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Another tall tail

4K views 29 replies 16 participants last post by  gbro 
#1 ·
Yup, there I was, again, confronted with another dilemma. It started when I caught my neighbor feeding his feral cats and 'the possum'. I have two small Pomeranian dogs, like many things, they ain't real bright. But, me and the wife are attached to them. A four foot chain link fence is all that separates my dawgs from the possum. The 'tail' begins below:

Ok, grabbed Momma's Marlin 39 and loaded up with CCI 'quiet rounds', five of them. It was only one possum. I positioned myself carefully in the pre-built 34' x 12' possum blind with a good view of 'possum territory'. For two days I waited and nuthin. Not knowing the legality of hunting/murdering a possum with dawgs? I released the 'hounds from hades', known as 'Rascal and Pepper'. Quickly, they were on the scent. The trail led to my tool storage building, 8' x 12' and located in front of my possum blind and the door was ajar. I quickly set my coffee cup down, hollered for Momma to bring the 'light' and a plan was formed.

Momma put the dawgs/hounds inside the house. Knowing that the original battle plan had changed from a sniping mission to close quarters combat, I changed out the .22 quiet ammo for .22 Stingers as a wild possum charge seemed imminent. We then carefully entered the building, no possum in sight, yet? I heard a noise under my tool bin? I told Momma to shine the light underneath there? She promptly told me that she wasn't gonna get on the D**n Floor with a possum. So, I poked the rifle barrel into the dark corner. I heard a hiss and then all hades broke loose, an explosion of gray fur erupted forth, in my face. It ran out of the building. Momma was yelling "don't shoot, its a cat". It was, I didn't.
Momma told me that she was through hunting with me. The 'tail' continues....

Ten hours later, after being abandoned by my spouse, sitting alone in my possum blind, in the dark, the possum was spotted. He emerged from the dark, about 20 meters/yards away, my heart was pounding as I levered a round into the chamber, then the earlier PTSD set in. That's Possum Traumatic Stress Disorder. Then the possum disappeared into the darkness, allowing me to compose myself and dry my sweaty hands. Fifteen minutes later, with my nerves calmed, he reappeared, one shot was fired, one possum fell and this 'tail' has ended.

Hope folks had fun reading this, it's basically true.
 
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#2 ·
To my way of thinking, you shot the wrong varmint. Possums eat grub worms and moles but aren't destructive at it like armadillos are. Feral cats are the plague of N. America.
BTW- If a possum shows any fight at all, it's very short-lived. He'll curl up and play dead. Very convincing act....after he's shot.

My dogs occasionally 'tree' a bird or packrat that gets in the house. Last week they 'treed' a weasel, still snow white, under the bandsaw. That explains the occasional mouse tail I see in prominent places, like the middle of the stairs. I've been 'notified' the weasel is taking care of business.
 
#4 ·
No armadillos....yet. Idaho is blessed with targets that bask in the sun on rock piles instead of scurry around in the middle of the night. They infested N. Florida just as I was leaving in '76. Coyotes were close behind.
Very interesting map of the fire ant infestation. They arrived in Mobile Alabama in 1930.
Map of progress since
 
#6 ·
Last summer, we endured a dead possum under the house for a couple of months. It ain't no fun. We live out in the country lots of rats and mice. Yearly, poison is thrown under the house. Everybody has to do it. I'll admit to having a momentary twinge of guilt after doing the deed. Then, I remember last summer. Possum Kingdom, no mas.
 
#8 ·
The odd thing about armadillos is they seemed to come north, up the Florida peninsula instead of from the west along the Gulf coast. Coyotes were common in N. Georgia and Alabama and seemed to have migrated south into Florida. It was always thought distemper and mange would prevent coyotes from the Southeast but it didn't work. They adapted and even lost their long hair!
 
#9 ·
Blackhawk-- My family was 'in agriculture' in the '50 when Fire Ants hit Florida. My cousin was County Agent west by two counties and kept us abreast of ants creeping eastward. It was noted, they slowed in sand and leapt ahead in red clay. As 4-Hers, we traveled our county looking for Fire Ants. Just as the screw worm was finally eradicated a new pest shows up to kill game and farm animals alike. It's always something!
Had we known how much fun it was to cast their beds in aluminum, they would have been slowed more! (check ebay for fire ant castings)
 
#10 ·
Had we known how much fun it was to cast their beds in aluminum, they would have been slowed more! (check ebay for fire ant castings)
Yes, I have seen those and watched several youtube videos of people casting them. Cool. Fire ants are doing a number on gator populations. They began building their mounds on top of gator nests and when the baby gators hatch, they have to "swim up" through millions of ants. Many baby gators are killed before they can escape the nest.
 
#11 ·
Yup, there I was, again, confronted with another dilemma. It started when I caught my neighbor feeding his feral cats and 'the possum'. I have two small Pomeranian dogs, like many things, they ain't real bright. But, me and the wife are attached to them. A four foot chain link fence is all that separates my dawgs from the possum. The 'tail' begins below:

Ok, grabbed Momma's Marlin 39 and loaded up with CCI 'quiet rounds', five of them. It was only one possum. I positioned myself carefully in the pre-built 34' x 12' possum blind with a good view of 'possum territory'. For two days I waited and nuthin. Not knowing the legality of hunting/murdering a possum with dawgs? I released the 'hounds from hades', known as 'Rascal and Pepper'. Quickly, they were on the scent. The trail led to my tool storage building, 8' x 12' and located in front of my possum blind and the door was ajar. I quickly set my coffee cup down, hollered for Momma to bring the 'light' and a plan was formed.

Momma put the dawgs/hounds inside the house. Knowing that the original battle plan had changed from a sniping mission to close quarters combat, I changed out the .22 quiet ammo for .22 Stingers as a wild possum charge seemed imminent. We then carefully entered the building, no possum in sight, yet? I heard a noise under my tool bin? I told Momma to shine the light underneath there? She promptly told me that she wasn't gonna get on the D**n Floor with a possum. So, I poked the rifle barrel into the dark corner. I heard a hiss and then all hades broke loose, an explosion of gray fur erupted forth, in my face. It ran out of the building. Momma was yelling "don't shoot, its a cat". It was, I didn't.
Momma told me that she was through hunting with me. The 'tail' continues....

Ten hours later, after being abandoned by my spouse, sitting alone in my possum blind, in the dark, the possum was spotted. He emerged from the dark, about 20 meters/yards away, my heart was pounding as I levered a round into the chamber, then the earlier PTSD set in. That's Possum Traumatic Stress Disorder. Then the possum disappeared into the darkness, allowing me to compose myself and dry my sweaty hands. Fifteen minutes later, with my nerves calmed, he reappeared, one shot was fired, one possum fell and this 'tail' has ended.

Hope folks had fun reading this, it's basically true.
Be Advised shoot very carefully if you plan to take on feral felines in the future.
They are very hard to kill with a .22 and scream like nothing you ever heard after the first round this is something I have heard I do not shoot erant felines as they will arrest you for that here. Worse crime than kidnapping babies.
Islander
 
#12 · (Edited)
Be Advised shoot very carefully if you plan to take on feral felines in the future.
They are very hard to kill with a .22 and scream like nothing you ever heard after the first round this is something I have heard I do not shoot erant felines as they will arrest you for that here. Worse crime than kidnapping babies.
Islander
Personal experience, always shoot cats in the chest/heart region with a .22, they go quiet and never far. Head shots just flood them with adrenaline if you don't drill the brain directly and the skull on a bigger cat can stop or deflect lighter bullets, and at that point they'll make it a long way in a hurry. Can attract attention. Unless you can use a Hornet or Triple 2. 😁
 
#13 ·
I pretty much live out in the country. I do have neighbors. I have a large backyard deck, fenced backyard with a 4 foot locked chain link fence around it all. I don't hunt anymore and I really don't like to kill critters. I shoot the occasional stubborn stray or loose dog, with an old pump action Daisy BB gun, in the buttocks. It works, they move on.

What you said got me thinking, that in the last ten years, I've killed, one shot each, four possums and about seven feral cats. I used three .22 Stingers rounds and the rest were .22 short CB caps. Every time, I kept a low profile. No critter made any noise. All were DRT. The largest critter I ever killed with a .22 Short CB cap was a 70 pound pitbull that jumped my fence in Houston and was mauling my Labrador puppy. One shot, deliberately in the lungs, range forty yards, No bark, turned, jumped my fence, ran fifty yards and dropped dead. I would hope, I never have to kill anything again other'n golf balls, tin cans and time. BTW, golf balls and .22's are a hoot.

I wrote this little story, because for reasons unknown to me, I felt a pang of regret. I wanted in a way to make 'light' of it. I never shot a critter when I was on duty. Wish, with all my heart, I could say the same about the 'animals' I encountered.
 
#17 ·
Having grown up a deep south country boy who is now in his mid 60s and still a deep south country boy living waaaaay out in the country ... I can relate to this thread in so many ways. Chicken houses all around us (our houses were 10k birds as a kid now they are 50k per house) .... but the feral cats, eagles, snakes and hawks (and to some degree the poison) help to control the mice and rats. It's the yotes we have a problem with.

Here in SC the yotes came east across the Mississippi (via the bridges) in the late 70s, early 80s and invaded Mississippi, Tennessee and Alabama and then quickly moved into Georgia, South Carolina and Western North Carolina although we have them bad here in South Carolina ... they had hit us full-on by the early to mid 90s.

The yotes do far more damage to the quail and turkey (and your domestic dogs and livestock) than do the feral cats imho ... and I'm no cat lover by any stretch of the imagination. To the contrary, I have three dogs who eat cats for snacks. But the yotes do damage to everything and we hunt them unmercifully 24/7/365.

Now, we've got all your various snakes too right down to eastern corals and diamondbacks but the most prominent are your standard fare cottonmouths and your timber rattlers (around here we call'em cane breaks, red stripe and all) plus plenty of king snakes and black racers, rat snakes, Gardner snakes, etc. Again, the feral cats eat those too as do the possums, eagles, hawks, etc. Can't say I've ever seen a yote running with a snake in its mouth but I can say I've seen the wild pigs (which we also hunt unmercifully 24/7/365) go after snakes with a vigor. They even seem immune to the rattlers and cotton mouths.

We do have armadillos now ... they started showing-up about 10 years ago.

As far as fireants go they've been around as long as I can remember. I stepped in a pile of them as a toddler so that had to be '57, '58 or so ... still remember it to this day.
 
#18 ·
Up in my neck of the woods,
like everywhere feral cats can be devastating to the Ruffed Grouse populations.
I used to get a glimpse of what i thought was a Bobcat around my Shack and almost got a shot one time but.
i put some Deli chicken outside on my fuel barrel while working inside and when I went out to get my lunch there was none for me, just the empty box so I set a Conibear trap in a cubby box and the empty Kipper snack can and an hour later the cubby set was gone. Down on the ice about 50 ft from shore was the box and Siamese cat that had been seen for more than a year. Its tail was only about 2 inches long and ears must have been frozen off. Trap was over the head and cat still alive.
So I stepped on the rib cage to smother it and Boy did I get a clawing! Right through my leather boots.
No gun with that day so i had to take it for a while but hard to get both feet on it when on the ice.
Skunks are another problem and must be everywhere.
We lived in a Mobile Home the 1st 5 years and I had a Chesapeake Bay retriever in a Kennel and he would whine at night, found there was a skunk going under the trailer. I tried moth balls and that didn't help so I got the advice from a source I never ever asked anything again to shoot them right between the eyes.
Well that sounded like it would add a little enjoyment to a problem so i opened up a hole, there he was with cement blocks right behind him for a good backstop. couldn't have been 5 seconds after a perfect shot between the eyes with my 1890 .22WRF the smell hit me, and the Wife, and the neighbors!
Skunk smell never bothered me, I used it as a cover sent trapping and hunting for several years but being
this close the smell is not even close to what one would expect! man-o-man was i UN-popular in the neighborhood and my own home!
A dozen big cans of tomato juice did nothing after carrying the dead carcass out of town in a garbage bag and burying it.
Lots of soaps, pails full of smelly dirt and weeks of smelling skunk!
That one is tied for second place in the top ten Stupidest things I have ever done!

Gregor
CGVS
 
#19 ·
Inside 10ft center fire handgun shot shells are safer than 22lr and more effective. I carry CCI 9mm shot shells with me every day and have dispatched pretty much everything I've ever cornered in a attic or basement or caught in a trap with them.
 
#20 ·
We had a skunk wandering in our yard midday 2 yrs ago that I managed to send back into the woods and farm behind us 2 or 3 times before I figured it just had to be sick. A couple phone calls to F&G and the local police convinced me it would be fine for me to shoot it with a .22 and the LEO promised me that he would ensure nothing bad would happen (i'm in the city limits). Well he showed up again and I coaxed him back nearly to the fence line and opened up with my 10/22. 4 quick head shots from 15? yds and he never moved an inch or really even flinched. No odor either. I let him lie for a bit then went and double bagged him and dropped him in the back of my PU. By the next day he began to stink, so now came operation "get freakin rid of that dead skunk". I eased out to the interstate and noticed they were collecting trash alongside it right then, so I found a couple bags of trash waiting for the dump truck to come by and added 1 more :ROFLMAO:

Next came a quick stop at the DIY car wash for a bed spray. LOL.
 
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#21 ·
After my skunk fiasco, My father-in-law told me he gut shot them and they never smelled, they would go off and die , well he lived out on the farm and I couldn't do a shot like that.
We live trapped a lot of them with a trap made out of a 6 inch stove pipe. They never smelled and we drowned them, but carbon monoxide worked also.
 
#22 ·
Pud,
So, back when I was just a puppy, I worked in an old feed mill in East Texas. Now this old mill is the tallest wooden mill in the state. Something like 113 ft tall, all wood. Probably close to 100 years old. Needless to say, with all the grain, there were grain rats. Now this being back in the day, and the owners being of a trusting nature, some of us who were so inclined were allowed to "hunt" said vermin after hours in the basement under all the grain silos. We were only allowed to use rat shot, or pellet guns, so we wouldn't damage any of the equipment. Now most of the employees were of southern lineage...(read country boys) except one. This guy was from Pennsylvania (read yankee) which is what we called him. While he didn't seem to mind, to top it off he was also a city boy. How he found a job in a feed mill I don't know...any who...let's just say he often had a puzzled look on his face at some of the things we did and said on a regular basis.
When the topic of the "Great Rat Hunt" came up during the lunch break one day, the Yankee said he wanted in...uhhh...sure.
Now the basement area under the silos was a huge concrete room, with a 10 ft. ceiling and all the bottoms of the silos poking through from the floor above. Add in all the grain augers and drive units, conduit, air lines, support beams, with just a couple bare light bulbs here and there...you get the idea. Crowded, dark and closed in...
The area was divided into 2 separate areas one the older original structure, and the 2nd. a newer area with more modern equipment and "feel". The 2 areas were separated by a large sliding door that went floor to ceiling about 10 ft. wide.
Prior excursions had told us that the local rat population liked the older section of the building, but could be rousted out of hiding by beating the bottoms of the grain bins with 2x4s. So working from the far end of the room, we could drive them along the far wall and toward the sliding door which we would leave open just a couple inches. This left a narrow "kill zone" on the other side of the door. Now the Yankee had just been discharged from the Army, so we figured he should be that evening's "shooter".
So with the Yankee positioned on the far side of the door, with a Marlin semi auto .22 filled with the allowed ammunition, with a few sacks of feed for a shooting position, we told him to just aim for the corner by the floor and blast away as the targets presented themselves.
Off we went into the far room and began the drive.
Having done this before, we just b.s.'d our way along making all kinds of racket..then he started firing....
Pop...pop...popopopopopopopop....
HEY! HEY! HEYYYY!...
We looked at each other and laughing, ran toward the door. Yankee was standing there out of breath, eyes wide like Buckwheat on the little rascals. .."Holy fecal matter! There's a HUGE one behind that cart..."( pointing across the room).."I shot him 8 times and he never even slowed down..." of course we're thinking he didn't hit #*&%...but we made a new plan. With the Marlin reloaded, and handed to a new shooter of known ability, we put a rope around the end of the cart with the idea that we would pull the cart away from the wall and expose the prey hiding behind.
Ok...shooter? Ready! Rope? Ready! 1,2, pull!!
Rope goes tight...cart flies away from the wall...
Shooter takes aim...HAHAHAHAHAAHA!!!!
The laughter was not expected, but when the rest of us looked we joined in....once again the Yankee looked at us with disbelief. .."What?? There it is!! Shoot! Shoot!..."
Yankee's rat was on its hind feet against the wall hissing at us...yup, it was a 'possum.
Biggest damn rat Yankee had ever seen...

Big G
 
#23 ·
Fast Orange hand cleaner. If ya get a little too close to the skunk......

A fellow hunter on the deer lease had his beagle sprayed, and told me of using it (while I was petting the dog). I asked him how long ago it was, and he say either 'yesterday' or 'earlier today,' I forget which! Could have knocked me over with a feather! Not a whiff. He used it because it was all he had, not because of anything he had read or heard. Quite a ways to town and I guess he just happened to have some.

Growing up, we had a dog with a thick undercoat sprayed by a skunk. For months afterwards, when it rained or got really humid, the smell would reconstitute and bring it all back fresh in your mind! Not pleasant. I can only guess that the hand cleaner emulsified the oils, and thus neutralizes the smell. Haven't had an opportunity to try it, myself, but if you do, report back and let us know ;)
 
#25 ·
Good to know! I always have a quart or two of the Fast Orange around. Used it for years for other stuff, but Skunk is hard to get off! If I remember correctly, skunk spray is an ester that is loaded with thiols (the stinky part) which are molecules that have strong electrical charges on each end which make them want to attach to things...hair, skin, clothing, etc. Peroxide and Baking Soda was always the home remedy we used when I was younger.
 
#24 ·
I have a limited amount of 22 LR and 22 Mag shotshells. I used to handload them for 38 sp. and 44 mag. I used 10 shot though. I've popped a squirrel or two with the 22 Mag. at close range, but 22 LR is better. I sometimes use my old 177 pellet gun but alas, I knocked the rear sight off of it a few days ago. My old Crossman 22 pellet rifle is still waiting for me to replace the seal kits. lol

I've caught this guy on camera a couple of times the last six months or so. Seen it a few times on other neighbors property in daytime too. There is someone who feeds some strays a mile or so towards town at the last sewer lift station.

To Pudfark...sometimes the prey just slips into the darkness!

Plant Grey Sky Tree Flash photography
 
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#26 ·
I l lived on the Snake and then on Shoshone Creek and skunks follow water courses. (I'm an an oasis now, no skunks but plenty of water), I've had dogs all the time and STILL keep a couple cans of grapefruit concentrate in the bottom of the freezer. It almost works as well as that lady's product that works better but got me in bad trouble when I told the check-out lady what it was for....oh well. Some people are sensitive.
'yes ma'am, its the best de-skunking agent known to man.'
 
#27 ·
We camped often when the Girls were young and I had a new Black Lab. She was a retrieving nut just like I wanted and while walking the campground loop i was tossing the dummy when another camper asked if he could toss my dummy for his Lab. His dog was way better controlled than mine and when he released his dog he just knew it was going to be a quick retrieve, and it was but it was a skunk and of course the smell beat the dog back to us. Well we were almost packed up to leave and I was glad to be leaving, getting away from the smell. As I loaded the gear the family was on the shore with our dog and she found a dead rotten fish and rolled on it! Now we had a predicament! Out comes the dish soap, of course the dog has to shake every 10 seconds so it seemed and it was a smelly trip home for us also and we smelled that fish for weeks on the dog.
Got to remember to try the Orange hand cleaner next time, And I am going to make sure and have some on hand at the Lake!
Thanks MikeG
 
#28 ·
Given the opportunity to position one's self, wind direction is a strong consideration when dispatching 'Pierre Le Pew'. I have always preferred to kill them at 15-20 yards. Furthest shot was 50 yards or so with a .22 cb cap. He moved as I fired and it was a boiler room hit, it was too late, the immediate follow up shot did the trick. That area 'skunk stunk' for a week or more. Just my opinion, but shooting a skunk with rat shot? That'll put your reputation in jeopardy?
 
#29 ·
Skunks and snakes are universal subjects among all outdoorsmen. Both create stories and memories that last a lifetime....and always fun to hear.
Citric acid is what kills the smell and many juices and products have it in varying amounts or you can buy packets of it dry.
 
#30 ·
Skunks and snakes are universal subjects among all outdoorsmen. Both create stories and memories that last a lifetime....and always fun to hear.
Citric acid is what kills the smell and many juices and products have it in varying amounts or you can buy packets of it dry.
Well Not a lot of Snake discussion In My Neck of the Woods, other than We are glad we don't have any of those things here!!!
But as far as the women are concerned our spiders are JUST as BIG but TWICE as DANGEROUS!
One of my Grandson's was carrying a 12 pound snapping turtle by its tail and the next day he was refusing to use the Shithouse at the Hunting shack because there was a BIG spider in it, Lol I told him I was going to get him a flour sack dress.
That is a Grandma Influence!!
Gregor
CGVS
 
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