Me vs. My Cat -- pt. Two

Last night was a Two Ratter.

I've spent the last few days doing upgrades and renovations to my Crosman 2289.
It has been brought from a .22 caliber 14" barrel, and changed out to a 16" .177 barrel. I also added a flat top valve, and, overhauled the main pumping pivot point. And,.... after years of thinking about it, I finally screw mounted the pistol grip, eliminating the electrical tape wrap.

The sun started setting, and I was becoming anxious, as the night before was a total bomb; nothing.
So, around 8:30, I pumped up, and loaded a CPHP 7.9gr, and made sure all of the patio lights were off. I sat at my blind, and, I couldn't believe my eyes,... There was a Rat already on the seed bait, and within 30 seconds of sitting, it was declared Dead on the Scene.

Then, at about 1:30am I got up to take a leak, and, looked out the window, and there was round two vacuuming up seed.
i pumped up, loaded another CPHP, and, slipped out to the blind. It was still sucking up seed, and, it was dispatched within 30 seconds of sitting.

This one presented in black and white,... because the camera went weirdly green under my red light for some reason.

The tongs? I refuse to touch this vermin. I've also recently mistakenly grabbed a nighttime Rattlesnake by the tail with them. It was not happy about that.

I ventilated another Rat last night, but it got into the Rattlesnake bushes. So it was not chased.

But, in bigger news,....
A Ground Squirrel wandered into my Whack-A-Mole Gallery yesterday afternoon.
This is huge.
I went on an eradication campaign, years ago, and this is the first Sage Rat that I've seen since then,... in like 3 years. By the time I got my Beeman Chief .22 out and loaded, it was gone. But it will be back.

over the last two nights,.... three rats.
last night, two.

two nights ago, 1:30am pee break, saw rat on bait. Went out to the blind, and, it was still there.
no pics because of 25' of noisy crunching gravel, and Sarge is asleep mere feet from the action. I whacked the backstop with a blow-through, but did not wake her up.

last night,... one rat before bed, pronounced dead at 8:45pm.
Then, at the 3am pee break, I decided to just go out onto the patio, and wing it. A Rat showed up within five minutes, or less. And at that hour, I hate to hit the backstop with a blow through because Sarge is sleeping mere feet from all of the action. But I took aim, and fired, and, plugged the rodent, and didn't hit the backstop; Sarge slept through all of it.
Its 25' of loud crunching gravel to get to the backstop, so, no pictures were taken.

I'm sort of old school. I still don't have a cellphone, and barely have a grasp on new tech. Hell, i haven't even answered a phone in like 20 years now; and have no idea how Sarges landline (digital landline thingy) works.

My old flashlight, a Minimag AA, has been running on the incandescent/halogen, "analog" bulbs, now for forty years. And it recently burned out another bulb. This left one single analog bulb in each of the handles (we have like 3 or 4 AA flashlights in the house in various locations).
So, I decided to enter the 21st century, finally, and bought one of these new fangled LED replacement bulbs.

One of these,...

I installed it yesterday, and put the flashlight aside. I tried it inside in the middle of the day, and was impressed with brightness.
Then, last night at bed:30, I decided to go out and sit at the Rat blind. I was out there for probably 20 minutes in near total darkness, and, was presented with a Rat target. I popped it, and it got into the Rattlesnake bushes. So I went to look for it, with flashlight and tongs in hand. I grabbed the flashlight, and turned it on, and, it was like a nuclear blast went off in my face, or, maybe it was a plasma cutter?
Dang,... this thing is like daylight in a palm size package now.
Is this what the 21st century is like?

eyes wide open,.....

Two rodent night last night,.... but, 8 hours apart.

Rodent #2 was just now, at 5am, a Mouse that got around behind the backstop. I nailed it, and bounced it off the backstop. By the time i got out to where it was,.. poof, gone.

Rodent #1 was a Rat, DOA at 8:45pm.
as found,.... It was on the green groundcover patch immediately below the Cat fence. I popped it right behind the right front leg w/ a .177 from my newly mod'd Crosman Backpacker (now a 16" barrel .177 & Mellon flat-topper). It did one long rolling butt-over-head flip, and, expired:



Turned over. The entry wound is behind the right front leg - a vitals shot.
Kitchen tong picker-uppers, thrower-outers, because I don't touch these vermin.



All the guts are retained, and no gaping holes.

thanks, Bandito!

I had one Rat sighted multiple times at the 1:30am pee break, when on a whim, I went out and sat at the blind (most of this stuff is based around this timing regime).
It was like a rocket, in and out of the Gallery. It was running along the backstop baseboards, that I've taken to calling the Rail. It was like a blur. It would dart in from the left, on the Rail, grab a seed and in that same second of time, it would turn and exit. It did that to me 4 or 5 times, and, I gave it up, and went back to bed.
That leaves at least one more rodent for tonight, and who knows how many more.

Well now, its officially fire season here. We now have two major fires burning in the not far distance.
One of them, the Roblar fire is what they say is 5 miles away, on Camp Pendelton Marine Base, at the Zulu Impact Zone, where they launch the real powder burners from tanks and Howitzer-type canons, from miles away, as training excercise.
They started this one on a day where we had record high temps, extremely low humidity, and winds that come from the desert and head off shore when they get to the beaches - perfect.


This is a fire that is probably 20 crow miles from us, but we can see the smoke, and the last time it burned, we saw the flames.
It is in Orange County, and at the base of a mountain range called Saddleback Mountain, or, the Santa Ana Mtns., and the Cleveland Nat' Forest.
This twenty miles between this fire and us? Cleveland Nat'l Forest, State parks, and large private ranch holdings. There is nothing but wildlands between us and the fire. This one is called the Airport Fire in Trabuco Cyn.




This is the Roblar Fire on Camp Pendelton, and said to be five miles from our town, Fallbrook.
If you look to the ridgeline with the rising smoke, you see the smoke of the Roblar Fire. The ridgeline to its right, and just out of the picture, is where the Airport Fire of Trabuco Canyon is at.
The Roblar Fire is nearing 1000 acres, and, the Airport fire might surpass 10k acres by this evening, or more.


This is my view of the Roblar Fire, as of this morning.
The winds turned from desert -> ocean this morning (offshore winds), to going 180º opposite from the ocean blowing inland (onshore winds)
Everything that looks like clouds/fog is smoke, and ash. We are now getting the ash outfall with the winds coming towards us.


And, the ash "snowflakes" are thick this morning.


and, from this list, the worst of it is the Line Fire in San Bernardino County, at nearing 30k acres, that severely threatens my wild trout fly fishing stream.

@Bandito
Kitty has become a slacker. But I think this has something to do with summer and it being hot.
When I started part 1 of Me vs. My Cat, over at GTA, she was on an absolute tear. She was bringing us multiple rodents a day, or, at least a rodent a day, for months on end. Now, since it became warm/hot, she mostly stays on the patio until its time for her to come in (she is out from safe early sunrise light, until about noon'ish). At noonish, she is ready to come in and lead her life of leisure.

Rats,... I got a Mouse.

Rats have been a bit lacking lately. a good thing?

So, nothing last night. All of my Sunflower seed bait was still remaining.
Well, i got up, and was readying for building up the Coffee. i decided to look out over the Red Light District, and saw something move, like lightning fast. So I grabbed the Crosman, which was still pumped and loaded from overnight, and, pop, headshot.

Crosman 2289G Backpacker w/ 16" .177 barrel, Baker Al. breech
Mellon Flat-top valve
CP-Pointed 7.4 .177

DOA at 6am

And, she constantly reminds us that what we want her to do,... Is Not My Idea! (her idea - meaning: not likely to cooperate)

My newest experiment in nighttime Ratting,.... (actually an idea bagged from @Ranchibi)

I have wanted to turn down the intensity of my LED, but am at the lowest level that I can run it, and still detect my reticle. I have read where Randall uses a red light on his rifle, and depends on the night vision from a doorbell camera signal to his cellphone.
I want to be able to reduce my LED level, but still need to keep it bright enough to detect rodent. I then want to try to spot light a bit with my newly laser cutter modified MagLight AA (new LED lamp, and red lens).
So, I rigged a holder for the flashlight that mounts to my Rat blind on the patio.
The frame of the blind is of 1/2" PVC and fittings.

1/2" PVC pipe, and, 1/2" slip "T's"


It is all still slip fittings - no glue, for adjustability. The vertical riser is already reduced to its minimal height.

Thanks! @beerthief
I've wanted a .25, but, no longer have a need.
My Beeman Chief .22 devastated the local Sage Rats years ago; and in fact, I've only recently seen one again in 4yrs? But with that said, I had really good results with my Crosman 2100 .177 on the Sage Rats before I wore it out. At that point, I pushed them far enough back and away that I needed something with a bit more reach, and punch. Thats when the Beeman Chief PCP came into play.
But I wanted to replace my 2100 with something similar, small, light, and accurate. I found a good deal on the 2289, and have been rigging it since, including the downsize to .177 from .22. I really like that small light and accurate factor.

Moke said:

My newest experiment in nighttime Ratting,.... (actually an idea bagged from @Ranchibi)

I have wanted to turn down the intensity of my LED, but am at the lowest level that I can run it, and still detect my reticle. I have read where Randall uses a red light on his rifle, and depends on the night vision from a doorbell camera signal to his cellphone.
I want to be able to reduce my LED level, but still need to keep it bright enough to detect rodent. I then want to try to spot light a bit with my newly laser cutter modified MagLight AA (new LED lamp, and red lens).
So, I rigged a holder for the flashlight that mounts to my Rat blind on the patio.
The frame of the blind is of 1/2" PVC and fittings.

1/2" PVC pipe, and, 1/2" slip "T's"
View attachment 499001View attachment 499003View attachment 499002

It is all still slip fittings - no glue, for adjustability. The vertical riser is already reduced to its minimal height.

Click to expand...

So, this flashlight holder worked really well last night.
I set it up, and turned my main Red Light District LED down to its lowest setting (I was already at 2/10 for brightness - then reduced to 1/10).
I sat and waited, and, suddenly a Rat pulled up to the seed.
It was then that I turned the flashlight on, and focused it. This took quite a bit of exposed hand in order to do; the rodent was not phased.
I brought it to a strong spotlight focus, right on the Rat; it was like being on a stage and spotlighted. It stayed put for long enough to gather a Sunflower seed, which is where I will have typically had it sighted in and tried a shot. But, I was experimenting with the brightness and spotlighting, and missed my chance. But, it already proved to be a success in spotlighting, and not overtly scaring the rodent away.
Then I went to bed.

This is an extension of some of my past shenanigans in Sage Rat popping. I warned of this in the original post of this thread.
Some of these images might be repeats, but they help me tell the tale,.... so, here goes.

When we moved here, we already had a huge presence of Ground Squirrels. They are incredibly destructive critters.
I had already shot a ton of them from my Patio blind, now called my Red Light District (RLD), due to the nighttime Rat eradication effort.
I started realizing a drop in the Patio shots, and, took notes about where the Sage Rats entered the Patio shot; from the east meant they were coming from a large wild hillside. If from the west side, they were coming from a large abandoned Macadamia Nut farm. My efforts took me off of my patio blind, and moved me towards the front yard, which is the direction that the Mac Nut Farm rodents seemed to be coming from.
I cleaned out a bunch of Rodents from the front yard area, and kept being drawn west towards the nut farm. And, finally, I was drawn to the far west perimeter of my property (a single acre).
What I found is hard to describe. And, everything that I found was quite a surprise to me, as I didn't realize the depth of the issue.

This finally leads me to my Western Outpost, and, Daves Shed.
The Western Outpost is a large stack of curing firewood, in log form. I've made a seat, and I have a large "live edge" slab of wood for a bench rest.
The Western Outpost mostly overlooks my neighbors property. And I asked for his permission to set up shop, and, shoot at rodents on his property; I was going to shoot across his property, and towards his shed, Daves Shed. Daves place sides up to the large Mac Nut farm, and, in fact he has lots of Mac trees as well. He likely has an acre of nut trees, added to the 5+ acres of nut trees right next door.

The Western Outpost has a view of all of this perhaps 90º, from left to right, and, is outward to 300ft. The long shot is towards the left half of the 90º view, and, Daves Shed is towards the right of the 90º view.

This is the Western Outpost bench rest:


Kitty showing you the seat:



Kitty showing you the live edge wood slab bench rest:

And, this is the long shot from the left side of the 90º bench view. This is from a measured 300' shot at a rodent:





300' head shot, female Sage Rat (pregnant?)



OK,.... the Western Outpost has been introduced, and, the long shot from the southern half (left) 45º angle revealed. Literally a Sage Rats killing zone on this 45º left long shot angle (ranges from 60' as nearest shot, and outward to 300' - with 225' the average shot).
Daves Shed is the other half of this 90º view, but to the north.

Are you finally ready for Daves Shed?
We're getting there,... be patient.

Before we get to Daves Shed, I introduce the cause of all of the rodents, the Macadamia Nuts.

The tree - this one is mine. I have at minimum 5 acres of them that are essentially abandoned, directly across the road from us.


The nuts,....
They grow in an outer husk that is quite hard. They need to reach this husk splitting point in order to get to the inner nut shell.
The inner nut shell is like hardened steel, extremely hard.
The inner shell is what makes a Macadamia nut so expensive, as they are incredibly labor intensive to get a whole nut removed. I use a small 4lb hand sledge hammer mallet on concrete to crack open the inner shell.


The Macadmaia nuts in various phases,.... whole nut, outer husks cracked, and, what the rodents do to them once the outer husk splits away:


The rodents chew through the inner shell, which is like hardened steel. They then consume the nut meat, and leave the shell with a hole chewed through it.
I like to use the hollowed out shell for targets as they make a nice ricochet noise when you hit them. I aim for the open hole. The nut shells just vanish with a zing on impact.