASH PRIZE) NOVELTY EVENTS: BUSHWACKER, THREE BIRD, LONG BIRD, AND 5 STAND SQUADS OF 5 – A PRIZE TURKEY OR HAM FOR EVERY SQUAD Make up your own squad of equal skill levels. STARTS AT 10:00 AM UNTIL 3:00PM TICKETS: $7.50 PER EVENT (EXCEPT THE ANNIE OAKLEY) FOOD, FUN AND PRIZES EVERYONE WELCOME!!!!! And plan to do the same thing again on JANUARY 1, 2017 – New Years Day – same prizes, lunch available everyone welcome. They do Buddy shoots, Bushwackers and sliders as well as regular 16 yard trap. Coffee is always on – everyone is friendly.

* Trap-shooting (and skeet shooting, where applicable) etiquette: (repeated from last

month)

1. Pick up your empty shells, or even better, if you have an over/under, when you “break” the gun, intercept the shells and put them in your pouch. Remember-somebody has to pick them up 2. When you rotate from position 5 to position 1, acknowledge to the lead shooter that you are ready 3. Break down your cardboard boxes (shells or clay pigeon boxes). It minimizes the space in the recycle bin as well as helping with the clean-up 4. If you are the first shooter listed on the score sheet, it will speed things up if you coordinate the rest of the squad 5. If you are shooting “handicap” and have finished at your station, move the speaker to the yardage that the previous shooter is at. 6. Offer to keep score “Today a man knocked on my door and asked for a small donation towards the local swimming

pool, so I gave him a glass of water.”

And we would like to wish each and every one of you a merry Christmas and we hope that you

have a joyous holiday.