GTA
General Discussion To Gateway To Airguns => Hunting Gate => : longislandhunter February 07, 2010, 06:53:59 AM
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When I woke up this morning the first thing I did was look out the window at my starling bait station. As I pulled the blinds back to take a peek I see a small flock of yellow beaks clinging to the suet cakes hanging on the tree and feeding on the suet that was falling to the ground. I quickly made my way down to the basement shop and as quietly as I could I opened the bilco doors just enough to shoot through and propped it open with a piece of wood. The starlings were really concentrating on feeding and they didn't notice the door being opened. With the door propped open enough to shoot through I went to one of my gun safes to pick a rifle. As I opened the safe I saw an old friend resting in the back of the safe, it was the first rifle I bought 4 years ago when I got addicted to this sport..... it was my Walmart GAMO Shadow .177 on which I had mounted a BSA 3x12x50 AO scope using a BKL 6 screw one piece mount. I haven't shot this rifle for quite some time so I pulled her out of the safe and loaded her up.
I returned to the bilco doors, stuck the barrel of the Shadow through the opening and took up a shooting position. I put the crosshairs on a yellow beak that was clinging to one of the suet cages and squeezed the beautiful gold trigger. The gun fired and the yellow beak fell off the suet cage and hit the ground. The flock flew off but by the time I had reloaded the Shadow 3 or 4 birds had returned and were at the suet again. I Picked out a bird that was on the ground presenting me a frontal shot and fired. The CPL hit home and the bird flopped over on the grass. As I was reloading another yellow beak landed next to the dead one. I put the scope on him and fired. He went down at the shot but then got up and started hopping his way towards the back of my yard. I was still in my pajamas but I reloaded the Shadow, quickly slipped on a pair of hunting boots and went out into the backyard to find the cripple. As I looked around for the runner I suddenly heard some noise way up in one of my oak trees. I looked up and saw 2 gray squirrels racing their way through the tree tops. As I followed them in the scope one of them suddenly stopped and looked back over his shoulder at me. The Shadow fired and the CPL slammed home, hitting the nutter square in the noggin. He clung to the branch for a few seconds and then let go, falling to the ground and hitting with a loud "thump".
I never did find the "runner" but I had 2 dead yellow beaks and a nutter :)
I took a couple of pics for my GTA hunting buddies, then snuck away to the side of my shed to clean the harvest without the wife catching on.
Jeff
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Very nice productive morning indeed Jeff! Nice pics & shooting with your 1st air rifle from 4yrs ago!
We sometimes look for 1 species like birds and forget to look closer for those grays. Although I gave up looking because I don't have any left, hehe.
Do you remember what pellet each rifle likes, or do you have it written down, and what distance they were zeroed at, etc.? You have so many guns I would think you need to write it all down.. :)
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Nice shooting Jeff!
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Harry,, I have a filing cabinet in my shop and I keep a folder for each rifle. The folder for each rifle contains all the information on that rifle such as what work has been done to it, what pellet it's sighted in for and the distance, the targets from each shooting session are in the folder for quick reference, stuff like that. I basically make an entry in the folder every time I shoot the rifle or do any sort of work to it.
As for the squirrels,,, yeah, they caught me by surprise. :)
Jeff
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nice shooting jeff! I would call that a productive morning lol
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Great shooting and pic's Jeff and it's nice to have nutters and feathered pest in the yard to harvest. They just don't come near my place hehe except for that one nutter several month's ago and he hasn't been back. It's time to get my butt out there and really get into some hunting and play catch up with you all. Ed
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Thanks all :) I really enjoyed popping those pests today :)
I had yellow beaks visiting the suet cages all day but after I nailed those birds this morning the rest of em got real cagey and would spot me every time I would poke the barrel of the Shadow out for a shot. At least the birds are visiting the bait station every day now so I'll be happy if I just get a few shots each day..
Jeff
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great shooting and thats a definete productive morning ...cant wait to here about your afternoon......lol
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Nice shots Jeff.
Sure is great to be able to step out back and do some hunting at a time of year when the woods aren't so hospitable. Makes the Winter go by faster !!!!
Paul
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That`s the best....first thing to do when you get out of bed....shoot some critters. Great shooting at those Starlings....too bad one got away. Curiosity got the best of that nutter...he should`ve just kept on truckin`.
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nice haul
great shooting
good story
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Great shooting! That is a big ole scope on that gun! What a bonanza!