Trip Out with the airgun today.

[demonwolf444]

Been a long time since i have spent an afternoon walking the permission with an airgun so when it got to 3 o clock today i thought, "I'm Off!"

 

So with good intentions i took my phone to do a decent write up with pictures, searched for some decent pellets, but only managed to find my hollow points.

 

The RWS .22 hollow points in my PCP ( Webley Venom Viper ) offer acceptable inch groups at 30 yards, which is fine so long as i keep the range as sensible as possible. To make things worse it was blowing a gale, so i knew i was going to have to be looking at more like 20 yard shots.

 

The gun its self outshoots my ability from standing, as with most good pcp's. From a really good rest at 30 yards on a still day ive shot sub 5p groups with JSB Jumbo diablo, which it loves, so it was a little frustrating to know i was limited by the pellets. Anyway onwards.

 

 

I went out with the intention of setting up under sitty tree for a brace of pigeons, as i got to the permission i noticed a rabbit from the other side of the hedge of the first field, i wrestled through the hedge and knelt to take a nice easy 20 yard shot, ( believe me ive never had such an opportunistic rabbit! )

 

Kneeling i saw coming down a path which is not really a path but everyone walks there all the same, some people out for a walk, frustrated i sat tight waiting for a clear shot, shortly after the wind changed direction and the rabbit bolted. Damn! Standing up the people walking stopped at the hedge, asking me what i had shot, "nothing yet". They wished me luck which was nice, i waited for them to be well out of the way before i started on.

 

Moving forwards i slowly scanned my eyes around a good ratting spot, i always take out these blighters whenever i can, its right by a good breeding area for ducks and pheasant, with excellent cover, so every rat dead is one less egg stolen. I normally go by night with night vision or a lamp, but this visit was without any luck. Moving onwards i made my way slowly to a sitty tree which is conveniently next to a large warren, 20 yards from both i had a good chance of a pigeon or rabbit, but after an hour and nothing, i moved on. I made my way through a grass paddock, the wind in my favour, a couple of rabbits bolted directly up the hedge line from right underneath me but never came out into the open where i could have squeeked them to stop and taken a shot.

 

I moved down another warren which has plenty of rabbits and often a number of rats also, but nothing appeared, the wind was not in my favour by this point so i was hardly surprised.

 

Again i made my way into a wood, to see if i could get a pigeon or two as they landed in to roost, however this too was a no go, the wind was strong and kept changing direction, and despite carefully stalking in towards a tree full of pigeons, there was no point pulling the trigger as the tree and the pellet were moving that much in the wind.

 

Just about to call it a day when a flash of silver caught my eye, in the thick cover a squirrel bounced in and out of view, never more than about 15 yards away from me, each time i barked at it to stop, it was obscured by some cover, finally i had a good shot on it at about 10 yards. Having never shot this rifle and pellet combo at so closer range i made an educated guess. Normally at this sort of distance it would be about 1.5 ish mil dots, but the trajectory of a hollow point from my shooting seems to be a bit more pronounced, i held at 2 mil dots high, TWACK.

 

At the squeeze of the trigger the satisfactory noise of a pellet reaching its target met my ears, text book head shot. Pleased i fought through the brush to retrieve a podgy male grey squirrel.

 

Pleased that my long journey was not completely wasted i went to take a photo to post on here. "Battery Drained, Shutting down device".

 

No picture today. Glad i had a good walk out today and a squirrel aswell

 

[Underdog]

Well done.

I was stood waiting for a fox till dark.....nowt come!

U.

[demonwolf444]

Nothing like disappearing into the woods for a few hours though, sorry for the rambling post guys, just wanted to share

[Mentalmac]

Nothing like disappearing into the woods for a few hours though, sorry for the rambling post guys, just wanted to share

Nice write up, can be frustrating eh?

I always find if I am out with the airgun then all the rabbits are 150 yards away and being such an open perm its hard to get to airgun range!

When I have the HMR they are at 15-30 yards and stupidly lazy. Seems a shame to shoot them so close with a HMR!

 

Squirrels and a airgun are a great past time, I enjoy it much more than blasting them with shotgun now. I am a bit spoilt with a HMR, PCP airgun and shotgun so ended up dusting off my springer (Stoeger X20 suppressor) and put a scope on it and had a great time zeroing it - and increased my muscle size! and then spent a great afternoon plinking pretend squirrels in the garden - am tempted to go back to basics and just take that shooting next time.