We'll take a 40 gallon metal trash can, paint it white and turn it upside down and set it maybe 500-600 yards out.

Set up a spotting scope on a tripod and spot for your pal; high, low, left, right etc. We use .357 and/or .44 mags. We don't hit it much but it is fun to sit down and rest the gun on your knee.

Anyone else do this?

I've busted clays at 100 with a .22 and shoot .45 for groups but not tried a pistol further. Sounds like fun.

I have shot handguns out to 300 had fair success with it. I think with a scope or a dot sighted handgun it would be a lot easier.

In the mid 80's I was into Silhouette competition with a contender 7 mm International in Unlimited Class. I was the first competitor to shoot an official perfect score and was the provincial champ in 1985.

At the long range there was a 500yd gong. I could hit that all day long from the creedmore position.

When a new group of rifle shooters would be pounding away at it, I would crank my sights up 23 clicks and whack the gong just to be annoying. Then I would show one them how to do it with my pistol and he would usually be able to hit it. "Focus on the front sight and squeeeze", I would tell him.

A good pistol shot with good sights and the right technique can shoot better than the average rifle hunters. Elmer Kieth got us all seeing the possiblities and then a couple of decades later any silhouette winner could shoot circles around him. Long range pistol shooting has evolved a lot. It is very satisfying. Brian

In the Mid 80's the International Silhouette Handgun Shooters in the USA were getting so good that at major competitions they would have to stage a shoot off at the end of each competition.

To eliminate finalist, they would do things like move the 50 meter chickens out to the 200 meter line or move the 200 meter rams way out to some ridiculous range. I was never at any of these big championships. I just heard the stories.

Basically, if you wanted to win a major international silhouette championship in the USA, you had to shoot about 2-3 moa all day long in the hot sun, with brutal muzzle blasts going off beside you on the line. With open sights on a pistol! And that was back in the last century.

And, (are you ready? Wait for it...) many guys just used bulk bullets from the main manufacturers that now days we would not even consider for a plains game hunt.

Those guys could shoot. Brian

Brian, I had forgotten that Ottawa lets you guys have handguns ...

There is no way my eyes will allow it any more, but at one time, IHMSA was a lot of fun. I don't know that there is anything prettier than watching those steel turkeys spin after a revolver hit from 150 yards away. At the time, my FA 654 Silhouette was up to the task...

Ya; Good old Ottawa. Talk about centralized government!
It is pretty easy to get a handgun in Canada, but you can only take it to a registered range. I'm not into that anymore.

Back in the old days we didn't worry about the rules too much. But now it would be big trouble to get caught in the wrong place with a pistol.
You pretty well have to be a criminal to carry a handgun now days. So, I just don't use my hand guns much anymore. Brian

Doubless, I am with you! Brian

Doubless, I can't see well enough any more for that either.

When I could see well, over 30 years ago, I would use that little black adjustable iris made by merit (I think) that is attached to a small suction cup that stuck to your shooting glases.

Also, there was a hippy co-op in a nearby town of Salmon Arm, that I bought "Eye Bright Tea" from. I drank it and kept a good diet with minimal sugar. Just before a competition I would go out in the parking lot and skip rope for a few minutes to get my heart rate up about 10 minutes before I was to shoot. (competitor would chuckle, "Oh-oh he's skipping".) I competed for one summer. That was all.
My son was 12 then and won the provincial juniors with the same contender with a 357 Max barrel.
It was a pretty good cycle. Brian

25-30 years ago when my oldest son was at home he and I burned up a ton of 45 Colt and 44 Spl. ammo shooting my open sighted revolvers out to 520 yards. Much as you described, using the old Elmer Keith method of sitting on our fannies, drawing up our knees and resting our wrists on the inside of our knees. From 300 yards in an 18 X 24 inch steel buffalo cut out was hit fairly regularly. At the longer distances we hit it quite a bit but I don't know that it could be called "regularly". Great fun and a good education about long range handgunning.

Looking back over my shooting experiences, not hunting experiences, I think that sporting clays, gopher shooting with a 22 pistol and doing just what sharps4590 describes above were the best. Brian

A buddy and I had a hillside with nothing front of us but open ground with scattered boulders and rocks.
Nothing else for miles and one could see at least 1/2 mile or more.
We would lean back against a boulder with forearms on our knees and pick a rock as a target (big as a baseball or VW) first to hit it chose the next target.

If one shoots enough, then the ability of the mind to calculate the correct aim at random distances never ceases to amaze me.

many years ago we would walk along the river bank. there were brush piles on the other side with cans and bottles laying around. 75 to 100 yards wide shootin a 38spcl. 158gr lead rn.we would ricochet the bullet off the water and try to hit the can or bottle. cant always tell how that bullet willfly

We all use to put a dollar in the pot and set up 18x18 tiles at about 350 yard at try to shoot them with anything from 38's to 45 colt. It was a lot more fun than blackjack.

Not too difficult if you know the range and sight it for that range..Set those white tubs as unknown range, nix the range finders, wind computers and rest on a stump, play the hunting game,,gets all but impossible but it sure is fun with pistol or rifle for that matter..

Years ago I shot with 2 guys from NW Ohio who would stand on a bridge with .41 Mag S&W's. Float 2 five gallon cans down a creek and sink them within a couple hundred yards. Fun. And yes, they were religious about cleaning up the (shallow) creek before leaving.

For long range pistol fun get yourself barrels for the Colt 911.

They are available in rifle calibers, like 223 Remington, 243 Winchester and 308 Winchester.
Great fun to shoot.

I have a Keith #5 I had built several years ago that was built on a super blackhawk frame w/ 5"bbl + Ivory stocks that is extremly accurate but I have not tried to shoot THAT far. Hell anymore I can't even see that far.