Passed a number of illegal shooters in the no-shooting zone while scouting the New McIntire Trailhead on Wildcat Mountain today -- including a couple of idiots in a large gravel area shooting DIRECTLY at the Wildcat Quarry road, albeit through about 200 feet of trees. Idiots! Not wanting to have a discussion with armed idiots, however... I moved on, though I planned to slow down for a few surreptitious photos for my "shooters" file on the return trip. So, imagine my DELIGHT when I reached this spot not only find the Clackamas Co. Sheriff making a call, but ALSO the offenders picking up their empty shells and putting them into a plastic trash bag, under the watchful eye of the law..! Here's the joyous scene:



Let's just hope there was a healthy citation involved, too. Even better, a car stopped me further up the road just minutes earlier, and asked "where a good place to shoot skeet is". I pointed them back down the road (unknowingly) toward law enforcement, not wanting them to shoot up the New McIntire area.

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Wy'East Blog

HOORAY!!!!!!

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May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view.--E.Abbey

LOL. Nice.

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www.buckrail.smugmug.com

Great!

I'm not sorry: ALL of these guys are collectively LOW LIVES and need to go somewhere designated for shooting or just stop being cheap scum and join a mature gun club with a real shooting range...don't they have those?

I'm all for them closing this area for everyone except for hikers. It's just too close to Sandy so the lazy shooters can drive out and trash the place and act like immature little kids whom are potentially jeopardizing others lives in the process..

Great photos. Hope they're fined and jailed...these guys in my book are at about the same levels as meth heads and crack dealers.

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http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrismarkes/collections/

Some places like Sherwood Gun Club may be out of some folk's price range, but there should still be a place just east of Vancouver called the English Pit Shooting Range.

http://www.englishpit.com/

Was just $5 per visit like 10 years ago. But the $15 day use fee isn't that bad right now if I'm reading the page right. And only five for young people.

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M. D. Vaden of Oregon

Largest Coast Redwoods

Portland Tree Service & Arborist

Thanks for the link -- I've love to see a similar public/private facility like that opened somewhere in the Clackamas area to absorb some of the shooting activity. $15 isn't bad at all, when you consider the cost of driving further into the NF, not to mention the costs of ammo, etc., that are inherent to shooting.

BTW, just to illustrate the idiocy/stupidity of these shooters, here's a schematic of the spot -- I was stopped on Wildcat Mountain Drive for the photo, and the shooters were aiming at a gap in the trees that leads directly to the road to the Wildcat Quarry (Douglas Trailhead), no more than a couple hundred feet away. For those who know the area, this is the rutted section of the Quarry road, just beyond the end of paving. Yikes! Given the number of people roaming around up there yesterday, it's a wonder nobody took a bullet to the the windshield..!



There was a second group of shooters in the same area, aiming in the same direction when I first passed, so they must have slipped out before the law arrived... unfortunately.

Tom

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Wy'East Blog

One more thing... I liked the humbling experience of picking up spent shells... and it made me think that a GREAT "community service" sentence would be for illegal shooters to spend a day or two out cleaning up the mess their kind have left behind. It would be even better of gun organizations, like the NRA, that fight any form of regulation, whatsoever, were to sponsor cleanups of this sort, and could offer them to the courts as a form of community service. Maybe they are, already... but I'd be surprised.

Tom

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Wy'East Blog

....okay, and just ONE more thing: given the cost of law enforcement, and the continually decreasing number of hunters vs. shooters, why not use the cigarette model, and apply a self-funding program tax for law enforcement to ammunition? Sure, the NRA would be all over it, and kill the bill before it could even be debated, but it could be a way to actually rein in this sort of behavior. You could also exempt hunters by allowing them to show a hunting tag valid within the past year, for example, to avoid the tax. Not sure if that would work, but I see such a clear difference between hunters and shooters, that you'd have to address the fairness of an "enforcement tax".

Tom

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Wy'East Blog

Picking up spent shells or cases is standard practice for most shooters. Most of the target or clay pigeon shooting that occurs in the forests and wilderness areas is not illegal, but shooting into an occupied area or across a road is stupid and reckless. If these guys were shooting across a road (which is illegal) or shooting in an areas where it is illegal to shoot, I hope they get 500 hours of community service restoring the area and cleaning it up.

I think having the NRA sponsor wilderness clean ups in areas that have been damaged by reckless firearms use is an excellent idea. I will write a letter to the head of the local Friends of NRA committee (they fund programs like this) and suggest it.

Several groups in this region already schedule cleanups of the popular shooting areas. Examples:
http://www.northwestfirearms.com/forum/ ... hp?t=25908
http://www.northwestfirearms.com/forum/ ... hp?t=26258
http://www.northwestfirearms.com/forum/ ... hp?t=14471
http://www.northwestfirearms.com/forum/ ... hp?t=25868

Unfortunately the less popular areas, or the areas where it is illegal, do not receive the same attention.




There is an existing 11% federal excise tax on all ammunition that goes to funding game management, forest services, and wilderness preserve projects. The bill was NRA supported.

More information:
http://www.ttb.gov/firearms/
http://www.ammoland.com/2010/02/01/fire ... ion-up-29/

I agree that a bill that significantly increased the tax would get no where, it would be seen as a punishment for exercising a right.

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Born in WV, raised in KY, educated in NY, and found home in OR.

What's scary about that photo is that I was actually on that Douglass Quarry road the day I was hunting for the trailhead.... I turned around in that spot and there was infact a guy shooting just a few minutes earlier!

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http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrismarkes/collections/