Hunting Adventure Memory that Lives On

[E.T.]

Have just about hunted all types of small game animals and enjoyed some excellent meals and hunts. When I first started hunting (a long time ago) my desire was to prove my merits as a hunter. But now I have an added incentive for going a field and that is to experience another adventure of seeing the unexpected unfold and being able to share this with other fellow hunters.

Prelude
My dogs name is Shadow who was acquired when he was 4 months old male. A lab and Shepard mix who was mistreated causing him to hate men and feared water. He was a pup that was destined to be put down if a home was not found for him.
As for me I was looking for my first hunting dog to train, a yellow female lab was my desire. At first glance I really did not want to acquire such a dog with problems but something in his eyes touched my heart. Getting him to overcome his fears and just to teach him the basics was one of the most frustrating periods in my life.

Memory
While pheasant hunting one fine frosty autumn day Shadow flushed a large cock bird that I patterned at 20 yards. There were so many feathers in the air that a person could make a pillow and the bird dropped like a rock. Seeing the bird fall Shadow immediately went to retrieve this bird. But appeared to run past the fallen location and I listened as the sound of his tags grew quieter. I mentally marked the location of the fallen bird so that I could show him his mistake when he returned. After a frustrating 10 minutes I could hear Shadow’s tags as he was returning. When he finally came into view he to my astonishment had a large pheasant in his mouth and proudly gave it to me. Upon checking my marked location no pheasant was found. That day Shadow taught me what my part is in future hunts and what his job was. Shadow is now 10 years old and our hunts are shorter but he never ceases to surprise me to this day with an additional memory to cherish.

Would love to hear from other hunters what they feel their best hunting experience or adventure was. Whether it is with dogs or great friends or having the unexpected happen.

Ed. T

[ozark]

Good post ET. Thinking back over the years it is difficult for me to select one greatest small game hunting adventure. One that I often recall is rabbit hunting with a wrist rocket using marbles as the propellent. Growing up as a child I used a homemade slingshot that we called a beanflip. I took many brown lizards and birds and I become accurate with that using selected gravels as my bullets. When the wrist rockets first came out I got one and a good supply of marbles to hunt with. I was a road hunter and hunted from a pickup truck. Rabbits were plentiful and normally stopped and just sit still while I stopped, opened the door and took my shot. I aimed for the head and many times connected. I would say roughly 60% of my shots resulted in a dead cottontail. I have taken bear, deer, turkey and countless squirrel with rifles, shotguns and crossbows but since the beanflip was my childhood weapon I find that in my adult life it is still a lot of fun. But, to become really good with it one must practice and really get into hitting the target. It is a thing of feel with no sights so the beginner will not do much damage to the bunny population. Like ET, I also enjoy reading about the experiences of others. OZ

[wilmsmeyer]

I have so many memories and trying to pick the best one is tough. I'll go with the weirdest one. It goes back to my college days and my new friends and I were cruising the countryside in pursuit of woodchucks. We all came from different parts of the state, but the love of the outdoors got us connected. We still all are!

If I remember correctly we had a .223, a 22-250 and a .12 gauge slug gun. Also, I had my Crosman CO2 .177 pellet revolver.

Anyway, as we drove down a lonely country road towards the farm we were going to shoot chucks at, a few starlings were flying about the same speed as our vehicle on the driver side about 20 yds off the road. My friend, sitting in the passenger side rear seat, grabbed my CO2 pistol. Nothing was said, he just did it. Me and the other guy kinda saw what he was about to do but he did it so fast, and so un-announced, that no one could say anything until it was over.

What happened next was amazing. He simply and quickly reached out over the cars roof with the pellet gun and fired a pellet. One of the starlings shed a few feathers and nose dived into the plowed field. We all saw it.

We all just looked at each other and began laughing like crazy. A one in a million thing for sure.

This is surely not a hunting memory, but because we were on our way to hunt......

I should add that 20 years later, this guy has shot 1 deer in 20 seasons. He's not a big hunter and mostly comes to camp to be with the guys. We talk about this instance every year it seems and the image is burned in my mind.

[E.T.]

Ozark

Enjoyed your wonderful story about the wrist slingshot and found everything exactly mentioned parallel to my hunting partners experience with one. He still enjoys shooting one periodically and watched him take a pigeon at 15 yards on telephone line with his fifth shot. One of the reasons he enjoys shooting one is exactly the no sight scenario and claims to help him keep his shooting skills honed for the long bow he uses for deer hunting. To me its amazing that anyone can develop even the accuracy mentioned and I was privy to experience such first hand. Thanks for sharing it and believe me when I say I have respect for anyone that can handle one of those.

Wilmsmeyer

Now I would have loved to seen that shot even if it was one in a million. But as you said it belonged to a hunting adventure of years ago that a fond memory is now carried into later years. I enjoyed reading about it and thanks for sharing.

Wilmsmeyer your one in a million shot comment triggered a memory for another field adventure that was shared by a co-worker many years back that I would like to relate. My friend, his brother and another individual were out hunting rabbits one early autumn with 22’s. But before I go any further I should mention this bunch of characters were real jokers who loved to generate pranks to laugh about. While they were crossing a hillside they came across a Varmit hunter positioned on the edge of the hilltop shooting groundhogs.
His view covered an open area for up to 300 yards. At first they admired the shooters .243 that was custom built but became a little annoyed when the shooter scoffed at seeing just 22 rifles being carried. My friends brother who just wanted to inject a little sarcastic humor said, “you don’t need a fancy center fire cartridge rifle to shoot groundhogs” as a ground hog was spotted out at about 200 yards. At that he shouldered his old long barrel, single shot 22 without a scope, lifted it slightly saying “elevation”, shifting it slightly to the left saying “wind age” and fired. Surprisingly to all the groundhog did a death flop. Seeing an advantage here one of the three simply said “See” and on that note all 3 who kept a straight face left the arrogant Varmit shooter standing there with his mouth open. When I heard that I almost fell out of a chair with side splitting laughter. That one friend no longer hunts with firearms but has replaced a rifle with a camera. His brother who made that shot has passed away and hunting with firearms was not the same for him. But his love to be outdoors was renewed with a camera and when we meet the memory of that event is always mentioned/relived and laughed about.


Ed

[ozark]

Another boring slingshot story: My son wanted me to buy him a BB gun so he could kill English sparrows, Startlings and Jays. We live in a small town and he was a little young to be shooting a BB gun. He tells the story now as if I was to stingy to buy one. Anyway, I told him of my own childhood experiences hunting with the beanflip (homemade slingshot) and proceeded to build him one. I then demonstrated how to shoot it and guided him some in the proceedure. I put up a target perhaps ten yards and selected some gravels and shot the target and told him to practice practice and practice until he could kill his birds. Childlike he fooled with it awhile and came to me and said: "Daddy I can't kill birds with this thing and I don't think you can either." I seen the challenge and had to defend my decision. I told him to come with me and watch. This led to proof that God helps dads out in time of great need. We went outside and I selected a couple of good gravels and talking all the time told him to slip under the trees until a target was detected. We eased up under a shade tree like some indian might have done and sure enough a English sparrow lit on a twig no more than twenty feet away. I made the draw and released the gravel and down came the bird. I handed him the slingshot and said: "See, all it takes is practice and a good gravel." I know that there was a lot of luck involved and I don't deny that God helped Dad a bit. Now this Kid is fourty four years old, retired from the Special Forces and about has his family raised. Today, we turkey hunted together. No gobblers but he took pictures of a bearded hen turkey and we had a ball. BTW, although the bearded hen was legal to take he passed on that and used his camera instead of shotgun. I had a shotgun also in case some of my readers will wonder if I hunt them with a wrist rocket. I enjoy sharing these stories with this board. Keep them coming. And I have a few others I could type in.