Shoot Suckers

[airedale]

I do quite a bit of shooting especially with rimfire firearms, paper targets are great for testing for the accuracy of a weapon and the accuracy of ammunition. Once I find the optimum combo for a particular firearm, paper targets can get boring for me.  I love plinking at various reactive targets, commercial metal gongs, plates, bells and spinners and I also come up with ideas of my own or borrow from others. Charcoal brickettes, necco wafers, small clay birds, various leftover garden crops etc etc.

A buddy of mine made a suggestion to me about using lollipops aka suckers, said to myself that is a great idea, challenging, cheap, very reactive and no mess to clean up, biodegradable. 

A little late this year to really get at it but I set up a small sucker target with half inch suckers and think this is going to be fun and challenging. 25 yards pretty easy 50 yards you better have better than average accuracy, at 75 and 100 a tack driver will be needed.

Want to add this would work great for pellet and BB guns at shorter ranges.

The prototype

Al

Edited November 30, 2022 by airedale

[Lawdwaz]

Nice idea Al.  

[Grouse]

I have become fond of shooting Ritz crackers at 50 yards.  They react well and I don't have to pick anything up, as the birds will eat all of the pieces in no time.

[Gobbler Chaser]

Cheap orange or green soda in bottles a little shaken and warm hung from branches are fun. Also cans of shaving cream put on a nice show,lol

[Splitear]

This is a fantastic idea Al, I've already shared it with a couple of my 4-H club leaders, and their going to make a target stand for them this week. Thanks for sharing this!

[TACC]

We also use these for our club shooting competition each year.

We only shoot them at 15 yards ,then the championship round is at 25 yards, using rimfire and a timer

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

[airedale]

So after some thought this is the plan for the "Sucker" shooting gallery. This GoSports "Blast" bracket kit uses 2x4s to assemble a completely portable target frame, the length of the 2x4s will determine it's dimensions. Just drill spaced out holes along the top of the cross members to insert the suckers, should work great. The good part is it's versatility and portability to use various types of other targets. Under $60 at Amazon.

My trigger finger is itching.

Al

Edited February 22, 2023 by airedale

[airedale]

I figure I might as well go whole hog and get the reset reactive accessory targets that slide on a cross member and another bag of suckers, 400 for about $20 pretty cheap shooting. 

I am thinking I should be able to hang an archery target on this thing also.

Al

Edited February 22, 2023 by airedale

[wolc123]

I never shot a sucker, but I really enjoyed spearing them, back when it was legal on the local streams.  Murder creek in the town of Newstead was my favorite spot.  The first warm rain in the spring would always bring them up.  

[airedale]

This is the time of year the ice went out on a nearby river I lived next to when I was a Kid. Suckers were the first thing we fished for, all night time fishing off the bank with worms, we used old tires for a bon fire so we could see. Caught quite a few of what they called dogfish too, basically big salamanders. It was a blast.

Al

[airedale]

One of my all time favorite things to do was bowfishing for the Sucker's big brother "Carp", it is Carp that actually got me into archery. I had some ideal shooting back in the day and was at it all summer long. I see there is quite a bit of activity for bowfishing these days, some specialized bows and boats that are set up and equipped for just that.

Al

 

 

[New York Hillbilly]

On 11/30/2022 at 6:21 AM, airedale said:

I do quite a bit of shooting especially with rimfire firearms, paper targets are great for testing for the accuracy of a weapon and the accuracy of ammunition. Once I find the optimum combo for a particular firearm, paper targets can get boring for me.  I love plinking at various reactive targets, commercial metal gongs, plates, bells and spinners and I also come up with ideas of my own or borrow from others. Charcoal brickettes, necco wafers, small clay birds, various leftover garden crops etc etc.

A buddy of mine made a suggestion to me about using lollipops aka suckers, said to myself that is a great idea, challenging, cheap, very reactive and no mess to clean up, biodegradable. 

A little late this year to really get at it but I set up a small sucker target with half inch suckers and think this is going to be fun and challenging. 25 yards pretty easy 50 yards you better have better than average accuracy, at 75 and 100 a tack driver will be needed.

Want to add this would work great for pellet and BB guns at shorter ranges.

The prototype

Al

Hey Al

I have always been pretty efficient at bringing home game enough for me and the family, but never what I would consider a sharp shooter. I guess I never put in enough time to get that accurate. 

My guess is if I tried this, at the end of the session I would be wrapping them back up and handing out to kids next Halloween! lol

[airedale]

It is all about making for fun and my love for shooting. I have some pretty nice firearms and I did not buy them to look at.

Al

[LET EM GROW]

If my 5 year old saw me shooting suckers, he would lose his mind lol. His autistic ways and love for suckers would create a massive meltdown lol. But neat idea.

[airedale]

Got the Go Sports Blast target frame assembled this afternoon, easy peasy, I just have to drill the holes on the bottom rail for the sucker sticks. This is going to work out great for all kinds of reactive target options and will hold my archery target. When the weather starts straightening up the lead is going to fly.

Al

Edited March 3, 2023 by airedale

[Robby]

Lemme move my truck first!

Robby

[airedale]

Had a little change in plans, the last two heavy snows brought down a bunch of limbs and some tree tops. One on the back yard shooting range landed right on top of my 100 yd target pretty much destroying it. So I am going to put the original 4x8 frame I put together above at 100 yds permanently. Picked up another set of target brackets and made a junior 4x4 size that is more portable and can be easily moved around to different ranges for all kinds of different weapons. I will be putting the suckers on this one.

Al

[airedale]

Been so busy I have not had time to do crap, hung my archery target block to the frame above it worked out great and holds it nicely, also put a few suckers in which will be shot with my airguns. 

The big 8 footer will be put up soon, got the chainsaws up and running and have to clear out the 100 yd area from fallen tree tops. I am also going to give these target frames a paint job. I can see this frame is going to be very versatile and accommodate all kinds of targets and shooting.

The good weather is finally here so some fun will be had.

Al

Edited April 11, 2023 by airedale