- Outdoor columnist Ben Smith tells of his recent outing at Providence Hill Sporting Club.
I’ve never claimed to be the best outdoorsman. Heck, I barely even consider myself a real outdoorsman, but by societies standards today I may as well be Davy Crockett. That said, my shooting abilities, or lack thereof, were put on full display a week ago at Providence Hill Sporting Club just outside of Jackson.
Homes of Hope for Children hosted their ninth annual clay pigeon shoot at Providence Hill and I agreed to tag along and do a little shooting. Before I go any further, let’s get something straight: I am not a shotgun expert. You can hand me a rifle, set a target up anywhere inside of four hundred yards, and I will drill tacks (kind of). I’m even pretty accurate with a compound bow out to about fifty yards comfortably. A shotgun and a moving target is an entirely different thing for me.
You’d think that given the fact that there are around four hundred pellets in a twelve gauge dove load that I’d be able to knock targets down with ease. Apparently, multiple projectiles gives me a false sense of security when aiming and I forget to aim altogether. Or it could be that the target is moving through the sky. When I shoot a target with a rifle, or a bow, the target is usually motionless. One thing is for certain, if I plan to shoot doves, or ducks, this season I need to practice a heckuva lot more before I hit the woods.
When I agreed to go to the shoot, I really didn’t know what to expect. I’d never gone on a bona fide skeet shoot before. Sure, I’d shot some around the farm over the years, but that was just messing around. My experience shooting skeet, or clay pigeons, consisted of a buddy standing to the side and chunking it up as high as he could. Not exactly “gun club” material, but very much South Mississippi degenerate activities. As the shoot got closer, and the more people I talked to, the more excited I got about the event. After all, what could be more fun in August than spending the afternoon with a bunch of friends blasting away at the sky?
When I drove up to Providence Hill, I was absolutely blown away. It was gorgeous. It was like a golf course, but for rednecks to shoot on. There were deer just inside the gate and large lakes lined the property. It was a sporting man’s paradise. The road veered to the left through the woods and up a hill where a large clubhouse similar to that of a golf course sat atop the hill overlooking a lake. My first thought was, how do we get one of these in Hattiesburg? And my second thought was, how much would all of this cost? The answer to the first question is easy. We remove everything golf related from one of the several courses around town and put skeet throwers where the greens are. The answer to the second question is…a lot more than I can afford.
There were two separate groupings for the shoot. One began at 9:00 and one would begin at 1:00. We were scheduled to shoot the afternoon event, but plenty of guys were still around from the morning shoot. Every guy I talked to that shot during the morning had nothing but high praise for the event and the staff. This was going to be a lot of fun.
When we took off from the clubhouse to hit the course, it looked just like the beginning of a golf tournament…except everyone had guns instead of clubs. It was overcast and not too terribly hot, but you could tell rain was definitely on the way. That muggy Mississippi air is undeniable. We arrived at our first station, and I was so giddy I could barely pay attention to the guy showing us where the clays would go. Fortunately, I wasn’t shooting first, so I’d be able to watch the other guys in the group go first and learn from them. All of a sudden, it sounded like what I imagine a small military battle would sound like. There were gun blasts going off all over the place! It was music to my ears, which were plugged by the way.
The first couple of guys from our team shot, then it was my turn. In all the excitement, I didn’t even think to take note of where the skeet were coming from. I hopped up on the deck, yelled pull, then did my best to find the clay pigeon soaring through the sky. Unfortunately, I didn’t see it until it had gotten out of my best shot opportunity range, and I missed the first target. I recovered quickly and hammered the next one. Knowing my shotgun shortcomings, I’d already told myself that if I shot fifty percent that I’d leave there happy. This was a good start for me.
We continued to move from station to station shooting the course. Each station was set up differently with different terrain. Some of the skeet came from the left, some from the right. Some of them went straight up, some of them whizzed by about a hundred feet off the ground. One station even had one that bounced on the ground. This was my proudest shot of the day. The best station was the one where we didn’t even keep score. They shot about sixty skeet, and we all stood on the deck shooting at the same time, somewhat resembling a really good duck shoot.
With just a couple of stations left, that overcast sky turned black and the bottom fell out. It was raining so hard that I couldn’t even see the last few targets. Needless to say, we got soaked. I don’t think I would have been any wetter had I jumped in the lake and went swimming. We packed it up and headed back to the clubhouse ending our day. And what a day it was! I haven’t had that much fun in a long time. Oh, and I ended up shooting over fifty percent, so I’m basically an expert now. Big shoutout to Scott Hanberry, Homes of Hope for Children, and Providence Hill for introducing me to something so cool. I’m already ready for next year!
Ben Smith
