This last Saturday moning I saw more squirrels than I could shake a stick at. The only problem was I did not have time to shoot at them, had a doctors appointment to make. So I figure I will only be gone no more than an hour, they should still be running around withing shooting range.....boy was I wrong with that therory. Got back home a little over an hour later and not a tree rat to be seen or shot at.
Finally Monday evening came around and one of the tree rats made an appearance within shooting range. The little bugger was running around on the old farm house property which borders my property. So I decide to grab the Shadow and a couple of Preditor rounds in order to remove the little mennice from the neighborhood.
The little guy got within what I figured to be 30 to 35 yards, for me this is a very good distance to be shooting at unwanted critters. The little bugger was digging around looking something that he probably buried weeks ago, at this point he is hard to see in the tall grass. After a minute or two of chasing him around with the scope he made two fatal mistakes: #1 he stopped moving and #2 he stood up straight. At this point I am ready to pull trigger and thinking to myself "this is one dead squirrel". I pulled the trigger, heard the crack of the gun followed by a solid thud sound, that tells me hit him hard.
Now at this point, like most of you, there would be a picture here somewhere showing you the airgun with its kill. Well today that will not be possible. The little #*@%'s last act of defiance was to die somewhere eles instead of within a few feet of where he was shot.
The moment he was shot he started on his accrobatic 20 yard run to the nearest tree. With every step he took he would jump up or do a side roll or a back flip. One would have thought he was trying out for the Olympics. After about a 10 second run he made it to the nearest tree, for me the tree he picked was the wrong tree. The tree in question is a dead Oak with a hollow section in the base. My first and only thought at this time was "not again", followed by many swear words strung together.
I grab my dead critter glove and head for the tree. Arrive at my destination to find alot of blood. There was blood in front of the stump entrance, on both sides of the stump and on the stump. At this point I am wondering with all of this blood how did the little bugger even make it this far. After searching in the weeds around the stump and only finding enough misquitoes to suck me dry I looked inside the stump to find more blood and no tree rat. I figure the tree is hollow several feet up the trunk.
There will be no dead critter retrieval today.
My only hope is that the neighborhood opposum or raccoon finds the carcus for a late night snack.
I hate it when that happens.
