GTA
General Discussion To Gateway To Airguns => Hunting Gate => : DougT March 20, 2010, 05:38:46 PM
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My work takes me through a lot of rural places, so I carry binoculars in my work truck and I see a lot of game and cool shooting places. If I have time I'll stop and ask permission to shoot. The past two weeks has yielded two land owners that welcome squirrel shooters, as they have been out in force during this recent warm, sunny weather. Last tuesday I called my newest contact and he seemed eager for us to shoot, explaining that the squirrels had eaten much of his garden last year and he wanted them gone.
I picked up WadeS this morning and about 7:30 we headed to the hills. We got on site a little before 10am and spent a few minutes BS'ing the old man and letting him shoot our .22 springers. The weather was great: sunny and about 50* out. He had a special request, that we shoot as many as possible near the garden area and another one living below an old grain silo concrete foundation. We grabbed about 100 Superpoints each and started patrolling the fenceline around his house/yard. The fence was nice as there were 6" round fenceposts about every 5 yards about 5' tall that were perfect rests. We spent about an hour working our way away from the house to the left and shot about 7-8. We then crossed the creek and shout about 12-15 more until we ran out of pellets in our pockets. The ranges were hard to judge, the breeze was intermittent and the squirrels didn't give much of a target many times. Most of the misses were range estimation problems. WadeS and I wouldn't count a hit unless we either retrieved the dead squirrel, saw it kicking or hear the WHOP sound and both agreed it was a direct hit. No skimming or shooting the foot counted as a hit.
We went back to the car, grabbed the rest of the pellets and spent the last couple hours going the other way from the house. Lots of squirrels to shoot and lots of boneheaded, inexplainable misses?!?!?!?!? Both of us ran out of H-points the previous week (our go-to pellet) and had rezeroed with Superpoints two days previous. Our confidence and familiarity with these different pellets was throwing our conficence. That's the reason we missed those 15-20 yard shots....
In total we shot for about 4 hours and bagged 35 squirrels. WadeS had 21 confirmed kills with his .22 Mendoza and I had 14 with my .22 TF-89. WadeS's longest was 52 yards and I'm not sure what mine was, probably 200+ yards ;) These squirrels are about 4"-5" tall when standing straight up and are about 1.5" wide. Most of our shots were when they were only partially visible.
Here is group pic of WadeS, myself and 14 stiff squirrels. We'll go back in a couple months when the babies are out and clueless. We also plan on having .22 PCP's by then!!!!! I think 100+ in a day is very possible with good guns, good ammo and good weather.
DougT
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Thats the way to get it started i would love a GS problem in my yard but then again it's small with no live stock hahahhahha nice pic of the country a little jelous here have a good season keep us posted . chris
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That's some great pest control there. great shooting and pic. :) I wish we had some ground squirrels here but only the Thirteen lined ground squirrel. about the size of a Chipmunk. Ed
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Nice haul there!
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Wow that's some awesome long range shooting! Nice job!
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oh yeah
its ground squirrel hunting time
we call the prairie dogs in my area
towns and towns of them
cant wait til i get out
great shooting
nice pics
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Just a few comments for you Doug. First, good recount of your hunt. Second, is there actually a ground squirrel season? Third, I sure do love those wide open spaces.
Teach them pests to keep thier heads down.
Keep at 'em.
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No, there isn't any official season as far as I know. The "season" starts when the weather is warm enough for them to venture out of their holes and into the crosshairs. They will be out for a few weeks for breeding and then disappear into their burrows to have their babies. Once about mid/late April rolls around the whole family will be out. The babies aren't very smart but are much smaller.
These aren't prarie dogs, I think they are called Columbia Ground Squirrels. Prarie dogs are much larger and less squirrel-like in appearance.
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I'm sure everyone of the misses, even your 200 yard + shots were entirely do to the pellet change from the H point. And my furthest shot was 53 to 54 yards, not 52. Just wanted to point that out.
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Nice shooting guys.
Those critters look to be about the size of our Red squirrels.
Paul.
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Doug and Wade, sounds like you guys are as deadly on squirrels as you two are on Starlings. I saw the first ground squirrel of the year for me just yesterday. I have very limitied supply of them in my area so I only shoot a few every couple of months. Great story and pictures, keep both coming.
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Excellent shooting at those ground squirrels. Didn`t think anyone can use those Superpoints....most shooters say they`re not too accurate. I tried the Crosman Superpoints...and none of my airguns like them. I know RWS have their own Superpoint....but I haven`t tried them yet.
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Gamo2hammerli, the superpoints seem to shoot "ok" but not quite as well as the RWS H points. Both myself and Doug T are able to shoot 5 shot groups at 15 yards that you can cover with a dime.
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Sounds like you guys had a lot of fun. Good shootin'!
Brian
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Great day. I wish I had some fertile grounds like that on which to shoot.
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Wade, I've used the .177 Crosman Superpoints with all my "1000"fps springers and even at 10 meters shooting off a rest the best I can do is about a 1" group. I've used 4 of those air rifles (The ones that shot them the best) to try out the Superpoints out to 40 yards....I didn't get a group, I got a PATTERN heh heh. Some of the shots were 8 inches apart!!!! And some were off the target sheet. The pointy pellets are just no good for longer distances in my opinion. The Predators which also have a pointy tip......but have a narrower profile seems to shoot great for other airgunners. I've not used those yet.
Maybe the Superpoints fly better with less powerful airguns, but I haven't tested that theory yet. Anyways, if the pointy pellets work well with a gun/pellet combo go for it.....most airguns are abit different from each other.
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Sweet!