Pre-Hibernation Hunting

Fellow sportsmen, and sportswomen, I have to tell you a tale about the infamous chizzleramos maximus humori species.  These little rascals hibernate.  When the weather gets too hot for them they just go underground and sleep off the heat.  I know and understand they hibernate in the winter months and they don't like snow much.  I am OK with that.  What kind of "ticks me off" is they won't give me a chance to hunt them as the summer months linger on.  Sure it is hot outside, 101º F or so.  I am sweating as much as any other old aged, over weight, maniacal killer in the alfalfa fields of Iron County.  I drove some distance to come end your lives in the alfalfa fields and you are sleeping with your significant other 3 feet or more below the surface of the earth.

I checked with the two resident experts, farmers, I could find on Thurs. 6-29-2017 and they both told me, independent of each other, -- chizzlers hibernate most of the hot months.  Varmints occasionally get up early and also very late to eat a minimal amount food (profits) and then go back to sleep deep in their burrows.

I did however manage to shoot a few of the little varmints.  I am the first to admit I am spoiled rotten with the earlier hunts this year.  It is kind of hard to accept shooting only 50-60 chizzlers in a 2.5 hour hunt when a few months ago I was shooting that many an hour. I did take my .223 Rem. rifle for some longer distance shooting.  I was having a great time.  I would sight up with my .22 l.r. on on the intended vermin victim at 25 to 65 yards. If the chizzlers were out beyond 65 yards I would switch rifles and let the lead/copper storm find its mark at from 75 to 200 yards.  I had a 60% + success rate finding my mark.  The old buggers 200 yards out taunting me were not used to such long distance death and destruction coming in from the old white Chevy 4X4.  I put a new fear into the chizzler survivors -- if the truck of death is visible you could easily be the next target.  Check out the comparison photos.  The .223 Rem. is a nuclear device on chizzlers with a handloaded  50 gr. Hornady SX bullet at 3,000+ f.p.s. speed.

I did enjoy the slower pace of destruction to a degree and used my extra time to keep my magazines filled to capacity.  I also made some fine shots on the profit stealers and took a couple of photos.  One shows the "prefect chest shot" on a big old herd bull, and the other shows a herd bull trying to make it back to his hole in the ground.  He didn't make it.

Chest shot just like a mini-oryx