Silly rabbits.

At the Casper trap and skeet range on Sunday, a GMV Super Star clay target thrower's vertical wheel whirred as an orange-yellow and black "rabbit" target disk - or sometimes two disks - patiently waited behind a small brake in a two-rod track.

Zach Rautio, with the range job title of "trapper," called out a number to alert a shotgunner standing in one of five blue cages that it was his turn, then yelled what type of flight patterns the targets would take, then "station five" referring to the fifth of seven places with target-throwing devices at the Casper Skeet, Trap & Sporting Clays Club.

The shooter then called "pull."

Rautio pushed a button on top of a clear plastic box, sending a signal along a wire to station five.

The signal tripped the brake to release the disk or disks, which rolled a few more inches along the track to tangentially connect with the fast-rotating wheel, which spun them and spit them out at nearly ground level from right to left across the range at a speed faster than Roger Rabbit's mouth.

These targets flew low like errant Frisbees, bounced along the ground of the skeet range and yawed in the fierce wind.

Sometimes the shooter blasted them on the first try or maybe the second.

Sometimes the rabbits - flatter and thicker than conventional clay pigeons - rolled along the snowy ground, stopped and fell over smug after dodging shots that could shatter them to bits.

Rawlins resident Jim Wilcox, with his over-under Winchester Select Energy 12-guage shotgun, zapped a few of the rabbits along with clay pigeons at a 5-Stand Shoot sponsored by the Casper Skeet, Trap & Sporting Clays Club north of the Casper Events Center.

"The wind affects it a lot," Wilcox said.

As tough as some of the fast lateral targets were to hit, the wind would bobble them up and down, he said.

The cold didn't help, either, as it stiffened faces and trigger fingers, Wilcox said.

He was among 25 shooters at the event, said Chris Boger, director of the sporting clay activities for the club.

In this competition, five shooters form a squad, and each shooter moves from one stand to the next, Boger said. "They have to shoot all five stations, then do it again."

The competitors usually used over-under shotguns, but some use semi-automatic or side-by-side shotguns, he said.

Competition regulations set the size of shot - the smaller No. 7.5, No. 8, or larger No. 9 shot - shooters can use, Boger said.

"The smaller (shot) gives more of a pattern," he said. "The larger retains more energy."

They shot at either single targets, "report targets" when a second target is released after the first is shot, or "true pair" when two targets are launched at once, Boger said.

The clay birds and rabbits flew across the range from left to right, right to left, soaring in an arc or speeding at a flat angle - just like the animals in hunting do, he said.

"The targets are designed to simulate real game," Boger said.

Reporter Tom Morton can be reached at (307) 266-0592, or at Tom.Morton@casperstartribune.net.