By adding fish parts to squash, tomatos, and cuke plants see what happened below
Monthly Archives: June 2020
A Hunters First Shot in the Field
A Deer Hunters first shot is invariably the best shot because the game is not moving or not moving much. Most hunters do not get a second shot if the first missed. More than that, your first shot also comes from a cold barrel. If you have noticed at the range that your first shot drops 2 inches on average or shoots left or right but when your barrel warms after a few shots and groups nicely but different than the first shot. Throw out the nice warm barrel group unless you are competing. It was that first shot that counted. Now 2 inches left right or up or down at 100 yards IS STILL A KILL SHOT provided your rifle crosshair or front bead was on the vitals such as heart/lung area.
That said, unless you are willing to spend time to determine why your cold shots are different, such as the barrel is not free floating or bedding issues, then I would use my rifle as it is and not worry about the cold shot difference of say 2 inches. Where cold shots come into play is at much longer shots of say 300 or more yards. If your cold shot is consistent then make the sight adjustment for it if that makes you feel better.
Many hunters including me have a sort or wobble as they aim and squeeze the trigger. If I am free standing and no rest, or a minimal rest, I often find my rifle dropping as I am on target or supposed to be if I aim for say more than 5 to 10 seconds. This is why I begin aiming at the top of the kill zone and wobble with gravity to squeeze the shot off. Example; I aim at the top of a baseball size target to start. If I am shooting off a rest then I can get on target up vs down right away. The other thing I have noticed is that even a steady v rest can produce left/right minor swings as I breath. These swings or sways are bad for long distance shooting if you don’t practice.
The nastiest thing to experience from a trigger, besides most often being heavy, is one that creeps and is not crisp at the sear. Get it fixed! You will be so happy that you did. Accuracy comes from paying attention to aiming details at the rifle. Yes of course the aim point needs to be correct but it all adds up with what you did at the rifle when the shot rang out. Example: cheek weld, scope not too high, low, forward or back too close to your eye. Not yanking the trigger. They do add up… Train for the shot. Again use those snap caps and work the action such as a bolt.
Think Deer!
Good Hunting!
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Rifle Hunters: How to get ready for deer season!
Here in the northeast we hunt deer in the woods, mostly and not from fields or blinds as many in the south and west do. We often take stands or “still hunt” thus a shot at a deer may appear without the use of a bipod or tripod. What do you do?
A REST TO SHOOT FROM
Well, the best option without a pod is to find a tree or branch to steady your shot.
In fact, if you are taking a stand or stopping for a moment, be sure to stop in a place where the trees, saplings and limbs offer a place to steady a rifle should a shot present itself, especially if you are not carrying a pod. There are many pod rest types on the market. The most popular are the bi-pod and tri-pod rests.
I have a mono-pod that doubles as a walking stick. But even then, I leave it in the car at times. Secondly, you can practice shooting offhand at the range and learn to use your sling to steady your shot. I do this offhand shooting at no more than 50 or 60 yards.
CLOTHING
It is best to practice with the clothing you are going to hunt with. The key here is that you want your rifle to smoothly come to your shoulder. Some recoil pads hang up on clothing so be sure to check. And who, knows you may find your scope too far away with bulky clothes. Check first!
KNOW YOUR TRIGGER
Thirdly, you can learn where your trigger breaks with practice so you know when the trigger/sear will go. Have your rifle trigger tested for weight. It should approximately be (for hunting) between 3 and 5 pounds. I believe that less than 3 pounds creates an opportunity for an accidental fire, and more than 5 pounds and you keep pulling and pulling as seconds pass while your deer melts into the brush and your shot is lost. Trust me I have been there and done that. Practice, Practice, Practice. The use of a SNAP-CAP fake cartridge helps you practice your trigger. Most sporting goods stores have them or can get them for your cartridge and caliber.
KNOW YOUR TARGET
You should 100% identify a deer, and know where other hunters are and what is in front of and behind before aiming your rifle at the vitals of a whitetail deer.
TRAIN WISELY
NH Fish and Game has lots of great training material to keep you and those around you safe. Taking the Hunter Education course again is a great refresher if you haven’t been in the woods hunting in a while. Safety First!
https://www.wildlife.state.nh.us/hunting/hunter-ed.html
GO GET EM’
Hunting whitetail deer is my favorite pass time! I hope it is yours as well! See you out there!
Good Hunting!
Refurbishing an old JC Higgins Sears Roebuck 22 Single Shot Bolt Action with CCI Quiet ammo.
An 80 year old model J.C. Higgins Sears Roebuck 22 Single Shot Model 103.18 rifle came back into my life. It was the one that I cut my hunting teeth on as a boy of 11 yrs old. It could shoot 22 Short, 22 Long and 22 Long Rifle ammo and it was very accurate. It was a great woodchuck rifle! Across the street from my home was a 100 acre field full of chucks! I was in boyhood heaven! My father would give be two high velocity 40 grain bullets to shoot at chucks so I had to make them count.
It came back into my life from a relative who had it, but it was in poor condition as the barrel was showing lots of surface rust. Decades ago the plastic butt plate broke and was replaced with a red rubber boot type that today was found disintegrating. Back in the 1960’s I carved the front of the stock to have a cooler European for-end, but never finished it or stained it. I have recently been re-acquainted with it because of its versatility, shooting shorts, longs and long rifle 22 cartridges. This little single shot was made for garden pests around the farm besides plinking. I decided to finish the refurbishment project of long ago and give the rifle a place of honor.
The first thing I did was to point the rifle in a safe direction, open the bolt (it was empty) checked the bore and cleaned it. Safety first! Not as bad as I thought. After cleaning I ran a bit of JB Bore-bright through it. It polished well. I decided to disassemble and inspect it in detail. Again, not as bad as I thought. I sanded the barrel exterior with 400 grit sand paper removing the dovetail sights (with a punch and hammer) and polished the barrel with steel wool for bluing.
I used Birchwood Casey Super Blue. It worked great with 2 coats.
In between bluing, I sanded the stock, replaced and ground and installed a new plastic buttplate.
I stained the rifle stock with some brown gun-stock stain I had on hand from my flintlock build, and after drying I put 2 light coats of Helmsman Varnish on the rifle stock. I didn’t want it glossy, just enough to protect the finish, after all this is a working rifle.
Now it looks so much better and ready for quietly plinking or garden varmints!
The rear sight was in poor shape and not the original one that was on it. I broke the bank for 14 bucks to put the original dovetail rear sight on it.
I was surprised that there were some parts available for this rifle on-line! Perhaps you may have an old rifle that needs some TLC.
Below is my back yard 25 yard test shot with CCI Quiet-22. It is very quiet and works very well with this rifle. I am a CCI fan! I was only 3/8 inch off with open sights. It’s the first shot that counts!
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Good Shooting!
Fish For Your Vegetable Garden Part 1 and Part II
I went striper fishing last week and had fish bait left over so I froze it. In the mean time have been creating a back yard garden. I noticed that my summer squash and zucchini plant are not growing fast like my other plants. I am watering them so what’s going on?
Before adding fish parts
15 days after fish parts added and watered.
Some research finds that they are perhaps not getting enough nitrogen. It dawned on me that our early American bretheren learned from native Indians used fish as fertilizer. I had 4 small tinker mackerel in the freezer! I started by taking the frozen juices of the fish and creating an emulsion to pour at the base of plants but later cut the fish into chunks and buried a chunk at each root.
Some research on line says I am on the right track. We shall see! I will take a photo next week and track progress. I did feed my tomato’s and Cuke’s some fish as well.
Here is what the cuke plants look like now. Left is a tomato plant and right are cukes that have fish parts added. Soil is dry so watered daily. Cukes are flowering and growing cukes like crazy. I’d say water helped greatly but the fish caused the bush to have explosive growth. And that is no fish story.
Good Gardening with the fish I was going to throw out in the trash.
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