I am not suggesting taking away 2nd amendment rights. This post has nothing to do with that.
Currently, in the U.S. anyone can go out onto National Forest or BLM land and target practice. Those lands are also used by campers, hikers, OHV riders, etc.
The target practice areas are everywhere. At nearly every single pullout in a forest you can find shell casings, trash that was used to shoot at, and even easy to spot shotgun shell hulls. Occasionally, I found live rounds as well.
If you are camping it’s almost impossible to find a spot where you don’t hear constant gunfire. So, noise pollution is everywhere.
If you browse some of the websites/apps dedicated to finding free camping spots you will sometimes see reviews where people say that the target practice folk were not careful with which direction they were shooting and that bullets were coming close to the trails or camping locations. You can imagine this to be true when you see how nearly every pullout has signs of previous shooting.
I have been in numerous National Forests: including: Vermont, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Florida, Georgia, South Dakota, Colorado, Arizona, California, Oregon, Washington…you get the picture. I have been to a lot of forests and BLM land and every one of them sounds like militias are there preparing for the next war. And every one has target practice trash.
In my opinion, Oregon is the worst state for gunfire noise pollution and target practice trash and shell casings everywhere. I never found a single camping space in Oregon where I could not hear people shooting in the background.
So, all I am suggesting is that you take some acres in a corner somewhere in every forest and make a gun range. This would keep the noise and trash in one place and would also allow the forest rangers and BLM to police the areas and enforce rules and safety.
I’m not sure if you are just super unlucky and happened to be in the wrong places at the wrong time or if you’re exaggerating your experience, but my wife and I are avid campers and we’ve never had that experience at any of the National Forests or BLM areas we’ve stayed at. Are you mindful about hunting seasons when you are in these places? Obviously if you go during a hunting season, you’re going to hear gunshots. But outside of hunting seasons, I’ve rarely (if ever) heard single gunshots in these areas, let alone something that “sounds like a militia”.
In my experience (living in a very rural area), when people just want to target shoot, the vast majority of them do so either at a gun range or on private land. I’ve never encountered someone doing that on public lands of any kind. Is it possible that what you’re hearing could be on neighboring land where there might be a range or something?
I’m not saying no one has ever done this, but as someone who frequents these places, it’s certainly not an epidemic like you described. Again, maybe you are just really unlucky and just happened to be there on the days when the few weirdos who do that were there.
In Oregon this is all too common. As an avid hiker/camper I come across this every weekend. Since covid it has gotten significantly worse here. I have now been shot at 12 times in the NF and BLM land. Idiots here will shoot across and down forest service roads. They bring cars and appliances to shoot, and don’t clean up the mess.
Grew up shooting in the woods here, this is a fairly new behavior in the last decade. There always were some troublemakers, now people are shooting wherever they feel like with no thought of safety. In the last few years is the first time I have ever seen people hunting from their trucks. Have run into over 20 trucks illegally hunting from the roads in the last 2 years.
Guns require safety and respect, this new generation doesn’t seem to have much of either.
Designated areas should be available and monitored for people to target practice.
Yeah, Oregon is on another level when it comes to people wanting to shoot in every location.
I was down near Coos Bay and pulled off on a spot that was on the East side of the road (so not ocean side) and there was a sign posted by a local homeowner begging people to not shoot there because people were shooting towards the East and bullets were flying by their house. If you saw the spot you’d never imagine anyone would want to shoot there because the 101 highway is right there and then on the East side it was flat with houses in the distance. Oregon is on another level for sure.
I have shared OP’s experience in some places.
Same here. I have been woken by gunfire many times while camping on blm land. It is unpleasant crawlng out of the tent wondering “am I downrange?”
No, I did not exaggerate. In fact, I was camping last night and at 8:30PM when it was dark some morons were shooting at a boat ramp parking lot. Did you see my list of states where I have camped? Shooting is everywhere.
Your experiences may be different than mine but that does not mean I did not experience what I did or that I have exaggerated.
No one’s saying you didn’t experience what you say…just that it does not seem to be an experience shared by many others.
You are saying that. Basically, “I haven’t experienced that, so it doesn’t exist”. AKA argument from ignorance.
When you accuse someone of exaggerating that is precisely what you are claiming.
There was no accusation, but I apologize if it came across that way.
apology accepted
I find myself in WMNF often and haven’t heard what op is describing there.
I spent two weeks in Green Mountain National Forest in Vermont last August right near the Appalachian Trail and there was gunfire everyday.
No one has to believe me. You can drive out to the areas and see the trash and items they shoot at. You can go to Google or Bing images and type in “target practice trash” and see the pictures.
I’ve only been to the ones in Minnesota and Kentucky and have never in about fifty years heard a single gun shot in a national forest. I can’t say he’s lying as I have not been camping with him, but I’ve also not heard of anyone else complain about it.
Seems the actual unpopular opinion is in the comments.