I like to squirrel hunt with airguns, squirrels can be a challenging quarry in the woods. At the first of the season the squirrels are usually up in the trees cutting and packing away supplies for the winter. With leaves on the trees they can be a hard to spot, but if you move extra slowly stay alert and listen for debris falling you can locate them. I like to use a call that produces a bark during this time. A call or just clicking your toungue rapidly will bring one down the tree for a peek. Kissing the back of your hand also works extremely well.Then as the leaves start falling boars are looking for mates. This is the best time to be out hunting as squirrels seem to be everywhere chasing in a freenzy to reproduce. Most days it is fairly easy to take your limit with just a little patience.
After the mating freenzy calms down squirrel hunting can be extremely tough, areas where you know squirrels are plentiful may produce not a single sighting in a full day of hard hunting. Many a day I hunted long and hard without taking a single squirrel. When the squirrels do come out it is for a brief feed, they are extremely wary and will see you quick making shots hard. Its a good time to practice your stalking skills, move very slowly, It should take several hours to cover 100 yards, I have found that a squirrel whistle or distress call works during this time. Camo is a must as the squirrels that do react will be looking directly in your direction.
It's a fine time to out be in the woods, calm without many hunters and sometimes you can locate buck sheds that give a clue as what you might get a chance at the next fall. Great time to teach kids about hunting too. If your not using your airguns to hunt squirrels with occasionally you missing a fine relaxing pleasure, and the best part is fried squirrel and gravy are excellent.
Anyway this is how I do it, it would be nice to hear from some other small game hunters and read about how you do it

Good tutorial!

That's neat Joe. Sounds like it takes alot of patience, and time.

Eventually, we'll get you out there with your Chameleon. It's coming thru the pipeline.

Gary

Thank Jerry, Gary, I was hoping to get some feedback from one or two other small game hunters. I love to small game hunt, I t like big game hunting too, but deer hunting in general is about the sorriest hunting there is.
Squirrell, rabbit, quail, dove, or grouse are the way to go . Most of the time the action is fast and at the end of the day you don't have to break your back or get elbow deep preparing your harvest.
Gary I can't wait bud, it is going to be one heck of a squirrel rig.

There's a movie of the prototype at the range on the page ..... if anyone wants to check it out.

I have a couple of Chameleon rifles working their way thru the shop.



I'll be out of this hole in no time!

Gary

ANOTHER rifle I'd like to have! How is yours going to be set up Joe?

Very nice Gary,I've always liked the rotating breach block type action,simple and strong but seal up nice.You've designed and built a gun that is classy and has the look of being strong and dependable.I like it a lot,Joe will be on to the squirrels with that.What does it weigh in at in the format showen?

Thanks Danny,

About 7 lbs if I recall.

Gary

Hi Jerry,
Just a basic Chameleon, with a more traditional butt stock and schnabel forearm stock. Longer barrel and reservoir. No shroud, I like to hear it go off, and power adjuster that comes stock on the model.
You may know that the Chameleon was designed to be configured in several calibers and different formats including a pistol. Over time I hope to have it all, 32, 45, and .22 for the pistol. Now don't tell Gary, I didn't want him to get all upset thinking about all that additional work he will have coming his way.
The 32 will be for coyotes, and foxes.
45. for deer in the thickets where shots of 35 yards will be looooong. This will be my first upgrade.
The pistol for relaxing on the front porch.

See that Gary? "Just a basic Chameleon." Not everybody needs to have every option and change things up! Oh wait...never mind.

Joe, that's going to be one heck of a shooting system!

huh

Yeah ... right. Guess you'll need a compartment case .... too .....





BTW ... new smilie stuff. I thought I made some really, really small. Must recheck that. target plane

Thanks Jerry, I thought gary would appreciate that Basic Chameleon comment!!

I'm real excited to see pics of this poject. I'd never seen or heard of a Chameleon (Gary's version) until someone put up the "content lost in space" post a few weeks ago and it was one of the things that I wandered into that really struck me.

Good post Joe! I'd love to hunt squirrel someday. Here in Nevada, there are no tree squirrels, I'd have to go to Arizona or California to hunt them. Plenty of jackrabbits here though, and it's open all year round.

You've got a good deal there Peter. Open spaces to shoot. Lots of yardage. Very nice.

Gary

Thanks Peter, I would love to hunt those jackrabbits someday. I know they have got to be blast.

Hey Joe,
This is how we do it in Mississippi! This is a pic of my son Kyle at 5 with a couple of critters. POSTED ON HUNTING FORUM

The details of the hunt include Kyle pointing out the rabbit as I'm giving him pointers on what to look for, dark eye, flick of an ear etc. He just says "like that one there?" Of course, I ask "Where?" We made a good team though. A single 14 gn 22 cal JSB Exact from the Falcon landed perfectly and the rabbit cut a back flip and was still. I'll bet you've seen this reaction to the head shot with your bunnies as well.

Please note the bare feet. It's so hard to keep shoes on these kids!

If Gary would help me with the fox population I might have a real bunny haven around here. As Gary can attest, around here one rabbit screams and fox come running from every direction! Makes for real quiet rabbits!

BTW this was pre-Barnes ownership. I had purchased this Falcon as my first PCP at Standing Stone IV from Van at AirHog. It's still fun to shoot, accurate and quiet with the "barrel extension".

Kent

I really do need to make a Fox hunting trip. You bet. Are they coming thru the windows yet down there?

For those who didn't read about it before, Kent and I had gone deer hunting .... and I'd missed my chance at a doe. We got home, and decided to go out on a grassy road on the back of Kent's property ... with thicket on both sides. We hastily set up a screen blind nested up against a dead fall and a pile of stumps. We set out an electronic game call. I had a "Gray Fox" 46 model (not yet named! and Kent set out, and then triggered the game call. Honestly, within about 30 seconds ... I saw a critter (which I took to be a dog) appear up at the end of the grassy road (about 150 yards away). It came at a fast trot, directly toward us. Right down the road!

I told Kent something was coming, and he thought I was kidding him! I got the scope up ... and verified it was a FOX! It's a FOX ... A FOX IS COMING LOOKS like A FOX!!!!!! As I stuffed a slug into the scope, and cocked my binoculars ... .... it kept running toward us. When it got to about 60-50 yards .... I decided that was close enough. BANG!!!! And there was a wailing and howling and the thing disappeared into the thicket. We heard thrashing for a few seconds, and then ....

There's one back here!!! Kent said. I was sitting in a canvas chair leaning forward. I found it nearly impossible to turn. I think I knocked over a few stumps and dragged the dead fall with me ... just in time to catch a glimpse of the fox behind me fading into the brush. As I looked back around ... there was a third fox in the grassy road ... 40-50 yards away!!! Amazing.

Somehow I managed to load and fire ... and that fox dropped in it's tracks. So - I thought I had a double. We'd be "hunting" for about two minutes or less!

We looked for the thicket fox for hours. Even the next day for hours. I mean it was dense in there. We even cut paths thru with a hedge lopper, and looked under every snake infested old log in the place! (Ooops ... never thought of that!!!) Never saw hide nor hair, nor blood. So; in my excitement, I must have skinned the hide of the thing. It made quite a ruckus, but it wasn't there ... and Kent said he never saw any buzzards in the air over there. Guess I just made a fox with a bald stripe down it's back.

Now, that one was the bigger, darker male. A Gray Fox. The one behind me ... was a bright red fox. The one I dropped, was a female Gray Fox, and she will be joining the crew of buffalo skull and Boar head in the office ... laying on the tall shelves sometime soon.

It was quite a whirlwind hunt.

Gary

Good hunting story Gary.

I remembered 25 years ago, I was hunting rabbits in southern California, then suddenly I saw a red dog running out of the brush (I had never seen a wild fox before), it stopped and looked back at me, then I realized it was a red fox, I immediately mounted my 12 guage shotgun and pulled the trigger! click.... nothing, the gun had misfired! that was one lucky fox. I have never seen another one ever since. I'm going to hunt them with an airgun someday, should be a blast!

Foxes are funny critters. If you watch them closely, they don't move at all like a dog. It's like they've got little springs on their toes, they're always bouncing from one place to another, even when they're just walking.

I agree rotor, I've always thought of them as more feline than canine.

Good story Kent, reminded me of what my grandpa use to say when I went rabbit hunting with him as a kid, "look for their eye". I never could figure it out until I aged a little. Of course when I was 4 or 5 he told me that if I sprinkled salt on a birds tail he couldn't fly and I could catch him. I spent a lot of time up in the tree with a salt shaker until he finally told me " boy if your close enough to sprinkle salt on his tail your close enough to grab him. I caught me one to before the summer was out, a cat bird, my mom still tells the story of how I came in with that bird. Been hunting ever since.