Nice Pair at 80 yards in Wind
Went "gopher" shooting again today.... The landowner is very pleased as I really reduced the numbers on his main pasture on my first hunt.... It was mostly sunny, but cold and windy.... The ground squirrels weren't sticking their heads up for long and it was difficult shooting compared to the first time.... Very few close shots (I guess I've made 'em nervous).... There was a group of three at a lasered 80 yards in two burrows side by side.... It took a few shots to dope out the wind, and I was holding 2 MilDots high for that range.... By waiting for a bit of a lull in the wind I could hold about one Dot to the left and finally got all three.... two of which I found in the same hole on top of each other....
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I figure I got between 12-15 again today, mostly between 30-50 yards.... The owner wants to get rid of the Yellow-Bellied Marmots on his property, as they make a bigger mess of the field than the ground squirrels.... They are also "Schedule B" nuisance animals if damaging property.... In his upper pasture, there are several large woodpiles, and I saw five marmots on them at various times today.... I got clear headshots at three at about 40 yards each, and was rewarded with a loud THWACK each time, but the animals fell down into the pile of logs and I couldn't recover them.... I saw good solid hits on all three, and am confident they didn't suffer....
All in all, it was a successful day.... It's going to be tricky striking a balance between leaving a small breeding population for next year and keeping the landowner happy as he'd like them all to be gone.... He is certainly pleased with my success rate, and commented today he can hear when I hit because of the CRACK - THWACK in quick succession....
Bob
