Squirrel Tactics Evolve With Experience

Today was a productive day of squirrel hunting education.

This was my third outing this season, and I’m already picking things up.

1. Take a chair and sit still. Don’t stalk, and don’t bother with a blind.

2. Make sure you sit in the shade, because you will be unhappy if the sun starts warming up your back and you can’t move because you don’t want to spook anything.

3. Position yourself so there are no trees close to you. If they’re too close, they cut off a lot of potential field of fire, and squirrels will mysteriously find their way into the blocked areas.

4. Take a pistol so you can shoot wounded squirrels in the head.

5. Don’t leave a dead or dying squirrel lying on the ground to attract other squirrels, and don’t shoot another squirrel before you pick it up. Go get it. Squirrels can revive and scamper into hollow logs and knotholes, never to be seen again. Then they suffer, and you don’t get your squirrels.

6. Put the sun at your back.

I am pretty sure I shot three squirrels today. I say “pretty sure” because only one came home with me. I’m starting to question a lot of things I’ve been taught.

First, I’m wondering if rifles have any place in squirrel hunting.

Based on what I’ve been seeing, it looks like you can shoot a squirrel right through the chest with a rifle and still lose it. Unless you shoot them in the head, they may stay alive long enough to cause problems. They can climb and get stuck in tree crotches, or they can hide in other places before they expire.

I saw a squirrel on a tree trunk today, maybe 15 feet up. I would guess it was 40 yards off. I popped it, and it climbed up the tree at a fairly slow pace for a squirrel. It appears that this is a sign that you’ve hit the target. When squirrels aren’t wounded, they move very quickly. Anyway, I never saw the squirrel again. I guess its dead body is still in the tree.

I shot another squirrel, and it ran around in circles and then stopped. I saw another one to my right, so I delayed going to get the first one. I nailed the second one, and it tried to climb a nearby tree as though groggy.

I got up to get the first one, and I couldn’t find it. I went to look for the second one, and I couldn’t find it, either. I never did find it. It was alive long enough to hide too well.

I resumed looking for the other one, and suddenly, it leapt up from the leaves and tried to run off. I had not shot it cleanly enough to kill it right away. It ran into a hollow tree. I had to go get a chainsaw, open up the tree, scare the squirrel out, and finish it with a pistol. It’s in the sink now, brining, minus two legs.

This is not the way I want things to go. I need to be more efficient and humane.

I have seen lots of men claim they use .22 rifles and shoot squirrels in the head. Call me skeptical. Yes, I’m sure that if you shoot at 20 squirrels, you will hit some in the head and kill them instantly. I do not believe anyone can consistently do it, unless they’re shooting from under 50 feet. It’s easy to shoot into an area the size of a squirrel’s head from 100 feet when your target is inanimate and you’re using a rest. It’s much harder when you have no rest and you’re pressed for time because the squirrel may take off. I think the men who say they’re doing it are liars. It’s that simple. I’m a good shot, and I can’t do it.

If a guy shoots at 50 squirrels and hits two in the head, he will probably forget about the 48 he missed or wounded and tell everyone how easy head shots are.

Today I saw a guy claim he hunted squirrels with a 1911, which could be trusted to put shots into something like 2″ at 75 feet. No one on earth has ever been able to shoot a typical 1911 that well, offhand. I doubt it’s possible for professional marksmen to do it from rests. People will say anything when they know no one can check.

So what’s the answer? I can think of some possibilities.

1. Use a shotgun. This is what my grandfather told me to do. He said that when you shoot a squirrel with a .22, it may fall into a crotch and stay there. He said a shotgun would knock it down. There is more to it, though. It’s pretty hard to miss a squirrel with a shotgun, and they usually kill right away. Also, I would be able to take many more shots, because shotgun pellets won’t travel long distances and injure my neighbors. With a .22, I can only shoot when I’m absolutely sure the bullets can’t leave my property.

2. Wait for shots under 50 feet and make sure I get head shots. This would pretty much kill the whole effort. I would be lucky to get two squirrels a week.

3. Use segmented bullets that fall apart and wound squirrels worse. This may be a good idea, but I would have to check to see how accurate they are. I happen to have some.

4. Use my .17 HMR. With V-Max bullets, it will tear a squirrel up a lot worse than a .22, so wounded squirrels would be less of a problem. The down side is that the meat would be messed up.

It’s amazing how much BS you can pick up from hunters. I’ve been told it’s not necessary to hit squirrels in order to kill them. People say they “bark” squirrels. The idea is that you shoot the tree next to a squirrel, and the stuff the bullet knocks loose from the tree knocks the squirrel out. I’ve shot near squirrels, and I’ve shot clean through them, hitting the bark on the way out. I have never seen a squirrel get “barked.” Maybe it’s a fable hunters like to tell as a joke, like the one about snipe hunting.

I hate to resort to a shotgun. It makes killing squirrels more like shoveling snow than hunting. It’s barely a sport. But if it reduces suffering, maybe I should consider it.

Today I tried a surefire, easy, super-quick method of squirrel cleaning I saw on Youtube. You cut above the squirrel’s anus, through the tail. You slit the skin a little bit to either side of the anus. Then you put your boot on the squirrel’s tail and yank on the hind feet. Supposedly, the squirrel will slide out of the top half of its skin. The hide will tear conveniently, and you’ll be left with a dead squirrel wearing fur pants which are easy to pull off.

It didn’t work for me at all. The hair came off the tail long before the hide even thought about coming off the squirrel. The tail kept sliding out from under my heel, even on concrete. The squirrel I cleaned today was pretty big. Maybe his hide was unusually tough. Anyway, the method doesn’t impress me.

I can’t find my commercial chicken shears. I need them to cut critters up the belly and sever their sternums. I had to use Home Depot scissors today, and it wasn’t efficient.

My problems with lost squirrels make a thermal monocular look like a good idea. One of their purposes is to locate wounded prey.

Things will get better, and I’ll do a nicer job in the future. In the meantime, it’s wonderful to get out there and feel like part of nature. Men who don’t hunt are incomplete. I’m glad I was raised with a good attitude toward it. I’m glad my mother didn’t turn me into a snowflake who is so feminized, he puts spiders on paper plates and transfers them outside instead of stepping on them the way a man should. Self-righteous sissies who are ignorant about wildlife management are multiplying like mold in America. It will be very sad when Americans have to stop teaching their kids to hunt.

I’m glad I took up hunting squirrels. I had hoped to shoot hogs and deer on my farm, and it’s disappointing that they don’t come here, but squirrel hunting is very worthwhile. Any idiot can hit a deer. Hitting a squirrel is much harder. Most deer are killed at distances under 100 yards, and a deer is about a dozen times as wide as a squirrel, so hitting a squirrel at 25 feet is like shooting a deer 100 yards off. Also, squirrels move a lot, and they don’t stand conveniently on the ground. They’re also harder to spot, and rimfire rifles are less accurate than good deer guns. I think what I’m doing takes a lot more skill than using a 1-MOA gun to shoot a motionless animal the size of a pony.

If only they had more meat on them. A squirrel thigh the size of a deer’s would make a magnificent feast.