Project Appleseed

We had a typical Ohio spring weekend at ECCL in Northern Ohio. It was cold, cloudy, and windy, with occasional spits of rain or snow & Graupel thrown in for good measure. Then the downpour and wind. Saturday started with a delay of downpour/storm but we made good use of the undercover with History, hands on SHF and planning.  When the storm subsided, we proceeded to begin the marksmanship events.  Time monkey was not on our side, about 1 PM the next cold front greeted us with 40+ MPH winds.  Our wind break tarps were no longer and lost another canopy to mother nature.  25 minutes of holding down the remaining prep area from blowing away everything and really wore people out.

However, these mother nature interruptions were not enough to slow down the weekend. On the contrary, it only added to the challenge. The participants demonstrated their marksmanship, and the new shooters steadily improved.

We made the Memorial Volley on time since Mother Nature gave us the opportunity.
The attendees were Safe, attentive, and openly asked great questions regarding the marksmanship and the history.   

GREAT IMPROVEMENT from Saturday to Sunday on the Red Coat

Red Coats
              Shooters   100 Yard   200 Yard   300 Yard   400 Yard   HS   Cleared
Saturday AM    8            3            3           1          0            2   0
Saturday PM    8            7            5           5          4            3   0
Sunday AM    8            7            6           5          4            3   1
Sunday PM    9            8            6           5          4            2   2


Lunch and the Great first strike Presented by Wrangler, we finished the fundamental blocks of instruction, IMC and returned to the line until the windstorm shut us down.

The storms really gave us the time monkey that affected our entire day.  As our day ended, we were still very safe day but not through the COF.
Sunday on this range you can not start until 10 AM so we made use of our time to catch up on the teaching all steps in positions in the COF and any remaining history along with KD, by Cadence.

Our two youths were engaged and ready to try everything.  Our 10-year-old left-handed, at one point wanted to try right-handed to see if he could improve.  He was very familiar with shooting since his father owns Ohio Air Guns and he shoots air rifles almost daily.  This was a full learning experience, in three positions, rimfire, safety, & marksmanship. John is a small frame young man & did very well on all.  He went from shotgun pattern to groups, from AQT 70's to 113.

Our 15-year-old, Leah, brought a rifle that did not function properly, but her elective was a Tippman M4 and excelled in getting it under control & going from shotgun pattern, following the learning process that was presented to a high of 158 before end of Sunday.  She is now planning to join the youth shooting league and further expand her shooting sports.  She did a great job.

The Red Coat Ohio Patch awards were given out to: Aliquippa, Kassie & Jason.  Great job.

Congratulations to:
New Rifleman, Kassie with a score of 213 & 215.
New Rifleman, Jason, PCP Air Rifle with a score of 222, 217 & 210 (Ohio Air Gun, Owner)

RIFLE PCP AIR GUNS

What is PCP (pre-charged pneumatics) air rifle?  It is an onboard compressed air cylinder that uses air to send a "pellet" down the barrel.

How safe is an air rifle?
All manufacturing, safety, bolt lock open, removable magazine are like a bolt action rifle.  This was a .22 caliber Uragan, with a 6-24 x 50 Parallax scope.  Magazine would hold 12 rounds.  During prep time if a recharge was required it was from a scuba compressed air tank.  It took 15 seconds to charge to 250 psi.  One charge would give over 60 rounds per charge. (Others can do 80 rounds depending on the on board air cylinder).
Once charged the air tank was returned to prep area and shooter returned to be ready for next target sequence.

This did not cause any disruption and/or delay in the prep period.

Meadow started his marksmanship shooting in Air Rifle competition.  I still do.  These are known to be accurate & Safe. They are all calibers, but we can keep them in AS, they need to be  at .22 or .30 and only PCP with magazines.

Sunday, After the safety briefing and a recap of the steady hold factors for each position, we brought rifles to the line.

After several sighter squares targets and a couple of drills, we posted the first of five AQTs for the day. We got two AQTs in before lunch.

We ended the day with a final Redcoat and a big thank you to all the participants who showed up to make such a great weekend.

Presentations to the ECCL club for 5 years, of having Project Appleseed.

We had a wonderful time with great participants and good instructors at an excellent ECCL range.

Rain . . . Wind . . . Sleet . . . More wind . . . Sunshine . . . Typical northern Ohio April afternoon.

Congratulations to Kassie, Jason and Aliquippa for clearing the Redcoat target.

Congratulations to Kassie and Jason for earning their Rifleman Patch.

Lots and lots of improvement from all the students. It was quite gratifying to see all the group sizes get smaller and smaller as the weekend progressed.

It was great to have so many new shooters on the line.

Just wanted to express my sincere appreciation to Meadow for take over for me as shoot boss. I had some family issues come up a couple of weeks out and wasn't sure of my ability to be there. Thanks Al!!

It was good to re-unite with all of the instructors: Codebook, Aliquippa, Slowbutsure, Wrangler, Chico, and Springbok on Sunday.

Congratulations to Kassie and Jason for earning their Rifleman Patch. Huzzah!!

Looking forward to the September event.

What an excellent group we had. With enough colored hats in attendance some great individual instruction was done all weekend. This was even more amplified by how receptive the shooters were. Truly an enjoyable bunch. Now...for the picture dump.

DAY 1 Pictures (Photographer: Codebook)

Memorable events of the day -  sudden and significant increase in the wind velocity sent everyone scattering to pick up paper, chairs, coolers, cups and various debris.  Meadow and Slowbutsure held down the tarps protecting everyone from -the wind and the rain! Slight delay of 30 or so minutes.  One canopy roof tarp went airborne (fortunately we had an Airforce veteran - Meadow - to retrieve it).

Quote from: slowbutsure on April 26, 2023, 10:32:25 PM
(fortunately we had an Airforce veteran - Meadow - to retrieve it).

🤣🤣🤣

DAY 2 Pictures (Photographer: Codebook)


Memorable events -  Lack of strong winds!   Three cleaned Red Coats!  Two new Riflemen!  Two super impressive youth students!

A special "Thank you" Appreciation certificate from Project Appleseed to the Erie County Conservation League (ECCL) for five years of continuous support.

As an officer of ECCL I want to thank Corvette (Steve Branam - retired state coordinator and shoot boss) for introducing ECCL 5 years ago to Project Appleseed.  Cadence and Meadow have continued the high level organization and instruction Steve provided.  Looking forward to another 5 years!!!!!

Deb Canter
ECCL Vice-President