FAST FIRING MORNING

I ran into a good friend at Karl's Jr. after picking up some lumber.  Our conversation, of course, turned to chizzler hunting and we set a date.  I was right in the heat of the effort in building a new house but I decided to take a morning off and go hunt some anti-agriculture varmints while sitting there eating onion rings.

It was a great drive to the location with my pal.  We caught each other up on our families and various topics.  We arrived at the northwest side of a circular pivot irrigation system around 9:30 a.m.  We had no sooner parked our truck when the chizzlers went nuts.  They were constantly crossing the bare earth "no mans" land between the desert vegetation and the irrigated alfalfa field.  We were shooting as we were setting up our individual positions.

I went through about 225 rounds of .22 l.r. ammo. all in all.  My pal was shooting a nifty new Mossberg MVP .223 Rem. caliber that used AR-15 clips to feed the bolt action.  He shot about 100 rounds of .223 Rem. and launched several chizzlers into a low orbit over the alfalfa field.  He was also exploding them into red mist.  I was really impressed.  After about an hour of this mischief he then switched over to a Ruger 10-22 and proceeded to nail dozens more varmints with his "little" rifle.  He is a good shot and not boastful at all.  I just noticed the consistent "plop, -- plop, -- plop" sound as he fired rounds and they hit their intended mark.  One can tell when the projectile hits vermin by the sound of impact even if you don't see the projectile strike.  {It's kind of a cool sound to me and others who hunt chizzlers.}

I had a well stocked nest of varmints about 60 yards out from my firing position and another good nest about 110 yards out.  I was using the stadia lines in my scope and really found the sweet spots on the stadia lines for the two ranges.  I would lay waste to one nest for a 10 - 15 rounds then move my point of aim over to the other nest and unload another 10 - 15 rounds at that group of profit eaters.  I would pause in my bombardment to reload my magazines and in a few moments start the whole adventure over again.  I did this for 2 1/2 hours.  It was amazing.  There were some big old "herd bulls" out that morning.  I was kind of proud to get three or four of them.  They are really lots bigger than regular chizzlers.

Herd bull circled in red

 
 I was joking when I told my hunting partner my trigger finger was sore.  He agreed his too was sore but he wasn't kidding.  My thumb and my trigger finger were dark grey from loading ammo.  His were dark also.  I don't know if I have ever experienced trigger finger fatigue before, it was a new and different situation but COOL.

Yes, I took many chizzlers out on May 16, 2014.  No, I don't feel sorry for them.  They were in the wrong field and eating the wrong farmer's alfalfa.  I was helping out and having a real good time doing it.  The chizzlers could be poisoned and die a slow and painful death or could be shot and instantly be transported to the big alfalfa field in the sky.  I was just helping out.

Work gets in the way of having fun.  I look forward to another run away day in the future helping out my friendly farmers.