“But you, be strong and do not let your hands be weak, for your work shall be rewarded!” 2 Chronicles 15:7 NKJV
Shooting is one of the hallmark fieldcraft skill sets. While I would say we could make this about firearms or bow the topic will be about firearms today.
How does anyone become competent at a task? It is through time spent training, building muscle memory and familiarity with the skill. Just as you don’t become a skilled baseball player by throwing the ball one time, nor will you become a skilled marksman by going shooting one time.
It is through the mastery of the basics that true skill is built. It is often said that “practice makes perfect”. That’s not exactly accurate unfortunately, it is only through perfect practice that perfection is made. If you practice something incorrectly you create a bad habit, which will take an even longer time to unlearn and become properly trained on. This knowledge can be daunting…how do you start if you have no idea what you are trying to learn? Or how do you assess who you should study under? Just don’t allow it to paralyze you to the point of inaction.
I hunt in boreal forest and it seems to rain most days when I get out in the woods hunting. I got tired of wiping water off of the scope lens and have switched to using a peep sight on my main hunting rifle, and my backup rifle is scoped. The normal distance a shot is taken in my area is well under 100 yards due to the heavy forest, though the logged areas due offer increased visibility. These two factors have made me settle on a peep sighted rifle.
A couple more factors on my hunting rifle set up: I have multiple loads for my rifle: a heavy game load, a medium game load, and a small game or gallery load. This allows me to cover all game I am likely to hunt and encounter in the field. I am sighting it in on a maximum point blank range concept. According to my math, my front sight width is 8.6 MOA and coupled with knowledge of the average sizes of game aminals I can use this for range estimation.
And with this in mind we should decide what our end goal will be and work to make a training plan from there. If I am making a plan for hunting with a rifle I want to be able:
- To hit a stationary coyote, lion, bear, deer, elk out to 250 yards under field conditions with a peep sighted rifle.
- To hit a walking animal at 50 yards.
- To be able to hit a grouse, rabbit, or squirrel in the head with a reduced rifle load out to 25 yards.
So how am I going to train for these goals? I am going to start but figuring out what “field conditions” actually are. Based on my hunting style I am most likey to take a shot from the standing or sitting position. And will also take a shot from the squat or kneeling position. I will have cross shooting sticks with me when I’m calling predators and my hunting rifles have either Magpul Rifleman slings or a leather 1907 sling.
My approach to firearms training involves a great deal of dry fire practice and training with an air rifle. This allows many more repetitions without recoil spoiling sight pictures. It is also easier to train on as I can dry fire in the house. I want to have at least three each dry fire and air rifle training sessions for every one live fire one. It might seem boring or silly but I promise you that it works to build skill and muscle memory.
The training must include positional shooting exercises which reinforce solid positions, bolt manipulation drills, and reload drills (including those which change the cartridge out for a reduced load).
Each live fire training will begin with a plan so I train with a purpose. The use of a reactivate target such as a 6″ steel plate is good. As it is the size of a coyote’s vitals and gives instant feedback. An easy way to begin would be to start with the steel set up at 50 yards and practice with 3ish rounds each shooting position from easiest to most difficult: sitting, kneeling, squat, and standing. Once I got to point where I could not miss at this distance I would move back to the 75 yard line and repeat.
For the distance of 250 yards I need to know the vital size of the game I am pursuing and the tragectory of my differing loads. From there I will be able to see if I can hold on my target out through my desired range or if I will need to hold over at some point, especially on smaller game such as a coyote which has a vital zone of 6 inches.
The meter for success must be realistic, were the vitals struck? We’ll have to shoot at life size targets of game from time to time to verify. Which means a consistent refresher on game anatomy should be part of the training regiment to insure a clean shot is available from the angles provided.
Hitting a moving target, even a walking one adds a degree of difficulty in training. A background of/or beginning to train in trap or clay shooting with a shotgun is useful. As are moving targets on a pull string, pulled by a training partner. Care must be taken to discover and replicate the speed your choose game is walking.
A good standard to go by for a walking shot of a game animals at or under 50 yards is to aim for the leading edge of the vital zone swinging the rifle through the shot, and NOT stopping when the trigger is pulled.
While not the same, the principals are similar. In the Border Patrol I was fortunate enough to participate in a lot of force on force training which afforded much practice of hitting a moving interactive target, i.e. a role player. This was extremely valuable training and a void I am working on filling in my training plan.
Moving forward we will go over the individual positions and drills, then begin developing training plans for the hunting handgun, defensive pistol, and defensive rifle.
Remember that if you are developing your own training plan it is best to be both critical of your objective, your tools, and the realities your environment places on your hunting style. This allows you to reverse engineer your training to a point where you can achieve your desired results. As much fun as going out and burning through boxes of ammo is, true profientancy requires end objectives and goals to reach them.
-Joe
Outpost 95 