Early in the year I like a shotgun, usually a 16 gauge single shot Iver Johnson. Later in the year I use a .22 rifle when the leaves are on the ground and I can't get close enough for the scattergun. So far this season I've got 13 tree rats. How bout yall?
We got acres of ground squirrell's here but alot are not in areas where you can hunt/shoot. They are a problem in our berms @ the gun club. The raptors are pretty fat here, tho.
Jake, what do you do w/ the tree rats after blasting? eat? feed to the dogs/vultures, or make fertilizer? Just curious..
Ruger 10/22 in a rifle and my Winchester 1400 for a shotgun.
I have taken them before with a Taurus M94 .22 revolver as well, but that's been a few years.
I use my pellet gun 8) its plenty powerful enough. i remember, one time i shot one up in a tree 20 feet up, 25 yards away. the pellet hit with a thwack! i was aiming for head, but missed and hit the torso, taking out both of his lungs. amazingly, he survived for 5 seconds. during his fall from the tree, he caught a branch and swung on it! and then plummetted to his doom, where he wiggled a bit, then died.
Like a lot of others I've taken hundreds with .22 rifles, handguns, modern shotguns and pellet rifles. But! Nothing gives me more enjoyment than going afield with one of my hundred year old plus black powder doubles. It's a blast (literally) to touch one off, see the cloud of smoke and bag the quarry with an old smoke pole, all with rounds I had fun making myself. (Heck, loading the rounds is half the fun.) Taking out the big spent brass case and sliding in a fresh one. Love it, love, love it!
Do I have a favorite one of these? That's a hard one.... I guess if I had to choose just one... and this is hard... I'll say my 1878 Colts 12ga.
I like my Remington Sportmaster 512, but that's because it was the gun grandpa first taught me to shoot and it is only gun that came to me when he passed (9 grandchildren and some great grandchildren, so things were a little scarce).
Hey! That was my first new .22 and I still have, use and love it after forty years. 512X Sportmaster to be exact with a 24" barrel and tube mag that holds 15LRs, 17Ls, or 22Ss. Yeah, nice little rifle.
The only squirrel I've shot was a grounder. Little bugger was digging into the berm @ the Range. Used my Para .40 @ 15 yds. I think he was dead before the bullet exited. Left him on the hill for the vultures or coyotes. Circle of Life.
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