A Recent Squirrel Hunt with an Airgun

As many of you know, I love to hunt with my airguns. So much so that I rarely break out my firearms anymore. There's just something about accomplishing a successful hunt with nothing but an air-powered weapon....I guess it satisfies my primitive-hunt gene somewhere on the DNA strand.

Recently I headed out to the woods with my airgun in search of my favorite prey, the squirrel. Deer hunting is great and I never want to be without it. Picking off starlings and other pest birds is a worthy use of my time and excellent practice for more serious shooting pursuits. But the grey and fox squirrels that inhabit the woods where I live are by far my favorite target for my airguns. Not only are they challenging, but I get a tasty treat as a reward for doing it right!

I headed for a patch of woods on the edge of town. An advantage of using airguns is that I can hunt places where firearms simply aren't allowed, either by law or by being considerate of the neighbors. I was done up in my camo overalls and hat, and elected to perch at the base of a tree where the woods narrows down and runs down a fence line. With fields on both sides, the squirrels use this conduit as a means of safely moving from one section of woods to another.

Within twenty minutes I was rewarded with the movement of a squirrel scurrying along the ground. With the leaves on the ground this time of year, they are often heard before they are seen. I peered around the trunk of the big oak I was sitting under and watched the grey squirrel bounce up off the ground onto a leaning trunk of a wind-blown tree. I got myself up to my knees, keeping the tree trunk between myself and the squirrel. I peered around once more and brought my air gun up to place the sights squarely on the shoulder of the squirrel. By this time, my movement had alerted him to my presence, but one of the quirks of rodents is that they are curious, and often will freeze and look harder at a possible danger, giving the hunter time to steady themselves for a shot.

I was braced against the tree with a rock-solid rest, and my finger stroked the trigger. The Beeman Kodiak pellet that I was shooting connected right on target, and my first squirrel of the morning fell a short three feet to the forest floor. Quick and efficient, and the houses and residences 150 yards away weren't disturbed in the least. Collecting my reward from its final resting place, I sat back down once again and resumed my hunt.

Within another thirty minutes, a larger fox squirrel made his way through the trees towards me. I had a little more difficulty with this one. He apparently knew I was there and made a point of keeping a tree between us. I would catch him looking around the corner, or just over a branch as he gauged my intentions and level of danger I presented. However, as he tried to make his way through the bottle-neck of the fence line, I finally had my shot. At nearly forty yards, the pellet connected solidly and the squirrel fell from near the top of a giant oak tree. I administered a follow-up shot, a not-uncommon practice even when using firearms, and I now had enough squirrel for a meal.

Hunting with air guns gives you access to hunting locations that are normally out of reach, and the great selection of airguns you find at Compasseco can set you up with all you need to enjoy the great sport of airgun hunting. Take a look around the website and ask all the questions you can. Check your local city and state regulations since there are some places where it is forbidden, and obey the law. Remember, the public is watching, and we want to be good representatives of our sport.