Are you ready to enter the twilight zone?

 Sitting out on the back deck plinking at cans gets a little boring after a while. Granted, with each successful shot the area of the can is some what deminished, but I have yet to totally obliterate one with my 22.

Here is some thing you can do to make shooting a challenge. First make a rake. this is a simple device, a piece of 1x4 with 1/2 inch pegs spaced 3/4 inch or slightly more apart. You will want to paint it, one side a dark color and the other a lighter color.
Don't glue the pegs in, they are expendable, and you might very well replace a lot of them. See illustration.
Next cut up a 3/4 inch dowel rod into 1 inch lengths. These you will want to paint as well, I'd suggest red.
This is intended to be an intermediate range target, some where arround 75 yards, but closer if you need. Now here is the fun, at 75 yards, this is a minute of angle target roughly equal to 1 inch at 100 yards, It should make for a good competition for your Sunday plinking.
Now for the next step, and why I said twilight zone. After you have anhilated a few plugs, the next step is to practice low light shooting. begin at sundown, and shoot one target dowel. Every five minutes, shoot another. Use as many shots as it takes to get the target. and do so until you can no longer discern the targets.
We are so used to living with light, even in the middle of the night our city streets are aglare from street lights, signs, porch lights and auto lights that we no longer consider how well we can see at night.
In the military, we always prepared for attacks in the early morning hours. First call or stand to was an hour before dawn. That allowed the troops time to prepare for any attack. Any light will screw up your night vision. Keep that in mind and try this next time you ae in the woods late. Set out a small red light and see just how far away it is visable. You might be amazed.
So if you want to try this, let me know how you fare. I plan to do it soon my self. If you want, send a pic of your target to me at kansasredneck@gmail.com and I will post them here.
Happy shooting, be safe and have fun.