Illinois e-News Release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Wednesday, April 12, 2023
IDNR announces 2023 wingshooting clinic schedule at locations statewide
SPRINGFIELD – The Illinois Department of Natural Resources (IDNR), in cooperation with partners and co-sponsors, will offer wingshooting clinics at sites throughout Illinois through mid-November.
The 2023 clinic schedule features several special events:
- The Becoming an Outdoors Woman program offers shotgun shooting classes as part of an extensive outdoor skills program.
- The Healing Outside of a Hospital, or HOOAH, program offers sporting clays shooting opportunities to active-duty military personnel recovering from injuries and to veterans with disabilities under the supervision of IDNR wingshooting instructors.
- A special type of wingshooting clinic involves combining a youth wingshooting clinic with a pheasant hunt. Advantages of this combination of activities includes enhanced shotgun safety training, improved wingshooting skills, and higher success when afield hunting. IDNR typically offers two in early spring, and there will be six more of these youth wingshooting clinic/pheasant hunts this fall at various IDNR sites.
Wingshooting clinics provide instruction and help beginning students and experienced hunters improve their shooting skills. Most clinics occur on weekends at IDNR sites, cooperating gun clubs and shooting ranges, hunter preserves and farms.
Introductory wingshooting clinics provide instruction on safely and successfully shooting a shotgun at flying clay targets. Youth and adults who are beginner/novice level are eligible to participate. Each clinic begins with a morning shotgun safety presentation, followed by a short, small-group, hands-on shotgun orientation session with each group’s wingshooting instructor. After a lunch break, students spend the afternoon in the field shooting flying clay targets. Most introductory clinics are offered at no cost to participants. Shotguns, shells, clay targets, safety glasses, and hearing protection are provided.
Hunter-level wingshooting clinics are designed for shotgun shooters with reasonable experience. They are hands on and include opportunities to shoot a variety of clay target presentations on sporting clay courses specifically designed for hunters. The clinics consist of two wingshooting sessions each day. A briefing about shotgun safety, handling, and on-range safety protocols are reinforced during the first 15 minutes of each four-hour session. The clinics are designed primarily to improve the wingshooting skills of hunters and others who enjoy shooting sports.
Young shooters ages 12 to 15 must be in at least the “intermediate” skill level category to enroll in the hunter-level clinics. They also must be accompanied by and shooting with an adult participant. Shotgun shooters 16 and older with beginning to advanced wingshooting skills who want to improve their shotgun skills are encouraged to attend. The fee is $30 or $35 per participant for hunter clinics.
Clinics are taught by IDNR-certified instructors. Many instructors also have a National Sporting Clays Association instructor certification. The participant-to-instructor ratio is usually four-to-one. Participants are typically grouped with others of similar shooting ability.
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