Author: Craig Boddington

Craig Boddington was the senior contributing editor of our modern gun and ammunition caliber dictionary. Craig was involved in the development and testing of many of these and writes from first hand experience. This dictionary was written exclusively for Wholesale Hunter with unique information found nowhere else.

Shooting Groups in Summertime

Summer is the Perfect Season to Improve Your Accuracy and Technique by Shooting Groups

Turkey season—and its ridiculously early mornings—is finally behind us, so it’s time to catch up on sleep! Unfortunately for hunters, just about all other hunting seasons are behind us as well. Fishing may be good, but for me, the summer doldrums offer a good time to get some serious shooting done.

It doesn’t matter much where your interest lies; all shooting is good practice, and all shooting is fun. Whether you’re into rolling cans, punching paper, ringing steel, or breaking clays, it’s all good! The summer is also a great time to take your kids to the range—with school out, you’ll have plenty of opportunities to teach them how to be safe shooters and to show them how much fun shooting can be.

I particularly enjoy summer shooting sessions. The long daylight hours let me take my time, and in the summer I’m usually not in a big rush to get a rifle ready for a hunt. I can work on loads and take my time shooting groups, and in between I can plink with a .22, bone up on handgun skills, and throw some clays. This month, I’m going to show you how you can make the most of your summer at the range by shooting groups.

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The Creedmoor Craze

Suddenly everybody wants one…and most manufacturers produce them!

In my 40-year career in this business, I’ve seen a lot of cartridges come and go. The introduction of a new cartridge is usually accompanied by serious marketing efforts, but they don’t always work, and success seems a bit random even though most cartridges work as advertised. I’ve seen a fair number of good cartridges do poorly right out of the starting gate, and I’ve seen cartridges enjoy immense popularity even though they’re similar to good cartridges that are already on the market. The 6.5mm Creedmoor is an anomaly, though—I don’t recall seeing a cartridge that sort of rolls along for a full decade and then skyrockets into popularity.

Photo by Craig Boddington
With a long, aerodynamic bullet the Creedmoor case pretty well maxes out a 7.62×51 (.308 Winchester) AR-10 magazine—but it fits and it feeds!

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Extending Your Range Limits in Practice and in the Field

Range Limits: Longer Than Ever, But Still Not Unlimited
(Craig Boddington)

 

In recent years I’ve done more long-range shooting than ever before. Ringing steel with relative ease at a thousand yards is not only fun, but also a huge confidence builder.

Years ago I did a lot of prairie dog shooting, which provides a fantastic opportunity for field practice. The target is tiny, and it doesn’t take much wind to blow the bullet clear off the mound, let alone off the varmint. And since prairie dog country is rarely calm, this is a great way to learn to read wind. If you can consistently hit prairie dogs at a couple hundred yards, big-game animals will pose little challenge at considerably longer distances.

Wyoming prairie dogJPG
In years gone by Boddington did a lot of prairie dog shooting. The target is small and the high plains are usually windy; he rates shooting small varmints in open country as some of the very best training for field shooting at distance.

 

I view range practice similarly. In a range setting, if you can ring steel consistently at 800, 900, or 1000 yards you will gain a lot of invaluable confidence in yourself and your equipment. Shooting targets at extreme range prepares you for field shooting at longer ranges, and shooting at actual distances is the only way to accomplish this. “Extending your range envelope” is a phrase I like. However, I don’t believe ringing steel at long range enables one to ethically shoot at game at similar distances.

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