Category: Wildlife and Hunting

A Good Death

Grief & Loss, Old Age, Wildlife and Hunting

I was chatting to a close and dear friend, who told me of the death of one of her closest friends.

Apparently this guy had been a surgeon, who’d retired when he could no longer do it.  Since then, he’d devoted himself to doing what he loved:  fishing and hunting wild boar in Europe.

Seems as though he’d been doing the latter fun stuff in the Lower Pyrenees, an area renowned for its matchless rural scenery:  high cliffs, deep ravines, sparkling streams of ice-cold water, you get the picture.

Anyway, he’d just shot a huge boar and using his cell phone, called his friends over on the next ridge to tell them this, but added that he wasn’t feeling too well.  When his friends finally got there, they found him sprawled next to the boar, dead of a massive and unforeseen heart attack.  He was in his mid-seventies.

Of course, my friend was all torn up over this death of a good friend, but let’s just think about this for a moment.

After a long, successful life, a man dies amidst gorgeous scenery, doing something he loved,  something very manly withal — having just dispatched a massive, dangerous boar — and his own death was likewise quick and probably reasonably painless.

Is there anyone reading this who isn’t the teeniest bit envious of Our Aged, Intrepid Hunter?

Ron Asks The Question

The Gun Thing, Wildlife and Hunting

“If you could only have three rifles to address all your hunting needs, what would they be?” — Ron Spomer

Of course, it depends where you live OR what terrain you would be hunting in, and what animals you’d be after.  Those three factors (before we even begin to talk about your hunting abilities) are probably the biggest drivers.  I mean, your needs in eastern Wyoming are going to be vastly different from eastern Kentucky, right?

And just in those two areas, what you hunt is going to be… diverse:

But enough equivocating.  Let’s make it really difficult, and say that you have friends all over the place so at any time you’re likely to get an invitation to join them on a hunt where they live.  (But if that makes it too difficult, go ahead and pick three rifles for hunting where you live.)

So you need three truly all-round rifles in your safe, (say) because that’s all you can afford.

Now pick ’em.  (My choices are below the fold, but pick yours first.)

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Problematic

Wildlife and Hunting

I know, I know:  when shooting a bear out of season, the best advice is “Shoot, Shovel, Shut Up”.

It’s a little difficult to follow that, though, when you and your wife are covered with bear bites and the fucking corpse is lying in your hallway, bleeding into the carpet:

A couple living in Wisconsin said they killed a bear when it attacked them inside their house on Friday, leaving them injured. The incident took place not long after the couple noticed the animal was eating from their bird feeder, the Associated Press (AP) reported Sunday.

Officials with the Taylor County Sheriff’s Office said the incident happened late that night at the residence near Medford, and according to the couple, the bear crashed through a window after they shouted at the animal to scare it away.

“Both the husband and wife were injured before they were able to stab the bear with a kitchen knife. Eventually, the man was able to grab a firearm and kill the animal,” the AP article continued.

A photo showed the bear lying on the floor in a hallway.

Also good advice:  don’t bring a knife to a bear fight.

For those ignorant of Wisconsin, Medford is smack dab in the middle of nowhere the state, and close to a national forest.

Twitchy

Wildlife and Hunting

Here’s a news piece which should engender a familiar response among my Readers:

A fearless badger is harassing passers-by at a renowned beauty spot — leading the RSPCA to warn the public about its behaviour.  Dog walkers, joggers and families out enjoying the countryside have all fallen foul of the black and white menace.

And if the pictures don’t make your trigger-finger itch and want to reach for a .22 pistol, we can’t be friends.

RFI: Crossbows

Wildlife and Hunting

The other day, a friend asked me to give him advice about crossbows — specifically, serious hunting crossbows, not the recreational (toy) type — as he’s been invited to a bowhunt for wild turkeys (I think) later on in the year, and for various reasons, a “regular” bow wouldn’t work for him.

It irked me that I couldn’t tell him anything — my interest in launching deadly projectiles has always involved gunpowder — so I turn to you, O My Readers, for advice.

He doesn’t have any budgetary constraints (lucky bugger), so he’s looking for the best you can get, with all the info related thereto:  bow brands, draw weight, the proper arrowhead type for turkeys, sighting device, etc.

In Comments, please.

Varmints

Bad News, Wildlife and Hunting

This report comes out of Florida, but we face the same issue:

Coyotes have learned to thrive in the same urban development that has caused other predator populations to decline. They can cross bridges, swim canals, and navigate sidewalks while hunting for food.
A coyote’s dream home, though, would be in a suburb like Bloomingdale, where densely packed developments are surrounded by farms and pastureland — a small taste of the open range prairies they used to roam.

In Plano, there’s an abundance of wild rabbits about the place, so where there’s food, there will be predators.

My apartment building lies less than a hundred yards from a heavily-wooded creek, and I must have seen coyotes crossing the road bridge about half a dozen times since I moved here.

This is somewhat problematic because I go for walks along a trail which follows said creek bed for over a mile.  Needless to say, I never walk unarmed — I never leave home unarmed, period — and even though coyotes prefer to be out and about at night time or at least dusk / dawn (when I don’t walk), I like the feel of the S&W Airweight in my pocket anyway.

I have a .38 Special shot shell lined up for trigger-pull #1, and hollowpoints for the other four.

  

(The shot shell is in case I get close to a snake — we have rattlesnakes, cottonmouths and  water moccasins in the creek area, and I hate the bloody things.)

Of course, it’s illegal to discharge a firearm in city limits, but I’d rather argue with a judge than be bitten by a rabid coyote or fucking snake.  Don’t even mention the chances of encountering some choirboy who might imagine that this fat old man is a ripe target for a little involuntary financial redistribution.