The Coons They Like My Trash

Heehehee... :D :D

Not laughing at you, Munk, but with ya.
I've been rounds with these destructive varmints myself.
Your experience at getting that one with a .22 sounds like I could have written the script. In fact, I actually vowed to never again intentionally hunt coons with a .22 because it wouldn't stop them before they ran to their dens.

Ya know, a shotgun would anchor them on the spot, present less ricochet hazard if you use small shot size, and also help to land a hit on a moving target when you've got bad night vision. Just a thought. 'Course, the kukri sounds like more fun!! :D

I've seen dead coons attract possums and more dead coons, but not live coons. ;)

I wish you the best of luck.
 
Yeah, the .22 is a clean shot proposition. I'm thinking of my 32/20

The shotgun is best. I know it.



munk
 
So...

It's midnight, twelve-thirty, like that. It's the end of December, early January, and I'm in layered clothing of many levels, all bulky, and in total, all insufficient for the cold. I am wearing 16 inch rubber boots to slog through the snow. I am standing in 18 inches of creek.

I am trying to hear the baying of a (honesttogawd it IS a breed of dog) Mountain Cur named "Rodney." I am with the father of a neighbor who has graciously invited me to be an assassin. He is a raccoon hunter/trapper. I am not. I shoot. He figures this will be great fun.

It is not.

It is dark. Not kind of dark. Dark. There are barbed wire fences everywhere. They hide in the daylight, and are invisible at night. There are plants everywhere which have shed their leaves for the winter, but thoughtfully have left their thorns--wicked, pointy things which can penetrate kevlar, and have no problem with the layers of clothes I am wearing. They also entangle anything taller than a mouse that passes by them. I am not tall, but I am taller than a mouse. They entangle me, and (I swear) call ahead to alert plants down the way that I am coming.

Did I mention that dairy farmers frequently have bulls that they leave in pastures with their heifers and freshening cows? I see (well, not "see") them everywhere. But they are there. I know this.

This is the unglaciated region of Wisconsin. That means that the last glaciers didn't extend down here, hence it is full of rolling hills, and has a topography known as Oak Savanna. Vast fires would start and burn out dried grass and other vegetation, but the Oak trees would survive, owing to their thick bark. The grass would grow again and be glorious in its verdancy. It sounds beautiful and is.

Rolling hills.

Those suckers are only rolling if you aren't walking up and down them. If you are afoot, they are steep, trecherous, rock-strewn, slippery slides of death.

Rodney treed a raccoon. Dave carried a light so bright that the Space Station folks waved at us. I shot the raccoon with a .22. It fell, dead.

Twenty-two caliber rounds will kill raccoons.

Raccoon hunting almost killed me.
 
down here they shake them out of the tree and let the dogs tear them apart

I'd never want to see it be illegal but the above is too barbaric for me. Especially since the coons aren't molesting anyone. These are woods coons.


My problem coons here open the trash can up at the buck pen and eat all the grain.
 
Kismet-
Thanks for sharing that. I wish I could make my coon stories that enjoyable to read. Really. I'm no good at story tellin' though. Did you ever get to go out with him again? Always interested in discussing such things.

You said, "Twenty-two caliber rounds will kill raccoons." I may be taking that the wrong way, but just to be sure, I want to clarify I don't disagree. It certainly can kill 'em, just as munk reported, and I've seen as well. My complaint about .22's is more because they don't jive with the methods I have to use. When you're sniping a coon out of a tree, as in your example, you've got a second to line up your shot to make it count. But in my case, the critter will be running, and I've only got a split second to find him with my light, raise my gun, decide if it's safe to shoot, and then anchor him before he can run the 3 feet to safety. I admit I'm not good enough to consistently make head shots under these conditions. A .22 through the body may kill them, eventually, but he'll be stinking up the whole shed for a week after he's made it to his burrow. What's worse though, is knowing that you hit them, and watching them run off someplace where you can't retrieve them or finish them off quickly.
 
Thats exactly, Possum. If you have time to set up the shot, a 22 will knock Coons dead, but if the coon is moving and you have to take what you can get, you'll more likely wound the animal, and I don't like that.


munk
 
Did you ever get to go out with him again? Always interested in discussing such things. posted by the possum.

Hey possum.

Yep I've gone on many times since then with Dave. I don't get around as well as I did, and he has reduced the frequency of his hunts...during the day, he was a dairy farmer, and time has taken its toll on each of us.

Mostly, I went out because I could. In another life, I'd dreamed of being an outdoorsman, but day-to-day responsibilities in the city prohibited any chance. After moving to rural Wisconsin, going with David was a chance at a new aspect of life. There's a book, The voice of BUGLE ANN, that was influential in my wanting to hunt raccoons. It's a dog story.

Also, I went because of Dave. A good man, taciturn, but insightful. Never stereo-type dairy farmers if you are a city boy.

You and munk are right, of course. A treed raccoon is a much easier shot than one that scurries or bounds away. They are amazingly fast afoot. Also, Rodney was there to capture any injured raccoons that fell. Never consider a raccoon a cute and furry animal. Their aspect is misleading. He suggested using a .22 to save holes in the pelt, but a shotgun is a better bet for nuisance removal.

Dave did it for the fur money and for, I think, the memory of times gone by. I went for the company and the experience.

We each benefitted.

Be well and safe.
 
I have heard that strong ammonia will deter them. I used to use a bungee cord to hold the lids down and soaked it in ammonia so they would not chew it. Worked for me, but I was in the burbs and I think the coons eventually had a run in with one of there natural enemies, the car.
 
RacoonHunter.jpg


...wouldn't this be a perfect occasion for that versatile deer rifle of yours
laugh.gif
 
Munk's got his battles with 'coons, my battles are with the Schwarz Luftwaffe -- huge black crows.

I set the bags out early each Thursday AM, and the "caw-caw-caw" starts like right now. I don't think I'm in the house five mins and they've lighted and ripped into the bags, taking great pains to distribute the unwanted trash over several dozen square feet as they probe for the juicy morsels.

We did the ammonia thing and it worked for a bit, but after a few weeks if you didn't dunk the bag in a vat of ammonia the crows would find a weak spot in the chemical defense and rip in.

I almost tried CB caps in an accurate .22 rifle but never got off a shot because of the neighbors and their cars across the street. No collateral damage -- I though of my neighbors doing the same thing in reverse and said, "Uh, no."

PsyOps were next -- I needed to take one, kill it, and leav it as an example. Using a baited old fashioned bail-type rat trap, I caught one, very dead. Before I could release it and stake it out on the site or do some other Medieval scare tactic, I discovered that crows are cannibalistic. The deceased was turned into lunch for the rest of the bunch, by popular and apparently enthusiastic vote by the successors. Not wanting to do an imitation of Rod Taylor in a certain Hitchcock movie, I waited until the carcass was picked clean. It took maybe 30 mins, tops. Less if the bastidges would have stopped bickering and cooperated amongst themselves.

Poison? Nope. Got a dog of my own, and lots of neighbors and not-so-neighbors do too.

Drag the cans down and back up each time? Nope. Too lazy, I'll admit and plus, the local "The Fast and the Furious" tricked-out Neon and Civic crowd use cans for target practice.

What finally worked and still does is a light misting of good ol' WD40 on the bags. I get three big spray cans at a time from Sam's, and one seems to last between 6 and 9 months.

The crows have been looking a bit peaked for a while now . . .

Noah
 
Noah Zark said:
What finally worked and still does is a light misting of good ol' WD40 on the bags. I get three big spray cans at a time from Sam's, and one seems to last between 6 and 9 months.

The crows have been looking a bit peaked for a while now . . .

Noah
Click to expand...
WOW!!!! :eek: Another use for good ol' WD-40!!!! :D :cool: :D
Perchance you've already sent this use in to the WD-40 website?
I don't know if they give out free t-shirts or anything but it might get your name on the list of contributers if there is such a thing.;)

Hmmm, wondering if WD-40 might be good for keeping the Condamned cats out of the what used to be flower beds???? :confused: :grumpy:
Cayenne Pepper sprinkled copiously helps until the first good rain.:D :cool: :D
 
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