Speckmisser
Well-known member
- Joined
- Mar 12, 2001
- Messages
- 12,900
- Reaction score
- 27
Well, I got lost and ended up at BirdDawg's place this morning, along with Rancho Loco. Dunno how that happened... one minute I'm just driving down the road, the next I'm sitting in a turnout meeting two more JHO members, and then the next moment I'm creeping through a creekbed with the .44 in hand and the -06 over my shoulder.
The hogs had definitely been there, with tons of fresh sign, but they must've got notice that Rancho Loco and his Guide Gun would be there because they sure didn't make an appearance today. We did spot three of them, hightailing it across a distant ridge. At the rate they were moving, I'd say they're in Sonoma by now.
After a morning still hunt, BirdDawg and I grabbed the scatterguns and chased quail. The quail were a little more amenable, and after warming up shooting at them with some special "blank" loads, I put in some real shells and managed to scratch a couple down.
BirdDawg was showing me how his shotgun can shoot around trees, but since there weren't any trees to shoot around, he demonstrated by shooting around a couple of terrified quail.
Somehow or another, we managed to run up on a bunch of chukar too, and after showing off my mountain goat imitation, I scared one over the ridge and it tried to land on BirdDawg's shotgun. Unfortunately, BirdDawg was practicing the tree thing at the time and I'm afraid he accidentally killed that poor bird stone dead.
I took three and a half birds at BirdDawg's place (there was one simultaneous shot... I don't think either of us hit the bird, but the combined blast scared him to death), then stopped off on the way home at a little favorite spot of mine. Looks like the other quail hunters haven't been there this year, because the coveys were huge! Unfortunately, so were the chemise and oaks, and despite seeing probably 200 birds, all but three of them managed to keep a tree or bush between us when they flushed. Wish I'd had BirdDawg's shoot-around-the-tree gun with me!
Ended up bringing home 7 birds and three unfired shells. I could probably have filled out the last three birds (or fired the last three shells), but my legs were turning into spaghetti by 1600, and it was time to head for home.
Big thanks to BirdDawg for letting me hang out and scare critters with him.
The hogs had definitely been there, with tons of fresh sign, but they must've got notice that Rancho Loco and his Guide Gun would be there because they sure didn't make an appearance today. We did spot three of them, hightailing it across a distant ridge. At the rate they were moving, I'd say they're in Sonoma by now.
After a morning still hunt, BirdDawg and I grabbed the scatterguns and chased quail. The quail were a little more amenable, and after warming up shooting at them with some special "blank" loads, I put in some real shells and managed to scratch a couple down.
BirdDawg was showing me how his shotgun can shoot around trees, but since there weren't any trees to shoot around, he demonstrated by shooting around a couple of terrified quail.
Somehow or another, we managed to run up on a bunch of chukar too, and after showing off my mountain goat imitation, I scared one over the ridge and it tried to land on BirdDawg's shotgun. Unfortunately, BirdDawg was practicing the tree thing at the time and I'm afraid he accidentally killed that poor bird stone dead.
I took three and a half birds at BirdDawg's place (there was one simultaneous shot... I don't think either of us hit the bird, but the combined blast scared him to death), then stopped off on the way home at a little favorite spot of mine. Looks like the other quail hunters haven't been there this year, because the coveys were huge! Unfortunately, so were the chemise and oaks, and despite seeing probably 200 birds, all but three of them managed to keep a tree or bush between us when they flushed. Wish I'd had BirdDawg's shoot-around-the-tree gun with me!
Ended up bringing home 7 birds and three unfired shells. I could probably have filled out the last three birds (or fired the last three shells), but my legs were turning into spaghetti by 1600, and it was time to head for home.
Big thanks to BirdDawg for letting me hang out and scare critters with him.
