Project Appleseed

    "So fair and foul an Appleseed..."

    Yes indeed. Saturday was 55, dry and sunny - a very fair day, much like the day of April 19th, 1775 -  Battle Day. Sunday was one of those foul days of endless mist/drizzle - and cold!

    A penetrating cold, which caused reflection on why a Winterseed patch to recognize those intrepid students who show up in snow should not also be applicable to those who endure a day of cold and rain!

    Nevertheless, 9 shooters showed up, and some were quite proficient right out the gate! Others had considerable issues which gave the instructors some business - ie, useful employment.

     Yet some things were new even to the proficient shooters, as we covered The Rifleman's Cadence, The Rifleman's Dance, The Rifleman's Trajectory, The Rifleman's Quarter-Mile, Ball and Dummy, NPOA, Inches/Minutes/Clicks - and even some of the proficient shooters learned the importance of "Hold the trigger back!" and "Keep your finger on the trigger!"

      - and in addition we went up to the long range and fired our .22s at 100 and 200 yards. Drop for the .22 cartridge was reported to be - with a 25M zero -  6 MOA at 100, and an additional 9 MOA at 200 - but we found those numbers to be applicable to High Velocity only. Standard Velocity shooters experienced considerable additional drop, especially at 200 yards

     - which led to the story some years ago of the two shooters firing on the metal silhouette out at 400 yards on Range One, seemingly at the same instance. When the "Ping!" of a hit came back, everyone looked at the shooters to see who would claim the hit - when what seemed seconds later, a second "Ping!" came back - and we found out one shooter was shooting standard velocity, with the bullet taking that much longer to get out to 400 yards!

      Several Rifleman scores were fired - one was above 240! - and one new Rifleman did it the hard way - shooting his boyhood Marlin auto with open and get-out-your-hammer-adjustable sights! Quite an achievement! Quite an achievement! (Said twice, for emphasis!)

      I believe there were also at least two AQT Stage Fours which scored out as 100 points, something you don't see everyday!

      At the end of the weekend, we expressed appreciation to our students for attending the Appleseed; without them, our program would not be a success!

     History-wise we tried to answer the question "What IS the American Revolution?" with emphasis on the "IS" - and we reflected on the price paid by Abel Prescott, shot at the South Bridge in Concord on April 19th, and finally expiring in August, four months later...

      One unusual thing happened, and I hope to have a picture posted to illustrate it: Coming back from the long range shooting, cold and damp, we fired a team competition on the Greencoat target, to heat things back up.

      Dividing the target into two vertical halves, each 3-man team had 10 rounds each to engage the four targets in 30 seconds (Rifleman's Cadence!) - but with the proviso that each of the top three targets had to have a MINIMUM of 6 hits. The winning score was decided by the #hits on the fourth/bottom target - but that score was ONLY counted if each of the upper three targets met the MINIMUM hits standard.

      When the smoke cleared, for the first time in my Appleseed experience, BOTH teams managed the "minimum hits" requirement, so the decision came down to the count on the fourth/bottom target - one team had 10 hits (out of 12 possible); the other had 5. Altho one team was a clear winner, BOTH teams showed not only excellent marksmanship, but the ability to strategize how they were going to fire so as to meet that all-important MINIMUM hit standard. Good shooting - and good planning!

     Again, thanks to our intrepid students who showed to make this another great Appleseed event! We couldn't have done it without you!

As Fred said great day Saturday but Sunday the weather was not that great. With the weather being cold and rainy you would except the shooters and instructor to be off there normal game but we had 3 Riflemen and major improvement from every shooter. Getting to shoot rimfire KD was a lot of fun even in the rain. The team shooting brought out the competitive side of all the shooter.

R-Mack