today is a cold and rainy day, raining/drizzling all morning with 5-10 mph wind, even I don’t want to go outside. My general understanding of the suburban squirrels is that they are fair weather creatures just like their suburbanites house mates. I mean why would anyone brave the weather when you have beautiful houses with superb insolation to keep you warm and dry.
Imaging the surprise I had when I was going through the living room to grab drink of water and saw a squirrel exploring my patio! I really never seen a squirrel in the rain in my yard before, granted it doesn’t rain that much here. He was only about 15 feet from where I was standing! We made eye contact and both bolted, I went to grab my dream-tac compact and he went up my tree. With my DTC in hand I went around the house, he was clearly alarmed and running up and down the tree. Leaning against the corner of the house I followed him up and down the tree through the scope. For whatever reason he decided it was safe and came down the base of the tree and what looks like sniffing for food. The pause was just long enough for me to squeeze the trigger to send a 177 hades through its vital. Squirrels natural reaction to danger is go up a tree but he made only couple of feet up before falling down and collapsed only a foot from where he was hit. This is probably the fastest vital kill on a squirrel to date. it was very healthy young adolescent male that got kicked out of the house, can’t think of any other reason why it would be roaming in the rain. This is definitely type of squirrel that will try to find a new home in my attic/roof!
just look how big this guy is and it’s not even a year old!
since the wife is out with the kids I decided to do my first squirrel dissection.
The pellet existed frontal chest area. I was a bit disappointed that I missed the heart but definitely got both lungs. In side the chest cavity there is a huge amount of coagulated blood so very likely I got a main blood vessel and why it collapsed so quickly. The heart is actually much bigger than I thought, no wonder they are so energetic and fast.
So the moral of the story is don’t run away from home or get kicked out of the house and sneak around strangers’ patio………oh wait, think we are all too old for that warning.
Edit: the shot was my typical 20-25 yard shot from corner of my house to my tree.
Imaging the surprise I had when I was going through the living room to grab drink of water and saw a squirrel exploring my patio! I really never seen a squirrel in the rain in my yard before, granted it doesn’t rain that much here. He was only about 15 feet from where I was standing! We made eye contact and both bolted, I went to grab my dream-tac compact and he went up my tree. With my DTC in hand I went around the house, he was clearly alarmed and running up and down the tree. Leaning against the corner of the house I followed him up and down the tree through the scope. For whatever reason he decided it was safe and came down the base of the tree and what looks like sniffing for food. The pause was just long enough for me to squeeze the trigger to send a 177 hades through its vital. Squirrels natural reaction to danger is go up a tree but he made only couple of feet up before falling down and collapsed only a foot from where he was hit. This is probably the fastest vital kill on a squirrel to date. it was very healthy young adolescent male that got kicked out of the house, can’t think of any other reason why it would be roaming in the rain. This is definitely type of squirrel that will try to find a new home in my attic/roof!
just look how big this guy is and it’s not even a year old!
since the wife is out with the kids I decided to do my first squirrel dissection.
The pellet existed frontal chest area. I was a bit disappointed that I missed the heart but definitely got both lungs. In side the chest cavity there is a huge amount of coagulated blood so very likely I got a main blood vessel and why it collapsed so quickly. The heart is actually much bigger than I thought, no wonder they are so energetic and fast.
So the moral of the story is don’t run away from home or get kicked out of the house and sneak around strangers’ patio………oh wait, think we are all too old for that warning.
Edit: the shot was my typical 20-25 yard shot from corner of my house to my tree.
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