If you’re feeling the effects of cabin fever, throw the .22 in the truck and head out to the rifle range. If you don’t have a rifle range in your area, you can go set up on a chunk of public land. Just choose your shooting site carefully, because you don’t want to endanger any other land users or make a lot of noise near where other folks live or play. And when you get done, you’ll need to pick up all your spent brass.
Once you find a place to shoot, just get to shootin’. Paper targets are the easiest way to go, but if you have ‘em, it’s more fun to shoot at those steel silhouettes. If you go for this option, be doubly sure of your backstop and other safety features, because you’ll get ricochets on just about every good shot.
Shooting a .22 is just plain fun, if you do it safely. The ammo doesn’t cost much, and the recoil won’t leave you sore at the end of the day. You can work on shooting from all different stances, and you can practice from a variety of different ranges. It all works to make you a better shot, and you’ll have plenty of fun while you’re doing it.
As I said, the recoil from a .22 shouldn’t cause you any trouble. But if you’re showing youngsters how to shoot, be careful that you don’t push them too hard. The recoil might not make ‘em jump, but they could still develop a flinch from the report. If you start to notice them flinching, call it quits for the day and try again another time.
But if nobody’s getting’ jumpy, keep at it. If you have more than one .22, use ‘em all. Shoot the bolt-action for a while, then switch to the lever. Pick up the semi-auto and see how well you do taking as little time to aim as possible. But just be sure to keep safety your No. 1 priority. Don’t get to shooting too fast that you can’t keep track of everything around you.
The more you practice with your .22, the better you should do when you move up to your center-fire rifles. Pick up a couple of bricks of bullets, and run ‘em through your .22s. Then, when fall comes around, see how much better you’re shooting.
