Australian shooter Catherine Skinner has won a gold medal in the women's trap, defeating New Zealand's Natalie Rooney in the final.

The Victorian hit 12 of 15 targets, one more than her opponent in the gold-medal match, and described the win as "surreal".

"It's one of those things that you say in the mirror before it all happens going 'yeah it's going to happen, it will!' But at the moment it really happened? It's really hard to describe just how surreal this is," she said.

The win makes her Australia's fifth gold medallist in trap shooting and lifts Australia's gold medal tally to three.

Skinner, 26, progressed through the semi-final shooting 14 of 15 targets to finalise her place in the final match.

American Corey Cogdell, a three-time Olympian, won her second bronze medal by besting Spain's Fatima Galvez in a shoot-off, after each woman shot 13 of their 15 targets for the medal.

Defending Olympic champion Jessica Rossi of Italy crashed out in the semi-finals after missing five of the 15 targets, a big disappointment for the police officer after she easily claimed gold and set a world record in London 2012.

She finished sixth out of six finalists.

Skinner a shooter since the age of 12

Catherine Skinner after winning the women's trap shooting at Rio. ( ABC News: Alister Nicholson )

Father Ken Skinner, a farmer at Mansfield in Victoria's high country, said he had not yet spoken to his daughter.

"I think she's like me, her phone wouldn't have stopped ringing. She's too busy with the media at the moment," he told the ABC.

He said she had no more events so "can enjoy herself now".

"I think Catherine was shooting them before she saw them today, you've really got to be quick at them before they get too far out.

"I took her brother out to the gun club, he was keen on guns, and that was a good way of teaching him how to use a gun ... and Catherine followed us around and reckoned it looked alright and had a go at it.

"She took it up when she turned 12 and could get a junior permit."