November Newsletter
Miramichi Sportsmens Club
The Miramichi Sportsmens Club was very busy in all factions during the past year and by the end of October we had 127 members. There was a lot of activity on the rifle range most every weekend this this past summer and fall. Many members also used the range during weekdays and evenings with a number of shooters skiing in during the winter months (pretty dedicated).
We made a number or improvements to the club during the year. This summer we had fill hauled in to make easier access to the target areas along the left side of the range. Denis constructed a number of shooting stations inside the building, at the pistol range. This allows shooters to shoot without any danger of getting hit with another shooters spent casings. Distance markers were added and a number of unique stands were constructed for different types of handgun shooting. Ray McCray designed an oscillating plate with an installed Skeet machine so we could use it to shoot Trap. Quite an interesting concept! We also ran a power cable to the Sporting Clays tower so electric trap machines can be operated without an additional generator. The skeet faction also purchased a second-hand lawn tractor to keep the grounds groomed.
There was an IPSC course given this summer at our range and in October 14 shooters attended our first 2-day IPSC shoot. Dennis Chamberlain and Doug Getty did a great job organizing and running this shoot. In the future, we hope to have more shooters participate in this very interesting and challenging type of handgun shooting.
The Shotgun faction also enjoyed a great year. Late in May the annual spring Sporting Clays Shoot was held with shooters coming from around the Maritimes to participate. This shoot was well supported by our members and everyone had a great time. Regular club shoots were held every Sunday and Wednesday all spring and summer. Starting in October our regular shoots were scheduled for Sundays because it was too dark to shoot in the evenings. We also had a combined faction shoot in August where all who attended had a great time.
Early this year we had Jim B. develop and maintain a new web site for our club. We post all upcoming gun club events and then post the results. We had a total of 1587 hits on the web site since February. Of these, there were 719 unique hits. Pretty good for its first year in service! This tool should really benefit the club in coming years.
We spent the latter part of the summer doing the paperwork to have our range boundaries expanded. We have received the needed paperwork from the provincial government to allow this to happen. We are now having the ranges surveyed to include the new boundaries. This project should be completed early in the New Year.
We have purchased a new lock for the main gate, which will be installed on January 1, 2007. Members will receive their new key when they renew their membership. The new keys will be numbered to ensure only Gun club members have access to the ranges.
You can renew your membership by filling out the form and mailing it to the gun club. You can also renew your membership at: Miramichi Volkswagon - see Paul Nowlan; Robie's Store – Alexis Robichaud. Note: Membership Forms are also available on our web site .