TOUGH Squirrel

This squirrel eats pellets for breakfast.

Posted: 12/23/02

I drove over to my buddy, Chris,'s house today. We, of course, went hunting. He's the guy to whom I gave the RWS 34. Well, anyway, as soon as we walked out the back door, we hear this squirrel doing it's barking thing. So, I say "Chris, take that bast***". "Uh..... no thanks, I'm not zeroed, you go ahead" "Okay".

So, I take aim, breathe in....darn.....he's behind some leaves. I'm gonna try for a headshot anyway ...... out ........ squeeeeeeze ..... in .... out ..... POW! WHAP! The squirrel falls down, and is hanging to the side of the tree with his back legs. I figure it's just his muscles, and that he'll fall soon. Boy, was I wrong! I got to within about 15 yards of him, and the thing jumped up, and had his back to me! "Whoa!" I hadn't yet reloaded(my ammo ring wasn't full yet, and the tin was on the porch...STUPID, stupid, stupid. I broke my own law!), so I reached back to my buttpack for my 2240. Some threads broke on the holster(I didn't use fishing line! Just one more goatf*** in the life of Cole;o) ), so I had to keep it in my buttpack until I could repair it.

I'm sitting there cursing while groping behind my back at the release-buckle-thingies on the buttpack. They aren't quick release. You have to thread a nylon strip through a little buckle with some slits in it. It's very hard to do quickly, especially when you can't see it! I got the thing about halfway open before I couldn't pull the tab up any higher. "Grrrrrrrr." So, I just haul the pistol out from under the flap. With the rear sight the way it is, that's not an easily accomplished task. FINALLY, after about 20 seconds, I get the darn thing out. I bring it up into my aiming position, and the freakin' rodent jumps off the tree and starts running!

By this time, Chris had gotten down off the porch and had his 6" C225 in hand. Being more of a "spray and pray" kinda guy(he can't shoot worth beans), he fired off all 8 rounds in the general direction of the squirrel. Naturally, no hits. He's busy reloading one of his 5 spare mags, so I take off after the squirrel. He jumps and hits a tree. I stop to look up, to see if he's climbing, and Chris is soon behind me. I start to sneak around the right side of the tree, and Chris follows. "No, you moron! Go around the other way!! He'll get scared by one of us, and run to the other!" "Oh, right!". So he starts around to the left. He says "I see him! I see him!" "Well then fu**ing shoot the ba*****!!!!!!!" "Uh, okay!" BLAM, BLAM, BLAM, "I got him!"and I see the bleeding squirrel run around to my side of the tree. "Not well!" So I raise the 2240 to aim at this furry thing about 1 yard above me. I try to take a quick aim, and Chris appears, firing: BLAM, BLAM, meanwhile, I'm attempting to get a decent bead on a now-moving squirrel. Yeah, sure! BLAM, BLAM, "STOP!!", BLAM!

Then Chris starts reloading.... again. I take advantage of this pause to shoot the squirrel....who has now stopped moving on the side of the tree. I take a quick aim, and fire. The pellet hit the squirrel in the heart/lung area, and he was thrown off of the tree. He starts to get up to run, but my foot is too fast for him. I immediately stomp my right Jungle Boot on him. Chris, by this time, has finished reloading, and goes "Uhhhhuh! Cole!" I say "Whoa! Cool! I can feel him pulsing and moving!" He laughs. During this mini-conversation, my right hand was throwing my pistol to my left hand, while simultaniously moving towards my left shoulder strap on my webgear. That was where my Cold Steel SRK was housed upside-down. I flick the strap off with my thumb, and withdraw the knife. Chris is taking aim at the squirrel, who is totally covered by my size 14 boot, except, conveniently, for his head. "NOOO!" Chris quickly realizes that there is a lot more boot than squirrel in his sight picture. Right after I see him raise the pistol barrel a few inches, I plunge the knife through the neck of the squirrel, thus permitting a slight gush of blood to emit foward onto the handle and my hand. Go figure. As soon as Chris hears the knife tear through the flesh, he goes "Cole, ugg, man!" And does his little giggle thing. He has the funniest verbal expressions. They don't sound like anything more than a neanderthal's speech, but they are funny as heck when you hear him say it. The squirrel is pinned to the ground, so I figure it's safe to remove my foot from his body. Yup, this time I was right. I begin to reload my pistol, and by the time I'm done, the squirrel has ceased all movement. "Finally." "Yeah." The whole ordeal had taken roughly 30-40 seconds, but it seemed like all day.

We inspected the wounds we had inflicted, and this is what we found:

First wound(Cole, Daystate, 25 yards): 1/4" below brainpan.
Second wound(Chris 225, roughly 3 yards): Front leg.
Third wound( " "): Belly
Fourth wound(" "): Belly
Fith wound( " "): L Rear thigh
SIXTH wound(Cole, 2240, 1 yards): Lungs, from right side, pushing up a lump on the other
SEVENTH wound(Cole, SRK, 1 foot[pun intended]): Neck, and a little bit of the left shoulder. Near decapitaion.

That was one TOUGH squirrel! Six rounds, 2 would have normally killed it, and 2 would have usually stopped it. I think the reason I hit 1/4" below the brainpan was because of the leaves. I had to guesstimate where it was. ::sigh::

Cole

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