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First kill with a suppressor
Got home from work today and noticed a raccoon milling around the yard and acting kind of strange. I usually never see them out in the daytime and when I do see them they are very skiddish making a fast getaway when they see me. This one was just pacing back and fourth and seemed a little wobbly on its feet. He looked fairly healthy on close inspection but I am not going to take chances with it being sickly and getting ahold of my dogs or me so I went in the house and grabbed my trusty Walther P-22. I stepped out the back door and he acted like he didn't even notice me, I hit him with the first shot at about 20 yards knocking him down. As I walked out in the yard he got up and came straight at me, I let go 2 more rounds and hit him in the head with the second shot at about 5 yards away, he dropped like a stone. I scooped him up with a shovel and took him to the back pasture where he can wait for the buzzards.
timc - formerly known as timc on the last G&A forum and timc on the G&A forum before that and the G&A forum before that.....
AKA: Former Founding Member
AKA: Former Founding Member
Replies
That was my worries which is why I dipatched him quickly. I have about 3 miles of nothing behind my house so I get all kinds of critters wondering up in the yard.
AKA: Former Founding Member
Are you shooting Standard Velocity or subsonic .22lr?
"The Un-Tactical"
You're probably right on that one, once I did that it thought that wasn't a great idea, so I gave the gun a good cleaning before I put it away.
AKA: Former Founding Member
I live in a very rocky area, digging holes is not an easy task. I guess possible something could get infected from it but don't really have any stray dogs or cats around here and I believe buzzards are immune to it.
AKA: Former Founding Member
I'm shooting Remington subsonic 38 grain bullets. They are super quiet and function well in the Walther and my 1022 with no cycling issues.
AKA: Former Founding Member
A subsonic round and a suppressor? That must sound like barely whisper.
Jerry
Good going - it doesn't pay to take chances with a sick wild animal. :up:
Actually I was suprised I hit it on the first shot but it has always been a fairly accurate gun. The suppressor comes up to the top of the front sight post but not above it so the sights are very useable with a 6:00 hold, mine is the 5" version, I don't know if the shorter versions are different on the sights.
AKA: Former Founding Member
Mainly just a clack-clack sound from the action cycling and almost no report from the bullet. The SWR Specter II is also .22 magnum rated.
AKA: Former Founding Member
As I understand it, feelings are mixed as to wheather these animals are native to extreme south Florida or not. I think I'm correct in saying that no evidence has been found in Indian middens, and William Bartram doesn't mention them in his visit to central Florida, though written reports do ID armadillos in south Florida in the early eighteen hundreds. I think these animals were there early-on, but I'm not qualified to say so with certainty. But....all that's beside the point.
Point is, for some reason unknown to the wildlife biology community armadillos started moving northward out of extreme south Florida and out of the native ranges in the southweastern states to the north and east in the 1950's. By the mid-sixties road kills in central Florida were common. By the early eighties road kills just north of the Georgia/Florida border were common. Now you will see them run over north of Nashville, Tennessee....right Teach? At the same time the western variety has moved east into Alabama and other states east of the Mississippi, and the Florida 'dillo and the Texas 'dillo are cross breeding producing a genetically better animal.
What triggered this migration of both distinctly different populations is what is puzzling. One of the elemental Laws of Wildlife Biology (I'm probably more familiar with Wild Life Biology :rotflmao:) is that "Nature Abhors A Vacuum". A vacuum had to exist to trigger this dual migration, but what suddenly created favorable conditions and thus a vacuum for these animals? Certainly it wasn't a food supply as the Whitetail Deer and feral hog population has created for the panther/mountain lion. Armadillos are worm/grub eaters, and these earthen creatures have always been here in the east north of Florida, haven't they? HAVE THEY? Now I'm beginning to wonder about this.....and I've got too much farming to do to wonder about this trivia :yawn:!
Good shooting though
It was a young one but age didn't matter for the reason he was removed!
AKA: Former Founding Member
Yep. way out yonder is one thing but around camp or the house you just can't have it. We've had a real problem here for years now with Rabid 'coons and skunks.
Woodsrunner, that's interesting about the 'dillers. We call them 'Possum on the half shell. And we finally have an answer to the age old question of why did the chicken cross the road. To prove to the Armadillo that it COULD be done.