Scouting wooded property for shooting area

You better find out if the owner is willing to sell or lease first, I think you're getting ahead of yourself. Since it's posted I probably wouldn't admit to scouting it either, you may end up in a heap of illegal trespassing issues.

Regardless of the other considerations or concerns, what kind of backstop is available on the property?

You can learn more from google earth and the zip code in 5 minutes, than a day of walking the property.

https://www.google.com/earth/

Not to mention you can see what’s beyond the property you will be allowed on, in your line of fire in the unlikely event one gets out of your properly constructed berm or trap.

A little foot work may find you a location with a good natural berm though.

Sounds like you know the owner, that's good. Personally for my own peace of mind I must know exactly where the bullet stops, I will not count on trees. Having walked many hours in the winter woods at night seeing distant lights flickering between the trees I can tell you that counting on trees to stop a bullet is totally unreliable. I will shoot at nothing less than a steep hillside, If you don't have that you probably should hire out a guy with a dozer to build you a berm.

First, let me just say I’m a little bit envious.

film495 said:

nothing is set up for shooting as far as I know, it is 140 acres of woods, surrounded by woods and hills, with a mountain to one side, with a few trails.

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A blank canvas that can be set up just right!

Secondly, since we own every bullet and where it ultimately stops, I agree with the tertiary consideration of heavy woods. Strange things happen, every precaution helps. But fore most, is a proper backstop.

This does not need to be a bulldozer affair. A nice shelf cut into a hill to hold targets can be shoveled out in a few minutes.
It should be big enough to catch what your shooting at an angle that won’t ricochet. If you shoot precision varmint rifles only, I’d say the berm can be smaller. Shooting into a ravine is good as long as there is a dirt pile so ricocheted bullets can’t leave. Stopping the bullets is all that matters.
Trees don’t do that well anyways.

And nice big berm of a couple dump trucks of fill sand with a bench and drive up service for handguns. Now we’re talking!
In Michigan, the state doesn’t like shooting into state land, but doesn’t care if you shoot on it.
A “trespasser will be shot” sign, with gunshots in the background, aught to be sufficient.

Enjoy the hike!

You must have a solid backstop, like a berm, or tall bank, to contain the bullet. You cannot count on trees, even as a secondary back stop. There are reports of people being hit through a half mile of trees. Setting up a private range takes some serious planning, not only for the bullet path, but to warn and prevent wanderers from doing that very thing into the field of fire. Posting signs as you mentioned earlier is a requirement, but it does not absolve you of the responsibility of making sure the target area is completely clear of anyone who could be hit when you commence banging away. Signs have to be around the complete perimeter of the "range", close enough to each other that you can see one sign while standing at another one. "I didn't see the signs" is an easy out for the hiker, trespasser, etc. if they aren't close together enough that you can't miss them. Not sure how they might excuse themselves for "I didn't hear the gunfire", but you don't ever want yourself in a situation where you have to explain yourself to a judge.

I have a similar situation except I am in a partnership with the land.
Be sure your trespassing signs are correctly placed according to state law.
Even on a hillside I'd consider pushing up a dirt backstop. Neighbor called the sheriff on us once, when he saw the proper backstop all was good.
Consider the layout and how it'll work in both summer and winter, does it drain, can you keep it cleared with a mower or bushog?
Take into consideration when you'll be shooting and try to have the sun behind you. Don't want to be facing west if most of your shooting time Is in the evening.

In theory your 140 plot could be surrounded with your own family and you’d feel safe to shoot. Counting on public land with trails to stop bullets sounds like a bad idea.

People shoot on tiny pieces of land by my house, its frightening.

This is an example of the google earth link I posted above and how easy it is to see what’s around your range.

I took the address of https://frontlinedefenseusa.com/long-range-rifle-training/

And zoom in so I can see cars parked at their 1000 yard shooting position.



back out a bit and I can see the whole facility and the end of the 1000 yard range.



I can keep moving back until I can see something in its line of fire and guesstimate that it’s less than 3500 yards from the firing line, knowing that the distance from the firing line to the end of the range is 1000 yards.



Then I can zoom in on it to see that it’s someone’s home, barn and such less than 2 miles away.



You could walk all day and even trespass and you wouldn’t know that without being a surveyor for a living.

We did some demo shooting on a friends land once as part of some night training. One bit was tracers. It was... informative. His land was a small cleared area for shooting, but the backstop was mostly just some extant hill, and lots of trees beyond.

The tracers went /everywhere/. Up, sideways, even back vaguely towards us. But lots hit a rock or tree or something, and flew up at a shallow angle, clearing the trees and continuing. Too many. He's improving his land.

You need a deliberate backstop, of good backstop material that doesn't have too much rock in the dirt on the top foot or so.

jmorris said:

You can learn more from google earth and the zip code in 5 minutes, than a day of walking the property.

https://www.google.com/earth/

Not to mention you can see what’s beyond the property you will be allowed on, in your line of fire in the unlikely event one gets out of your properly constructed berm or trap.

A little foot work may find you a location with a good natural berm though.

Click to expand...

I bought some land last fall. Google earth was the fasted way to figure out the basic idea where to put my range. Started clearing last sunday.

will logs stop bullets?

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At some point, they can also cause them to change directions, rot away and such. My 50 BMG will go through 1” plate steel, then the 8” diameter oak tree I had the plate leaned up against, then more than 3ft deep into a red clay embankment that was behind both of them.

The logs will rot in short order. A bullet will find a boundary layer in the grain a split through it with very little loss of energy.
A dirt berm is best.

Keep your daydream!

Something else to consider in the northern hemisphere is that a north facing range gives the most desirable lighting. were you to do long range precision shooting, looking at area runway alignments on aviation sectional charts is very informative as runways are predominately aligned with prevailing winds.

I'm in the process of finding a piece of land to set up a shooting range on. In general I am looking at land similarly to the OP except we (my business partner and myself) will be buying whatever plot works out instead of trying to shoehorn ourselves onto something potentially unsuitable. It is a very involved process if you want to do it right and eliminate things like escaping bullets, etc.

Currently we are forecasting costs in the 5 figure range, but this includes things like a concrete shooting pad, shed and overhang - none of which is necessary of course. A lot of those costs are actually fairly minimal compared to the cost of building a proper berm, especially considering the fact that the range has to be built basically in the middle of nowhere.

Getting dirt trucked in isn't always feasible if the trucks can't get back to the location you want to use. In our case, we intend to rent a bulldozer to push around dirt rather than truck it in but this entails a cost of around $1,000/day.

shoobe01 said:

We did some demo shooting on a friends land once as part of some night training. One bit was tracers. It was... informative. His land was a small cleared area for shooting, but the backstop was mostly just some extant hill, and lots of trees beyond.

The tracers went /everywhere/. Up, sideways, even back vaguely towards us. But lots hit a rock or tree or something, and flew up at a shallow angle, clearing the trees and continuing. Too many. He's improving his land.

You need a deliberate backstop, of good backstop material that doesn't have too much rock in the dirt on the top foot or so.

Click to expand...

Others have experimented with tracers and report this also. Only a solid earthen backstop will do and no trails or public areas close-by.

jmorris said:

This is an example of the google earth link I posted above and how easy it is to see what’s around your range.

I took the address of https://frontlinedefenseusa.com/long-range-rifle-training/

And zoom in so I can see cars parked at their 1000 yard shooting position.

View attachment 898044

back out a bit and I can see the whole facility and the end of the 1000 yard range.

View attachment 898045

I can keep moving back until I can see something in its line of fire and guesstimate that it’s less than 3500 yards from the firing line, knowing that the distance from the firing line to the end of the range is 1000 yards.

View attachment 898046

Then I can zoom in on it to see that it’s someone’s home, barn and such less than 2 miles away.

View attachment 898047

You could walk all day and even trespass and you wouldn’t know that without being a surveyor for a living.

Click to expand...

There's an easier way to measure with G.Maps. Place your cursor on the map at a spot you want to measure from, then right click; a pop-up box will appear with options, one of which is "measure distance". Select that (left click) and a marker will appear on that spot. move the cursor to where you want to measure to, and left click. Another marker will appear with a line between the two, marked in feet or miles. You can use your mouse to move either dot to get other measurements, or clear it and start over.

Ideally, for lighting the range (day time), you'd want it oriented so you're shooting towards the north. The sun will cross from east to west (right to left) and at northern latitudes will be behind the shooter, even when overhead, so the target area will get shadow-free light.

OTOH, you need to consider where the closest dwellings are and avoid shooting in that direction, even with an appropriate back stop.