Rough year for ground hogs

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CraigC

CraigC

Sixgun Nut
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Number three on the homestead this year and probably the last until next year. I had spotted him a couple weeks ago and started watching for my opportunity. When I got the new Keith Brown grips for the K-22, I started shooting it a lot so I had it on ready. He was spotted this afternoon and I took after him. I rounded the corner of my shop and caught him square in the chest at about 50yds while he was standing up and looking in my direction. Biggest one yet, weighed him at 10lbs. Probably not the best backdrop, he blends real well with the crusty old log.

003_1.jpg
 
I had never seen a groundhog until about forty years ago when my daughter married and moved up to Ohio. My son-in-law once told me "After a rain they come up like mushrooms!"

A few years after that I saw my first one here in the South. That was near Moscow, Tennessee in the Wolf River bottom land. Now we're seeing nutria as well.

Bob Wright
 
I've shot 4 out of our barn over the past 4 years. Damned things tunnel into the unused horse stalls and poop on everything. Trouble is, I eliminate one and then another...smarter one...takes up residence. I can tag them pretty effectively offhand off my back porch with a .222 Magnum and cast bullets, but I did smack one with a .45 200 gr LSWC.

As a kid in upstate, New York, out south of Buffalo, I kept myself in sneakers and ammunition by ridding the local dairy farms of chucks out in their meadows. The price then was 50 cents a piece...which bought a box of .22's. At the time, I was earning the princely sum of a penny a paper delivering the morning Courier-Express...all this in Western New York's balmy weather!

Sorry for the rant, and nice shooting & beautiful grips BTW, but I kill every one of those critters I see here on our farm in KY.

YMMv, Rod
 
Supported or unsupported on the shot?

What Ammo?

Regardless, that’s a great shot, then again from your posts you have more experience with a revolver than most on here I would presume.
 
CraigC said:
Number three on the homestead this year and probably the last until next year. I had spotted him a couple weeks ago and started watching for my opportunity. When I got the new Keith Brown grips for the K-22, I started shooting it a lot so I had it on ready. He was spotted this afternoon and I took after him. I rounded the corner of my shop and caught him square in the chest at about 50yds while he was standing up and looking in my direction. Biggest one yet, weighed him at 10lbs. Probably not the best backdrop, he blends real well with the crusty old log.

View attachment 956689
Click to expand...
Thats a good shot with a mighty fine looking k22.
<<<<This long-time ruger fan has taken a liking to S&W revolvers lately
 
I know nothing about groundhogs but I certainly like the gun that got him. A groundhog appears to be about the same as a prairiedog on steroids. Bigger, a little different color, and longer hair plus being capable of digging bigger holes.
 
There's not really a lot of them around. Not enough to go hunting for them, near as I can tell. More of a target of opportunity. Seems the further east you go in TN, the more of them you'll see. They're just a big rodent and I hear they're good eating, if you catch them young.

I'm probably better known for my single actions but I got that K-22 in 1997 and did a lot of shooting and hunting with it. Getting those grips for it sparked a renewed interest in it and I've done a lot of shooting with it as of late. The grips were made by Keith Brown in the traditional Roper style.

K-22%2002.jpg


BreechFace said:
Supported or unsupported on the shot?

What Ammo?

Regardless, that’s a great shot, then again from your posts you have more experience with a revolver than most on here I would presume.
Click to expand...
Leaning against the corner of the building with my left forearm. Unless I'm shooting suppressed, all my small game hunting is done with the Remington Golden Bullet hollowpoint. I can't take a lot of credit, a 10lb ground hog presents a large target, even at 50yds and the sun was behind me, shining right on his fat self. ;)
 
Looks like the last in the last picture, the groundhog shat himself.

We have "rock chucks" (aka yellow bellied marmots) and "whistle pigs" (aka townsend ground squirrels) out west here. They get the 17HMR zipper treatment, it really opens them up hence "zipper treatment."

Them and badgers are a big problem for range land, cows stepping in their holes and breaking legs. The ranchers leasing the BLM ground welcome their eradication and there is no good control, too many and too much ground.
 
I sent a ground hog to Valhalla in October. It was less skittish on the pasture side of the barn than on the house side making an easy target. The ground hog repeated his routine for a couple days in a row so I began to carry my S&W M317 when I went out to retrieve the horses for their dinner.

I've got a couple more around the property but I see them so infrequently that I don't spend the time "hunting" them.

CraigC said:
One of these days I need to travel west for a varmint safari.
Click to expand...

Four of us have gone on several prairie dog adventures in South Dakota over the past 10 years. We had great fun each time. You definitely should give it a try.
 
cfullgraf said:
I've got a couple more around the property but I see them so infrequently that I don't spend the time "hunting" them.
Click to expand...
That's me too. All mine have been real skittish too so I really have to spot them from the house or shop because if they see me, they're gone. They're faster than they look.


cfullgraf said:
Four of us have gone on several prairie dog adventures in South Dakota over the past 10 years. We had great fun each time. You definitely should give it a try.
Click to expand...
Me, Dad and an uncle have threatened to for years. Wife and I took a road trip to Montana and back a few years ago and every time we passed a prairie dog town I nearly ran off the road.
 
We have muskrats over here on East Coast. They’re a real problem on eroding ditches with their tunnels.
I’ve eaten them as a kid when I trapped them. They’re OK, but I haven’t had one in 60 years!
Now possum n yams on the other hand——-Good hunting!
 
Not many groundhogs here, but a few. More coons, opossums, moles, and the like. Few weasels and badgers.

Ive only seen one badger, dead, on the roadside. I have seen a den on my property though.

I could clothe half or russia with the fat a$$ coons on my property, eating my deer corn
 
94,
I can relate to that! We had one that was eating our deer corn we put out in the yard. He got so fat he couldn’t run and we found him DOA on the highway!
 
Wow, talking about woodchuck hunting brings back memories. When I turned 18 my parents got me a Hornady reloading setup for Christmas. I started loading varmint loads for my 30-30, Springfield 03A3, Lee-Enfield. My best friends family owned a 55 acre farm in southern Michigan that was overrun by the pesky varmints. Hunting them with a deer rifle really helped to develop my shooting skills. I nailed one at 200 yards with my Marlin 336 with open sights; there wasn't much left. My friend has a sporterized 1917 Enfield and nailed one at 350 yards. I look back now with fond memories; my friend and I still talk about those days.
 
Thought I was done for the year but spotted another this morning. Tried to get after him but he was gone by the time I got close to where he was. Did spot a doe bedded down in the leaves, just beyond the treeline.
 
Best and luckiest shot I've ever made with a hand gun was on a woodchuck. 40 yards standing up in the pea patch having his way with a pea vine. Shooting through two rows of peas (and pea fence) missed him clean with a Ruger Mark II standing on my hind legs offhand. But at the shot, he scrambled WFO across the mowed field moving to my right. Swung just off the end of his nose and let fly again and darned if that round didn't catch him right in the ear and barrel rolled him deader than a hammer. Wife was even there to witness it. Zero to hero in about 3 seconds (she'd told me I should be using a rifle if I really intended to defend her garden)
 
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