This is Maverick our five year old Sheltie. He was the most gentle, loving dog I’ve ever had and I’ve had plenty. Earlier in the week I had seen him barking at squirrels and chasing them as they scurried across our property.
Occasionally, he would chase squirrels up a oak tree located in the middle of the back yard patiently barking and staring up at them as chattered back at him. He would have not known what to do with them if he caught them and I think he could have if he wanted to.
A couple of weeks ago we came home to find him lying on the shaded part of the back porch having passed over the rainbow bridge.
My wife and kids were crushed.
The only thing that we could surmise is that he chased and barked to exhaustion. The day had been rather warm with a high heat index but he had a nice cool spot in the shade with plenty of water.
Even though I do hunt squirrels, I don’t shoot them on my property. IMO, that’s really not “hunting”, that’s plinking squirrels. Besides, Maverick would sometimes keep them at bay on the edge of the yard. But I believe, in his boredom he would let one in so as to have something to do.
Yesterday afternoon I was on the bench doing some much needed organizing and cleaning when I noticed a squirrel in the backyard near Maverick’s oak tree digging for nuts.
Something said that this is the critter that caused the death of the family pet.
The evening before I had taken my Air Arms S500 .22 to the local indoor silhouette range where I’d scored a 39 out of 40. (yeaa!) It was in the bag with a tin of pellets right next to the bench. I actioned a JSB 18.1 into the breech, refocusing the scope from the 11 yards at the range to the estimated distance of 35 yards to the squirrel.
The squirrel had his head down and was going after whatever was buried by the tree. He looked up, cocked his head my direction as he noticed me hunched down in the door way of the garage (the German sniper scene from Saving Private Ryan here) and with the half mil dot hash mark on his right eye, I was the next to the last thing to go through his head.
A classic line from the Magnificent Seven is quoted, “I seek justice but I’ll take revenge”.
