The Hunting/Shooting Thread

[Steve C. Sink]

Originally Posted by Merlin

You have heard of a designated driver, well around here we have a designated check the coyote in, person usaully named Mickie (spin off from the old commercial). He gets the body count and we others go on our way, shooting away.

Sidebar: here is a photo of trail camera photo on my bait pile that I should mention at the time was partially frozen. The bait this hawk was building steam to lift was the size of a basketball and you can see his tallons are stuck in deep ready to go.

I should say, hawks are not on my list of shoot on site but if she asked me I would slice into smaller chunks.

Great photography, Merlin.

MULE.

[Frank Daignault]

Shooting dump rats is another quality sport that is the funnest thing with clothes. You just sit quietly with a .22 and listen for the "clink-clunk" of a rat moving among the cans. If you kill one, a little later in the day, the others will come out to eat it. This provides additional shooting. I feel sorry for anybody who never had a favorite dump back in the day.

[Merlin]

WOW! Memory lane here you come on a rewind.
Friday night (17 years old) get out of work at the grocery store at 9 PM (white shirt and tie) and off to the dump to try out new . 22 (traded every two weeks or so). Shoot rats for an hour and off to pick up Buffy Sue and apologize for being late.
I think the rats counted on my showing up so they could drag off the killed ones for supper. I could go into more detail how we stood between the headlights firing away until they seemed as if a bunch where charging, as we beat feet back into the car for safety but I won't. Oh Gee I just did!

[Frank Daignault]

Hey Rich, ever go on a real honest-ta-goodness coon hunt? Blue tick hounds and the whole town?

[Merlin]

Not with the whole town but if I remember right 5 people, walker hounds, not blue ticks. Moving fast through the woods with a lowly 3 cell Maglite soon gets you not afraid of the dark. Hounds moving fast and seemed real close but come to find out they were on the other side of a reservoir (sound carried over the water). That was along walk (almost at a run) around not being able to pick your footing.

One of the youngsters (couple of years younger then me) who we nicknamed Cheetah climbed the tree as hounds were bouncing at the bottom and finished the deal.

The night over, it was a good thing to glide between the cool sheets and say to myself "been there and done that", what's next?.

[Frank Daignault]

My father used to go 'coon hunting but he never let me go. The time I went I was an apprentice in Connecticut and the guys at the shop said we would meet at the Ellington Road around 10 PM. When I got there, there was no room to park -- about 30 vehicles. The dogs started one and everybody ran through the woods once the dogs barked tree. Once we got there, flashlights all over, nobody had a gun. Took a while until we could come up with a .22 rifle. Its the dogs that have all the fun.

[Merlin]

To me it seemed like a big investment for little pay off. I mean really a dead coon well maybe you passed him over, feeding and training the dogs, lost night's sleep!.

But on the positive side, the sound of hounds on the trail will burn into your brain as a good memory.

Whatever floats your boat ---I guess.

[Piscator]

I remember sampling some 'coon at a few game dinners. Very dark meat, almost black. Very stringy and rich from what I remember, almost like a cross between turkey and lamb. I'd definitely have another sample if it were offered to me, though.

[Frank Daignault]

Evrybody always ate the 'coon. I was only a kid so I don't remember but we ate evrything that didn't eat us. Also, hunting there was always somebody who stretched and dried the raccoon hyde to sell. I have a friend who traps beaver today and he says they are great. I know my brother Norman ate muskrat which is not a rat. As they say, tastes just like chicken.

[DonLBI]

Even with all this snow and ice here I've been taking the dog out as much as possible. I've been seeing lots of deer and the herd seems to have come through pretty healthy but I am concerned with the turkey stock.

[Merlin]

Word here with most everyone having a coyote bait pile to snipe the yotes is that the coyotes being able to walk on top of the snow and the deer sinking in the yotes are feeding on the deer big time.

Myself, I think the deer have moved to the suburbs to feed on ornamental shrubs and of course people who just have to feed them.

With shallower snow on the ground the rules will have changed. At 6'4" in virgin snow the snow is up to my crotch and the twin brothers are cold.

[Frank Daignault]

Originally Posted by DonLBI

Even with all this snow and ice here I've been taking the dog out as much as possible. I've been seeing lots of deer and the herd seems to have come through pretty healthy but I am concerned with the turkey stock.

Don't worry about the turkeys. They thrive in the mountainous Berkshires and Green Mountains where the snow is much deeper than Jersey. STill, many share your concerns when it is the stuff that you hunt.

[Frank Daignault]

Guys at the gun club have started seeing deer yards of 12 to 15 deer on the move. Today, after last nights cold, I walked on top of the snow crust without breaking through. On the news they had to tranquilize a deer in Boston. I suspect, but I really don't know, that the deer are empty and have started moving out of desperation. They say that deer can only go a couple of weeks without food. I, on the other hand, can only go a couple of weeks without deer.

[Frank Daignault]

I just saw the results of a survey that determined that hunting license sales nationally rose last season by 3.6%. This brings the total in the US to 15 million. This does not include recreational shooters -- trap, skeet, clays, pistol, preserve -- who do not hunt.

[joeaugeri]

i just had knee surgery yesterday,so i am finished hunting this winter. but i still bought my licence last week, because i know those licence numbers are very important.