| Osprey field shoot March 17th 2002 | ||
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It all begins late the previous year with the decision on the date and the theme for the shoot. This year’s theme is to be dinosaurs and so the hunt is on for suitable pictures for the targets, once they have been located our target designer (Ros Whiddett, not even a club member but she generously puts in a lot of time for the club) starts on the painting. With the new year comes the first of two meetings to decide what needs doing and when, from this comes several tasks to be done before the shoot and decisions on work party dates. This is followed a month later with an update meeting to make sure all is on track. Once all the targets have been painted they have to be cut out, edged and then varnished, originally we did not bind the edges of the targets but the September 2001 shoot suggested it might be a good idea as several targets disintegrated in the horizontal rain we had on that day. It is a surprisingly long job to prepare thirty targets for the shoot and we know that if we have a good attendance then they may not survive the day. Also during this preliminary period Christine Hodder is making sure that everything needed for the tea tent is assembled as this is one of the most important jobs on the day, how would field archers survive without bacon butties and cups of tea. A new tea tent has been decided upon (actually more like half a small barn) but with all the rain we have been having it remains to be seen if it gets built in time. March 2nd 2002. 1st working party day The main job today is to get everything up the top ready to be laid out. We also walk the course and start laying out. For the course we have use of two small copses, three ponds and the adjoining fields. About two thirds of the course is in the open and all on top of a hill which is why we are used to horizontal rain on our shoot one time we might get lucky and have a sunny day! Some of the stuff we need for the shoot is stored in a couple of caravans in the top copse, all the stakes, marker pegs etc. this is all checked and sorted ready to go out. We start by taking the stakes that were stored by the barn up to the course and then we go round the course and decide the location of the targets and drive the stakes in that will support the targets, at the same time the target number posts are driven in at about the probable location of the red peg. This takes several hours and is all that is done on day one. March 4th 2002 time for the tea tent. Roy, Dave and Steve start work on the tea tent driving girders into the ground as foundations and start on the uprights. March 5th 2002 Work continues on the tea tent and all the framework goes up. March 7th 2002 All the cladding goes on and it is now ready for use. The rest of the stakes are driven in and we start the long task of getting the bosses out into their positions on the course. March 11th 2002 Just two of us today so we go around putting in the shooting pegs and tying the bosses to the stakes March 15th 2002 Time to sort the targets and allocate them to the positions, all targets have numbers put on the back so we know where to put them. Also the kill zones are drawn on. The indoor bosses are taken down and up to the course; we could not do this before as we were using them! March 16th 2002 The targets are taken out and fixed to the bosses and these are then covered with plastic to keep the rain off until tomorrow. The no go areas are taped off and check lists made of the remaining jobs. The big day, first job put in the direction arrows as we arrive. The gear for the tea tent is taken up and unloaded and we put carpet down outside the tent to stop the ground turning into a sea of mud. Christine and the other ladies lay out all the gear, light the boiler and gas rings and start the long job of keeping everybody fed and watered. We go around the course uncovering the targets and carrying out last minute checks to make sure all is OK. The archers start arriving early as usual but find us ready for them, Patricia and her daughter booking them in and food and drink ready and waiting. At this point we know something is wrong as the sun is shining surely this cannot last. Only slightly late we have assembly and lead the groups out, two blasts on the shotgun and the shoot is under way. All during the day we go around checking on the targets for problems and rectifying where possible but one thing cannot be changed in that we made a mistake with the pegs on a couple of targets putting them too far away but as some people have shot them they have to stay. Late morning and here comes the rain, heavy as usual, accompanied by strong winds which unfortunately causes a couple of people to retire as they cannot keep the arrows on the rest. It passes over and we are back to sun but still have the wind. The end of the shoot and we begin the job of collating the scores, we have this off quite well now using columns for the hundreds to make it easier to see the winners, the last group keep us waiting for some time while they discuss something before handing in their cards but eventually the results are ready. During the wait we held the raffle and now the final job as far as the archers are concerned is the prize giving which goes quite well. Once all the archers have gone we collect some of the targets and cover the rest as we are going to shoot them ourselves the following week, all the tea tent is packed away and of we go home. back to top |
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At the Beginning Working Parties first working day On the Day
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