Clay
target shooting or clay pigeon shooting as it is also known has its roots in
Edwardian and Victorian England.
It was in the early 1800's that the first
live pigeon shooting club came into being.
The live birds were held in boxes
called traps and when the shooter was ready he would call for his helper
to pull a section of the trap away, thereby releasing the
bird.
These 3 words are still used today 'Trap' (the machine
which holds the clay targets), 'Pull' (the method used to call for a
clay target) & 'Bird' (the name used for the clay target).
By
around 1870 there had been attempts to produce artificial targets, one such
method used was glass balls, either plain or filled with feathers. Later an
American inventor George Ligowski came up with a baked clay disk modeled on
clamshells he used to skim across water. Ligowskis' 'clay pigeon' quickly
replaced the glass balls and just as quickly replaced live birds.
Today clay targets are made from a
mixture of lime and pitch, also depending on the discipline that is being shot
can vary in diameter and thickness, although all are circular and generally
either black or orange in colour.
All targets are thrown from the trap by
means of a spring loaded throwing arm reaching distances in some cases up to
135 metres. |
In the main there are two types of trap manual and automatic, the
manual trap has to be cocked and the clay targets placed on the arm by hand.
The bird is then released by the operator or trapper as he/she is known.
The automatic trap has a central
carousel containing in some cases 400 clays the trap being operated by
electricity.
The target is released by a remote switch either hard wired to
the trap or in some cases radio controlled.
After release the trap
automatically loads another clay, cocking the spring loaded arm at the same
time.
There are many different
disciplines within clay target shooting, some of which are sufficiently
difficult to be included in the Olympic Games, these are just a few to whet
your appetite.
Down The Line ,
Ball Trap, English Skeet, English Sporting, Olympic Skeet, Olympic Trench,
FITASC, Double Rise.
The first 4 disciplines are generally the most popular,
clicking on them will open a new window with a brief simplified
explanation. |
... Promoting safe clay target shooting
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