Doggorloader Posted October 25, 2005 Share Posted October 25, 2005 The word is in the papers, several clubs in our area have had good looks by the EPA and/or DEC and our club is getting nervous over this lead concern thing and also the attention the DEC gives over expended shotgun wads and broken clay birds. It's not if but rather when the crap will hit the fan. Our club has been around since the 1800's and we now have upwards of 4000 sporting clay rounds a year plus 5-stand plus three pistol ranges plus rifle range. Just the clays action alone delivers upwards of 7 tons of lead into the trees a year. My question is has anyone seen or heard of actions taken at your clubs in the form of some kind of (lead) mining activities and/or recovery of spent wads and birds from the grounds of the club? How was it set up and accomplished? Our feelings are that if we can show some good faith recovery activities we can keep the State and Federal D...heads happy and also create some good feelings from the neighbors and community as well. We don't want to contact the DEC and get them interested but rather initiate a recovery process that keeps us ahead of the rest of the pack. Like the old bear hunting joke where the guy is wearing running shoes just in case and his buddy wants to know why. "I don't have to outrun the bear, just have to outrun you" he says. Tom Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ima45dv8 Posted October 25, 2005 Share Posted October 25, 2005 (edited) One of our local ranges, South River Gun Club went through a project a few years ago that sounds like this. They had a company contracted to bring these machines that made passes back and forth on the shotgun ranges, scooping up the ground, sifting it and laying it back down. IIRC, they collected something like 60 55-gallon drums of lead. You can contact them through this website. The web master listed at the bottom of the page is the general manager and can provide more detailed information. HTH... Edited October 25, 2005 by ima45dv8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tightloop Posted October 25, 2005 Share Posted October 25, 2005 Sorry to tell you this, but any and all options are very expensive...normally, the company scoops up the top layer of earth, about 7 or 8 inches deep and burns it in a controlled manner, depends on how big the range is, but it is not cheap... The DPS in Austin moved to another range a year or so ago and the old berms became part of the new berms because it was cheaper to dig it out and truck it to the new range than dispose of it... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carlos Posted October 25, 2005 Share Posted October 25, 2005 At the last club meeting, mining was brought up and we were informed that our club earned something like $27,000 back in the 1980s for allowing a company to remove the spent shot & lead from our land. Mining was "allowed" as a revenue generator, not due to the current environmental lead hysteria (and I say that as one who is pro-environment). As for wad & claybird clean up, that was not brought up. DogorLoader- I'll send you a PM. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Heiter Posted October 25, 2005 Share Posted October 25, 2005 "(and I say that as one who is pro-environment)"... Is there such a thing as someone who is anti-environment? I hear people all the time calling themselves environmentalists and I just wonder. I think it's kind of a given that we would all like it if the world was pristine and there was no such thing as pollution, but right now all we have are tradeoffs and some people are just willing to make more trades than others. I sacrifice a few trees so I can have lumber to build the house I live in. I give up a few cows so I can have meat and leather. I give up some clean air so I can drive a car to work. Most of us here are willing to accept some level of lead in the ground so we can enjoy our sport. Some make more trades than others but we all do it. I'm not looking to start an environmental debate, just wanting to clear up some terminology. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carlos Posted October 25, 2005 Share Posted October 25, 2005 Good point - & I used to joke around about there being two sides to the environmental debate: environmentalists and . . . "anti-environmentalists?" People who think: "I hate the environment! It should be BANNED!" WHen it comes to lead, you wrote: "Most of us here are willing to accept some level of lead in the ground so we can enjoy our sport. Some make more trades than others but we all do it. " Lead comes from the ground at some point. Besides, I understand that Lead does not "leach" into groundwater the way some other substances do - like gasoline or the extremely toxic oxygenating chemicals some States added to gasoline in an effort to, ironicaly, lower polution (I am thinking of Maryland here). Rather, lead by-products (the white oxide that forms on lead) is supposed to only leach a few inches into the soil - at most. The EPA should re-examine its priorities before attacking our shooting ranges. I once lived in Baltimore city and it was awash in lead paint on all the old houses (a few of which I owned over the years) - lead paint which has a much higher probability of poisoning people than any shooting range. In fact, I can't recall an outdoor shooting range EVER having been linked to a person's elevated lead levels. Regards, D.C. Johnson Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Heiter Posted October 25, 2005 Share Posted October 25, 2005 I found what I think is some really good information on lead mining on the EPA's best practices site. A few highlights: 1. spreading lime on the range can help minimize the lead migration 2. appropriate vegetation to prevent erosion is a plus 3. lead reclamation companies exist and profit sharing is a possibility http://www.epa.gov/region02/waste/leadshot/bmp5_8.pdf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wide45 Posted October 25, 2005 Share Posted October 25, 2005 I forgot who, but someone at Rochester Brooks mentioned that you should call it reclaiming the lead, NOT mining. If you mine the lead, it will be taxed. Doggorloader, Which club are you speaking of? I used to spend a lot of time at CSC. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lynn jones Posted October 26, 2005 Share Posted October 26, 2005 my club is the Memphs sport shooting assoc. we have several skeet and trap fields. we have over 1500 members, so the fields get used alot. we had a mining company come out and mine a few years ago. they mined most of the shot drop area. the ground has to be very dry to do this mining with the machine they use, however they managed to make a profit, and we made a little money too. this can be done about every 10 or so years to be worth the effort. now when it come to our sporting clays ranges, i don't see how this would work in a wooded area. the practical, cowboy, and covered ranges nothing has ever be mined. lynn Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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