This is what greeted me this morning...  Reggie, the Castle peacock.  No, he wasn't the target of the party.  The party was yesterday.  I just thought you guys could use a picture of the Peacock of Argghhh!  Some of you are sauntering, others sprinting, to a naughty place in your minds.  Here, this picture of Reggie stylin' in his feeble attempts to seduce Veronica, is for you.  The rest of you, let's continue...

We've been out here at the New Castle for just under two years now.  It's about time to do some improvements to Castle Firing Point One, the Deck.

We've some good friends we met via the Dole Institute who live in Lawrence, just down the road from us.  We've been to their place twice, it was time to have them up here.  So, Terry and Law, Misty and Trey, Nora, Penny, and Wendy came to visit.  Wendy came mostly to nurse and sleep, being only 8 weeks old.  Penny, being, oh, 3-4, came to grab chickens and fresh eggs, aided and abetted by great-grandma Nora.  Terry and Law came up to be the grandparents, and Misty and Trey were the generation in the child-rearing hopper.They all came to chat, eat, drink, be merry, take the Demesne Tour with SWWBO, and shoot off of the deck.  All that went swimmingly - in fact, Misty proved to be rather a good shot with the Bushmaster O.R.C.which is an M4 carbine clone.  This was the first time she ever shot one.  The impact on the 8 ring at the 9 o'clock position wasn't hers.

We've had several shooting parties out at the Castle, whether BYO firearm or grabbing an artifact from the Arms Room, or a mix of the two. This is the Armorer's idea of a lifestyle community. You are encouraged to BYOG (and ammo).  Too bad so many coastal/city libs don't share the ideal. 

Anyway, I've been tiring of the cheap portable targets such as they sell at Cabela's, not least because guests... shoot them, and they really aren't that cheap.  So, I finally built two target stands, one that sits at the edge of the backyard, and one that sits at the bottom of the hill. 

My design criteria were simple and cheap to build, and low maintenance.  This is what I came up with:  Take an eight foot long 2x4 and cut it into 4 two-foot lengths.  Take two six foot long 2x4s and lay 'em out parallel to each other two feet apart.  Set two of the cut pieces in between what are now the uprights.  Use your nail gun to nail 'em in.  You've now got a 6 foot tall target holder that cost about six bucks.  Repeat the process and you now have two of 'em.

Now take a 10 foot long piece of solid-core 4-inch diameter PVC pipe.  Cut it so that you have five two-foot pieces.  Okay, now you have two target stand holders that cost you about... ten bucks.  And you have a spare in case someone shoots... really low.

Grab your post hole digger and dig two holes about 16 inches deep, put in a couple of inches of gravel to help level and drain, and stick in your target holder, plumb it up and pack in the dirt you dug up around the pipe.  Repeat downrange.  You now have two steady target holders that will not flop about uselessly in a breeze, like many of those portable holders.  And they're cheap. 

Buy 4 PVC endcaps for the pipes to cover 'em when not in use, and you've got easy-to-erect (there go the prurient ones again) target holders that are also easy to remove to repair or replace.  And you've spent about twenty-five dollars total.  Replacing the target holders will cost you less than ten bucks, and as long as you've got decent shooters for guests, the holders should last a long time - because you can bring them in out of the weather.  And the answer to your question is - you can put your hand down now -  the close target is at 50 feet.  The far target is 195 feet, or close to 60 meters.