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Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 19,277 Likes: 12
Campfire Ranger
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Campfire Ranger
Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 19,277 Likes: 12 |
No shame in shooting squirrels with a shotgun. Shotgun or air rifle is the only responsible thing to do in more populated area's.
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Joined: Oct 2002
Posts: 13,494 Likes: 4
Campfire Outfitter
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Campfire Outfitter
Joined: Oct 2002
Posts: 13,494 Likes: 4 |
On the WMA's I hunt most require the use of a shotgun. Glad you like to "piss off" the bowhunters who have made several trips from home to set up in a good spot to bow hunt for deer then on opening weekend a group of first timers come out and shoot up the trees. Real cool. I feel the WMA's should be closed to small game hunters during the first two weeks of bow season.
Dog I rescued in January
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Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 19,277 Likes: 12
Campfire Ranger
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Campfire Ranger
Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 19,277 Likes: 12 |
On the WMA's I hunt most require the use of a shotgun. Glad you like to "piss off" the bowhunters who have made several trips from home to set up in a good spot to bow hunt for deer then on opening weekend a group of first timers come out and shoot up the trees. Real cool. I feel the WMA's should be closed to small game hunters during the first two weeks of bow season. [bleep] the bowhunters. I pay as much for my license as they do and have just as much right to be out there. Small game seasons also existed long before bow seasons so it's bow hunters who are encroaching on small gamers, not the other way around. That being said, if I know there is a bowhunter in the area I will go somewhere else so as not to disturb his hunt. It's the ones you don't know are there and give you schit for ruining their hunt that get my dander up.
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Joined: Mar 2008
Posts: 1,278
Campfire Regular
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Campfire Regular
Joined: Mar 2008
Posts: 1,278 |
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Joined: Mar 2005
Posts: 11,711
Campfire Outfitter
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Campfire Outfitter
Joined: Mar 2005
Posts: 11,711 |
On the WMA's I hunt most require the use of a shotgun. Glad you like to "piss off" the bowhunters who have made several trips from home to set up in a good spot to bow hunt for deer then on opening weekend a group of first timers come out and shoot up the trees. Real cool. I feel the WMA's should be closed to small game hunters during the first two weeks of bow season. [bleep] the bowhunters. I pay as much for my license as they do and have just as much right to be out there. Small game seasons also existed long before bow seasons so it's bow hunters who are encroaching on small gamers, not the other way around. That being said, if I know there is a bowhunter in the area I will go somewhere else so as not to disturb his hunt. It's the ones you don't know are there and give you schit for ruining their hunt that get my dander up. I bow hunt and yet totally agree with you. Nobody is entitled to special privilege on public ground. As a group I don't know any other single one group that are bigger whiners overall than bow hunters.
Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats.
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Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,799 Likes: 1
Campfire Tracker
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Campfire Tracker
Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,799 Likes: 1 |
On the WMA's I hunt most require the use of a shotgun. Glad you like to "piss off" the bowhunters who have made several trips from home to set up in a good spot to bow hunt for deer then on opening weekend a group of first timers come out and shoot up the trees. Real cool. I feel the WMA's should be closed to small game hunters during the first two weeks of bow season. [bleep] the bowhunters. I pay as much for my license as they do and have just as much right to be out there. Small game seasons also existed long before bow seasons so it's bow hunters who are encroaching on small gamers, not the other way around. That being said, if I know there is a bowhunter in the area I will go somewhere else so as not to disturb his hunt. It's the ones you don't know are there and give you schit for ruining their hunt that get my dander up. I bow hunt and yet totally agree with you. Nobody is entitled to special privilege on public ground. As a group I don't know any other single one group that are bigger whiners overall than bow hunters. Gotta agree about the whining....this coming from a former bow hunter. I actually [out of courtesy] knock off squirrel hunting some of my woods, when the tree stands go up for bow season, here in Indiana. maddog
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Joined: Apr 2010
Posts: 3,104
Campfire Tracker
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Campfire Tracker
Joined: Apr 2010
Posts: 3,104 |
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Joined: Jan 2008
Posts: 709
Campfire Regular
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Campfire Regular
Joined: Jan 2008
Posts: 709 |
I am overun with Squirrel's, so I shoot a lot of them on my property every year during the season. I use a little Rossi convertible barrel rifle. It has two barrels. A .410 and a .22 LR. The whole package weighs about 5 lbs. I can switch barrels in a minute, and for the tree rats that climb to the top I use the .22 barrel If they just stay low or try the old hide-behind the tree trick, I use the .410. If I shoot 30 or 40 in a season, next year there are another 30-40. Can't figure out how they can reproduce so fast. I give them away to friends who enjoy them. They are great to eat. I see no shame in using any weapon that will do them in without massacreing them so the meat is wasted.
Better to be over the hill than under it.
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Joined: Apr 2010
Posts: 3,104
Campfire Tracker
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Campfire Tracker
Joined: Apr 2010
Posts: 3,104 |
Can't figure out how they can reproduce so fast.
Its called reproduction.....
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Joined: Jun 2004
Posts: 16,740
Campfire Ranger
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Campfire Ranger
Joined: Jun 2004
Posts: 16,740 |
I've still got my first gun, Ithica super single. That .410 is a squirrel killer. With #4's I can hit 'em in the head.
A government is the most dangerous threat to man�s rights: it holds a legal monopoly on the use of physical force against legally disarmed victims.
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Joined: Apr 2005
Posts: 1,090
Campfire Regular
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Campfire Regular
Joined: Apr 2005
Posts: 1,090 |
Since I usually do most of my hunting in the early season, I end up using a 16 or 20 ga with #5s. Too many people around anymore to use a 22.
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Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 2,145
Campfire Regular
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Campfire Regular
Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 2,145 |
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Joined: Feb 2008
Posts: 41
Campfire Greenhorn
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Campfire Greenhorn
Joined: Feb 2008
Posts: 41 |
[quote=Palidun]On the WMA's I hunt most require the use of a shotgun. Glad you like to "piss off" the bowhunters who have made several trips from home to set up in a good spot to bow hunt for deer then on opening weekend a group of first timers come out and shoot up the trees. Real cool. I feel the WMA's should be closed to small game hunters during the first two weeks of bow season. [bleep] the bowhunters. I pay as much for my license as they do and have just as much right to be out there. Small game seasons also existed long before bow seasons so it's bow hunters who are encroaching on small gamers, not the other way around. That being said, if I know there is a bowhunter in the area I will go somewhere else so as not to disturb his hunt. It's the ones you don't know are there and give you schit for ruining their hunt that get my dander up. I agree Blackheart. One weekend a year out of an already too long 5 week archery season is not much to ask. And before you fall off your soap box Palidun, I am and have been a bowhunter for a long time and have had squirrel hunters, wood cutters, campers, dogs, hikers, bikers, and anything else you can imagine come by me while in a treestand. More important than worrying about the chance of upsetting a person or two on "public land" that I pay almost $150 a year to use through license fees is the teaching of a group of young kids to be careful and hunt clean and use what they take. The whole piss off the bowhunters comment is tongue in cheek because without fail, some high and mighty elitist string puller gives me crap about a .410 or 22LR shot he heard and how it affected his carefully placed stand 100yds from the road when I am half mile away making a single shot. We avoid areas with vehicles parked for safety reasons, but the elitist will have you believe they deserve a 5 sq. mile radius to maintain the integrity of their stand . Hell one year I came out of my bowstand after seeing more deer than I ever have on a single sit to find a marathon checkpoint and refreshment station at my vehicle. I kept hearing them all morning and didn't know what was going on. They probably drove the deer to me . Last year a bowhunter we walked up on later thanked me for taking the kids hunting and teaching them right when we saw him leaving for the day. We apologized, but it was no big deal to him. Shame everybody doesn't get it.
On an endless quest for furry targets.
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Joined: Nov 2010
Posts: 269
Campfire Member
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Campfire Member
Joined: Nov 2010
Posts: 269 |
I have to agree with the complaints about bowhunters' attitudes toward small game hunters. I have been inquiring around about squirrel hunting locally on private land. What I have been hearing from a number of local landowners is something like "Well, I let 'Joe' bowhunt for deer back in there, and he doesn't want anyone else walking around in there". Meaning for a couple of months before bow season.
The first time I heard this, I assumed that the landowner just didn't want to give me permission to hunt squirrels on his land, and was shifting the blame onto Bowhunter Joe, but after I had heard it a couple more times from different landowners who had different bowhunters hunting on their land, I realized just how possessive bowhunters get about the areas they have permission to hunt. As bowhunting has increased in popularity here in Illinois, it has gotten harder to find places to hunt small game.
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Joined: May 2005
Posts: 1,463
Campfire Regular
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Campfire Regular
Joined: May 2005
Posts: 1,463 |
I mostly use a 20 gauge for all of my small game hunting. 5's or 6's and a modified choke.
Dan
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Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 1,063
Campfire Regular
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Campfire Regular
Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 1,063 |
Deer season lasts from mid-September to January in Missouri, when you add up the bow, firearms, and black powder seasons. Small game season lasts even longer, but I'm not giving up the entire autumn.
On the other hand, those long seasons mean we coexist with much less friction than the stuff you are describing.
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Joined: Sep 2004
Posts: 902
Campfire Regular
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Campfire Regular
Joined: Sep 2004
Posts: 902 |
And that is exactly why you are seeing a drop off in hunter recruitment.
No one has anywhere to small game hunt as an entry level to hunting anymore because of the entitled bowhunters.
It amazes me to see the measures these guys take to have the woods all to themselves and then the audacity to tell me how much better of a hunter they are than I am.
Hell, I could probably kill a deer with a rock if no one else was ever in the woods that I hunted.
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Joined: Apr 2004
Posts: 42,899 Likes: 9
Campfire 'Bwana
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Campfire 'Bwana
Joined: Apr 2004
Posts: 42,899 Likes: 9 |
I always thought the old 410 single shot was the best squirrel huntin rig out there...
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Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 19,277 Likes: 12
Campfire Ranger
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Campfire Ranger
Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 19,277 Likes: 12 |
Depends on how tall your trees are. Around here, a .410 won't dependably take limb chickens out of the top of a tall hickory if you're shooting straight up from the base of it.
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Joined: Mar 2011
Posts: 117
Campfire Member
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Campfire Member
Joined: Mar 2011
Posts: 117 |
As to the OP:
I sure hope not. I have a young 'un to introduce to harvesting limbrats this June season, and I think a shotgun might be easier for him to reliably hit with. Also, a box of .22 ammo here is rarer than an honest politician, which is to say I haven't seen any for a very very long time.
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