THREE OAKS — Situated on 500 acres of fields, ravines, woodlands and rolling hills, Deer Creek Hunt Club is a beautiful location to spend a day or just a couple hours. And, whether you have never shot a gun before in your life or you are a seasoned hunter, the club has something to offer for everyone.

“We can accommodate the whole gamut—from the beginner to the seasoned hunter,” said Tammy Umlauf, sales manager at Deer Creek. “You can come in with your own gun and your own shells and just purchase the targets that you’ll be shooting at, or you can walk in with nothing, and we can supply you with everything.”

Located at 18000 Basswood Rd. outside of Three Oaks, Deer Creek Hunt Club is a private hunting club, but the public is welcome to come in and use the facilities as well.

“We have three different structures of memberships, but you can just walk in off the street, too,” Umlauf explained. “If you want to just come in for the day and shoot, that’s an option. For anybody who’s going to come in more often, we have memberships that will give you discounts.”

Umlauf and manager Tom Crook have been running the club since 2007, and they offer a wide variety of shooting activities for their visitors, including year-round sporting clay courses and skeet shooting, as well as live pheasant hunting from September through April.

“We have two full sporting clay courses set up. It’s like golfing with a gun,” Umlauf explained. “So, you’ll go from one shooting location to the next. You can either walk or you can rent a cart, just like it would be if you were golfing, but you’re using a gun to shoot targets with.”

To accommodate both beginners and pros, the club has an easier course and a more difficult one.

“Every station has a different presentation of targets. There’s stations 1 through 12 on each course,” Crook said. “We have all different types of targets. Some run along the ground like rabbits, and some shoot up straight in the air. Some twist and turn. The more difficult course changes all the time.”

On the spacious lawn in front of the club house, a skeet shooting range is set up.

“Skeet shooting is a specific game. We do that out front. It involves shooting ‘birds’—clay targets—that cross from the left and the right,” Umlauf explained.

A third option at the club is to arrange a live pheasant hunt.

“For the live bird hunting, the only thing that is required is that, if you’re under the age of 50, you have to have a hunter’s safety course. You no longer need a preserve license in the State of Michigan,” Umlauf said. “We have safety instructors here who meet with people when they first come in and who guide them along because we get a lot of first-time shooters here.”

Like the sporting clay courses, Deer Creek’s pheasant hunts are designed with the capabilities and wishes of the hunters in mind.

“It’s a ‘put and take’ hunt. We crate the birds, and then we take them and plant them out in the field, and then the hunters will go out with the guides and the dogs and hunt them,” Umlauf explained.

Visitors can choose to have the birds planted in wild areas or in cultivated areas on the grounds of the club, and they can bring their own hunting dogs or choose to be accompanied by a professional guide and his dog. They also offer European hunts, and they will clean the pheasants as well.

“For a pheasant hunt, 90 percent of the time, you’ll want to book it at least a day in advance, so that we can be sure we have a guide here for you,” Crook said. “Or, you can also come out on your own. You don’t have to use one of our guides.”

While individuals are welcome to come out to the club and hunt or shoot the sporting clays, Deer Creek is also a great place to have corporate outings and other get-togethers, like bachelor parties. The club also offers monthly “fun shoots” throughout the summer.

“We do a lot of corporate outings here,” Umlauf said. “We can open up the restaurant for larger groups who plan their outings. We’ve done pig roasts, or we do burgers. We can do just about anything people want.”

In fact, Crook says that many groups that used to go golfing now choose to come to Deer Creek instead.

“People just love it, and it doesn’t cost much more than golfing does either,” Crook noted.

In fact, visitors who bring their own guns and ammunition can visit the club and shoot 100 sporting clays for just $45.

More information about the services and memberships available at Deer Creek Hunt Club can be found at www.deercreekhuntclub.com, and they have a Facebook page as well. The club can be reached by calling (269) 756-6600.