Journal Entry 11/24/2012

Gun:  CZ 452 16″ American

Scope:  Clearidge Ultra XP 6-20x40AO

Ammo:  Federal Automatch 40gr. Solid

Morning

Little windy this morning so things were slow.  Made it out around 7 am, the sun was already rising.  Daddy saw one in the wood line but as soon as the dogs keyed in the squirrel hit a den tree.

Sassy treed again a little later that morning, hitting on some sourwood trees.  Now sourwoods have been our nemesis up at the lake as just about everyone of them have a place to den up.  I decided to scan the surrounding trees with my binos, which revealed a squirrel at the top of a medium sized red oak.  It was trying to camo itself in the remaining leaves.  I posted up on a tree for stability, left my power at 6 and made a hit in the vitals.  The squirrel didn’t want to give up so I considered another shot, but it came falling out and both Sassy and Koda were on him quickly.  Another mature male down.

Afternoon

The afternoon started with Sassy bumping a squirrel right in the yard, by Missy’s old dog pen. ( Now I don’t want you thinking this is some lavish yard with a lawn care service coming in to mow and automated irrigation system.  This is a single wide trailer on a heavily wooded lot.  Not your typical neighborhood yard.  So this isn’t like shooting them off the bird feeder.)  The hunt was on from here.  Daddy took out the small female in a white oak tree with one shot from his Marlin model 60.  I thought I had seen two squirrels in that  tree, but never could glass the other one.

We then moved on into the woods toward a creek bottom that drains out from the lake.  We hadn’t had any luck down here yesterday, but in years past it had produced plenty of activity.  Sassy picked up on some activity and headed toward the cutover, past one of the largest den trees on the property.  She looked back at us like, “Hey, I’ve got one treed, lets go!”  We moved in, and I had three trees in mind that I thought would be likely suspects.  The darkish oak in the back of the other two trees held a good sized mature male.  I glassed him and then moved into position to take him using my stix for balance.   He moved slightly when I sat down, and the shot I made just made him inch over, where my second shot connected.  Shot him on 14 power and parallaxed down to just under 40 yards.  The nice thing about an adjustable objective scope is that your target can always be in focus and it can help you to know what range you will be shooting at.

Sassy

 Sassy then treed a couple hundred yards away.  I caught movement through a red oak and the squirrel then got still.  As I was making my way around the skirts of the tree, Sassy hit on another tree.  I saw what caught her attention, squirrel movement about 20 feet up.  The squirrel was facing downward, now about 30 feet up by the time I made it into position.  I shot this squirrel on 6 power and parallaxed down to 20 yards.  Only took one shot and it was free handed, which is something I usually won’t do.  Daddy then started to fire at a squirrel in the red oak, but had me thinking it was in the white oak, so that’s where I was watching.  When we got on the same page, I found the squirrel facing down on the main trunk of the tree, where all the branches originate from.  I made contact with one shot and the squirrel come falling out.  Not sure that we had gotten all the squirrels in the area, I decided to glass the trees in the area once more.  I found another squirrel trying to camouflage itself in some leaf litter at the tips of some red oak branches.  I used a sourwood tree to post up on the make the shot.  Well shot number one connected, but the hind legs of the squirrel were hung in a “V” branch and the squirrel was stuck.  I fired a second shot to loose the squirrel but it didn’t work.   Daddy ended up taking another angle to knock the squirrel out.  It always aggravates me when a squirrel gets stuck, but if you hunt long enough it will happen.

There was no other action this afternoon and we made our way back home as the sun was setting.  It ended up being a great set of days off during Thanksgiving to hunt.  Up at the lake we have a tradition of taking these squirrels to a brother and sister who are less fortunate and it always warms my heart because they are so thankful for the squirrels we provide them.  We have a great time hunting them and they never go to waste.

Shots taken by myself:  6

Squirrels taken by myself:  4

Lake 11-23-2012

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1 thought on “Journal Entry 11/24/2012

  1. I have to say the best part about this story is the tradition of giving the squirrels to less fortunate who can use the help. Life is about helping others when you can, a lesson I learned early on from the actions of my father. Thanks for that Nate.
    Russ

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