Although I love to fish, with the mild temps today and the boat not producing much lately I decided to try and put the smack on a few squirrels, the bluegill of hunting. My father and I are both avid squirrel hunters, so much so that he bought a treeing squirrel dog last summer. He was out with the smokepole this morning at another property, so I decided to go sit up by my treestand behind my parents house and thin out the population a little bit. The woods are loaded with hickory trees and there are quite a few treerats.

While walking back the path to my stand, i spotted 1, then another 2 of the little guys in a ravine in front of me. Hit one offhand at 25 yds, and missed another. While at the stand I saw 2 more with the same results. They seemed to be active today, so I went and grabbed the dog to see what she could do.

She's a mountain feist that's 1 1/2 yrs old. Squirrel hunting is natural to her, and she's really getting the hang of it this year. It's fun just watching the dog work as she hangs fairly close scoping everything, then takes off like a bolt of lightning as soon as she spots one. Ended the day with 3 more for a total of 4 greys and 1 fox.

Even though I wanted to stock the freezer up after making squirrel stew last week, hunting squirrels is more about marksmanship anymore. The trusty Winchester lever action .22 delivered 4 out of 5 headshots today and 2 misses. Was really a great day to be out.

Any other avid squirrel hunters out there?

Crappie_Slayer I enjoyed the read, brings back memories about good times hunting other elusive PA. wild game.
 
Ever try hunting squirrel with a 'smoke pole' using shot?

I went out on Monday and shot two Grey's with the 22. The dog thing interest me where did your dad get the dog?

BTDT, never used a small caliber smokepole to get them, but I've done some reading about it on another forum and it seems like it would be quite a bit of fun. Might have to look into getting one someday.

Tuna, can't remember the name of the town, but its just a few hours away in Ohio. I can probably get the name of the people from my father if your interested. As I said in my earlier post the hunting pretty much comes naturally to her. When we picked her up last year my father asked the lady what he needed to do for training, and the response was just take her for walks in the woods, she'll know what to do. We did box trap a few to let her run in the backyard, but for the most part its just been lots of time in the woods.

Crappie Slayer if you could at your leisure,PM  phone number or Name of kennel or town in Ohio I'd appreciate it. Thank you.

I use a 32 cal tradition percussion with 40 gr of 4f more fun then a barrel of monkeys!

Jig's are you shooting shot and what size/load?

He'd be shooting a round ball out of the 32 cal. Lead shot out of a muzzle loader shot gun.

We shot number four shot from rifled barrels and it doesn't do too bad at about thirty yards.  Grouping was always tighter than we liked, even when we went to 7 shot for dove hunting.  Don't want to shoot a squirrel or bunny if much closer then that, what with tight groups, wasn't much left to cook.

I use .315 .32 cal lead ball with patch. I miss a lot but it fun. I have used my TC 12 ga shotgun with #4 shot and 65gr of 2F powder but that's way to easy.Gun has a full turkey choke.