Re: skunk trouble

In article <DjW6f.17240$E17.5722@xxxxxxxx>,
Tightwad <Tightwad@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

> I firmy believe, based on encounters, that some wildlife, and
> livestock, when they don't feel threatned do understand what we are
> about. I've had deer folow my tracks and when I sat down they just stood
> there and fed. I talked at them, not to them, since they obviously can't
> understand? They did not seem alarmed at all. Of course this was so far
> back in they probably saw one other human in a year.
> I've sat on a ridgeline and had ground sqiurrels come within a foot and
> argue with me. I don't alwasy use my gun when I go hunting but I still
> enjoy being out there.

I've often halfway wondered if maybe there's some sort of "animal ESP"
that can pick up on "I'm hungry/gonna shoot" type vibes.

Case in point: Two nights ago, about an hour before "dark o'clock".
Heard SOMETHING - couldn't tell what - outside. As usual when stepping
outside to investigate noises of unknown origin (Around here, one never
knows if one is going to open the door and find oneself face to face
with a mountain lion or a bear) I grabbed the gun closest to the door I
went out (in this case, the .30-06 - If I'd used the other door, it
would have been the short-barrel 12 gauge pump with a dove load in the
chamber, followed by alternating 00 buckshot and slugs to bring it up to
full load) to check out the source of the disturbance. Didn't manage to
find the "something", but did spot a group of deer (A couple of bucks
and half a dozen does) about 10-20 yards out, if that far. After looking
around trying to find the noise source (probably the deer crossing the
fenceline out of Coco's pen and snapping the bottom wire against her
water trough), I end up standing there watching them. So there I was,
with no serious intention of actually firing unless something
*INCREDIBLE* showed itself in the bunch, but still drawing a bead on
each of them in turn with a fully loaded, full-fledged, "as ready to use
as it gets without actually clicking the safety and squeezing the
trigger" deer rifle as I "paged through the catalog" going "Nope, that
one only has 3 points total, but I'd bet anything he'd drop in his
tracks since I'm lined up for a spine shot. Nope, that one's a doe, but
I bet she'd drop just as quick. Nope, don't want that one - nice rack,
but he's turned kinda funny to get without wrecking a bunch of meat",
and so on, for close to 20 minutes as they nibbled at the (rather sparse
this year) acorns against a *PERFECT* backdrop (Any "shoot throughs" or
misses would have buried themselves in a vacant hillside) to take a
shot. A touch on the trigger would have put whichever one of them I
wanted in the freezer as venison - I've got absolutely no doubt on that
score. In the end, though, I did the finicky hunter thing - thinking
"Nah, come on back next year and we'll see" as I went back inside and
re-racked the rifle, unfired.

It's times like those that you just *KNOW* that *THEY* know you aren't
*REALLY* interested in shooting, even though you've got 'em in your
sights (literally!) and the gun is ready to go.

(Oh, crap... I just let out the deep, dark secret that not ALL of us in
the woods automatically empty our guns at anything that looks like it
might be vaguely sorta-like almost kinda deer-shaped. I wonder how long
before "They" send the black helicopters after me for that little
infraction?)

--
Don Bruder - dakidd@xxxxxxxxx - New Email policy in effect as of Feb. 21, 2004.
Short form: I'm trashing EVERY E-mail that doesn't contain a password in the
subject unless it comes from a "whitelisted" (pre-approved by me) address.
See <http://www.sonic.net/~dakidd/main/contact.html> for full details.
.

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