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Airgun Hunter: Tree Rats

Airgun Hunter: Tree Rats

Squirrels- you either love ‘em or you hate ’em but either way, there are certainly too many of them! They’ve either out-competed the native reds for food and habitat, or just given them a deadly disease. “I don’t know, they come over here, steal our nuts and give us the pox!” said a grumpy Mr Red Squirrel.

Seriously though, they do a massive amount of damage in our woodlands and if they hadn’t been introduced from North America years ago, people would be feeding reds in the park, not greys. As far as I’m concerned, they’ve got to be controlled when possible and an early morning squirrel bashing session was long overdue on my shoot. I’d been reviewing a Daystate Huntsman Regal and decided I’d use it to take out a few tree rats. The stock on the Regal is lovely and I didn’t want to send it back with any blemishes, so I used some cammo to wrap it; it would give it some protection whilst in the field and also not stand out as much. I used a ghillie suit to break up my outline and a baseball cap with a face veil- I was determined to blend in to my surroundings as much as possible.

TACTICS

My method would be a slow stalk around the outskirts of one of the main fields and see if I could spot any movement on the ground or in the oak trees above me. It’s best to take easy in any stalking situation, even if you do look like a large bush; large bushes don’t generally walk about much and your quarry would soon catch on that something wasn’t quite right! I don’t like scanning around with the scope on my rifle; after all, you should only really point your gun at something you want to shoot, so I was using my 10 power Vortex Solo monocular. It’s ideal for this sort of thing, as it’s powerful enough to pick out quarry from a distance but light enough to stick in a pocket when not in use.

My long-range eyesight’s pretty good and I didn’t actually need the monocular to see the first grey blob on the ground near a water trough. I don’t know if it had just been for an early morning drink but he was facing away from me and he may have just been warming himself in the first rays of sunlight that were appearing. There weren’t any acorns of any size on the oak trees, so I wasn’t sure what he was eating but he was certainly tucking into something. It would be a very long, slow walk along the fenceline before I got within range but I got to about 60 yards from my quarry; it was much too far to take the shot and I like to get as close as possible before taking any shot on anything living. A long-range shot is not only more difficult from a shooting point of view but the pellet’s energy soon diminishes. 12ft/lb at the muzzle is pretty puny really, so it’s best to use as much of it as possible by reducing the range as best you can.

 

DISAPPEARING ACT

Squirrels have very good survival skills and as soon as they sense danger, they’re off; I thought I’d been very stealthy as I crept along from bush to bush but something must have spooked my quarry- but where had he gone? I kept as still as I could in the rather awkward half crouch I was in but my patience was rewarded by a movement in the small oak tree a few yards from where I’d last seen the squirrel. He’d only have had to run and jump to be out of sight and he was now sitting on a low branch. He was still eating, so I used his inattention to my advantage. There were a few sheep milling around in the field near my intended target, so maybe the noise they were making was helping me in my quest to get nearer. I eventually got to about 30 yards of the squirrel and used my rolled up beanbag as a makeshift monopod support to drop it with a shot behind the eye. I kept still for a while, just in case another tree rat appeared but nothing stirred, so I retrieved my kill.

I often see golf balls in the grass near the perimeter fence, as there’s a course next door and I’ve started collecting them to use as bait! It might sound mad but I recon that a few golf balls in a straw ‘nest’ could be mistaken for birds eggs and might attract crows or magpies- I’ll put it to the test soon and I’m sure it’ll work… Failing that I can always sell them as second hand spares to poor golfers, so it’s a win, win situation as far as I can see!

 

BONUS WOODPIGEON

I was on my way through the bushes when I spotted a wood pigeon out in the field, feeding on clover. Stalking woodies is usually impossible but I’ve done it before a couple of times and thought I might as well give it a go. My position amongst the foliage gave me an ideal vantage point to observe my intended quarry and he was making his way towards me, so maybe stalking wasn’t going to be needed after all. It took about 10 minutes but eventually the pigeon had waddled within range and a shot taken seated on my beanbag seat killed it cleanly. That’s when something very odd happened, a couple of sheep wandered across from the other side of the field and just stood looking at the dead bird for a couple of minutes, as if they were trying to work out what had just happened. Sheep aren’t exactly known for their brainpower, so it’s rather unlikely that they were saying a prayer or giving it the last rites but it was certainly very strange behaviour.

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INTO THE WOODS

I collected my kill and left the freaky sheep, holding their own version of a wake to it and made my way to the corner of the field, so that I could cross over into the lane that goes up into the woods. It’s rather tricky at the best of times but getting over a barbed wire fence whilst wearing a ghillie suit proved rather difficult, as it snagged every time I moved. I managed it eventually and I made my way up into the woods, scanning around for squirrels as I went. I could hear a few, jumping from branch to branch but they were over in the golf course and therefore safe- unless they came over my side of the fence of course and luckily one did.

He sat overlooking the path but was still a ‘no shoot’, as if I’d missed him, my pellet would have gone sailing over into the neighbouring property, which is obviously illegal and potentially dangerous. There’s no point risking injuring someone out playing golf and even if my ammo hadn’t caused any injury, it’s still classed as armed trespass and carries a hefty fine and it would be goodbye to my shooting rights and FAC! So, I just waited a while for the squirrel to move so that it was a safe shot and then dropped him on to the path. I’m not sure what species it was but a tree was shedding loads of fluffy white stuff and it was all over the ground, it was so thick in places that it looked like it had been snowing!

 

ONE LAST SQUIRREL

I made my way through the woodland, sticking to the paths, so as to minimise the noise I made. Once again I heard squirrels crashing around above me and even had one making that odd barking/screeching sound overhead. Unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to take a shot, so I started to walk back down to the farmyard. As I made my way through the white patch, I could see a grey blur in the distance, coming up the path. It was a squirrel and he hadn’t seen me, probably thanks to my head to toe cammo. I sat down on my beanbag, in the classic Field Target position and just waited for squirrel number 3 to come within range. I’m not sure where he was off to in such a hurry but he was completely oblivious to my presence. In fact I had to make a squeaking noise to make him stop about 15 yards away, as he was starting to become blurred through my scope. I’m sure he would have run straight past me had I not shot him!

So that was three grey squirrels in the bag, plus a bonus woodpigeon. Not a huge tally by any means but certainly a dent in the local vermin population.

KIT BOX:
Rifle:
Daystate Huntsman Regal PCP in .22 calibre
www.daystate.com

Scope:
MTC Mamba Lite 3–12 X 44
www.mtcoptics.co.uk

Pellets: 
Air Arms Field
www.air-arms.co.uk

Ghillie suit:
www.military1st.co.uk

Monocular:
Vortex Solo 10 X 36
www.vortexoptics.com

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