huntingTag Archive for hunting archive at Robert Pogson

Tag Archive for 'hunting'

Lead

Published by Robert Pogson April 17th, 2013 in firearms and hunting. 5 Comments

Lead is a cheap and plentiful metal. It is a waste product of the nuclear processes in stars and radioactive decay. The universe has recycled lead as a metal we can mine as sulphides, carbonates or as metal. Man recycles lead from scrapped batteries, roofing, pipes etc. Some of it eventually ends up in percussion caps and bullets used by shooters.

Besides the low price, lead has several very useful properties for shooters:

the high density, 11.34 g/cm³, which makes projectiles have a higher ballistic coefficient and deliver more energy to the target,
malleability, being very soft, lead is easily swaged into the shape of a bullet with modest pressure, and also easily deformed on impact to deliver a bigger wound,
low melting temperature, 327C, making it feasible to form bullets by casting, and
ease of alloying with antimony or tin to make harder bullets where required.

Copper, on the other hand, has a much higher melting temperature, is much harder and more expensive while having a lower density (8.96 g/cm³).
“Even though the Arizona Game and Fish Department distributes copper ammunition free to hunters, a small number continue to use lead. As a result each year up to half of the wild Grand Canyon condors require chelation treatment to remove high levels of lead from their blood.
"It is critical that we take mandatory actions to remove it from ammunition and require less toxic alternatives, said Sandy Bahr from the Sierra Club.
"Requiring non lead ammunition for hunting on public land would be an important step in limiting lead exposure for condors and other wildlife," she added.”
see BBC News – Lead bullet fragments poison rare US condors.

Sigh. Lead has the important disadvantage of being toxic to workers handling it, shooters firing it and ducks and condors eating it. Still, it will be a major expense to replace it followed with higher costs in the future and lowered performance on game. For example, a .308 Winchester can easily kill deer to 350 yards without adjusting sights for range while copper bullets although they may start with higher velocity because of the lower mass will slow faster. Copper bullets, except for energy delivered downrange are superior in performance but have a much greater cost:

There is some misinformation about all this on the web. For example, in long-range hunting country, the government of USA tested .30-’06 with lead and copper bullets at 50 yards! Clearly, this is the wrong rifle/bullet combination for hunting at such ranges. I always use a heavier/slower RN bullet for hunting in such situations because lead splashes like water at the very high velocities. One should not use a high-power rifle with high-velocity bullets at less than 100 yards. In bush most kills are at such short ranges. One should use hardened cores at least in such cases.

Because hunters are using the wrong rifles/bullets should not be used to justify the higher cost of copper. Education about better choices is key. I would recommend light high-velocity lead bullets only for long shots like 200 yards or greater. If you are in mixed open/bush country, have a heavy RN bullet in the top of the magazine and faster pointed bullets for open situations.

If you hunt with a rifle, use proper tools and you should not have to worry about lead fragments.

- Robert Pogson

A Man And A Rifle

Published by Robert Pogson April 6th, 2013 in firearms. 1 Comment

Since I was little, I’ve always enjoyed a good rifle. I suppose it’s for the same reason boys throw stones. A good rifle throws a tiny stone with great range and accuracy. Some men spend great time, money, energy and care doing that. Recently I had the opportunity to fire a rifle older than I am. It’s a Mauser 98k virtually in mint condition after all these years because it was not used in WWII and was in storage for many decades. It’s not the best, most accurate or most powerful of rifles but it is an excellent deer rifle, delivering great stopping power to 350 yards without adjusting sights.

A man carries the rifle, loads it, aims at the target and squeezes the trigger. The rifle then leaps to life accelerating the bullet and recoiling. No man can truly tame that. The rifle does its own thing. A great rifle like this does it very well.

Commercial ammunition in North America is whimpy for this cartridge because there are 8X57J barrels around which are smaller in diameter… Handloaded ammunition is necessary to get the best performance from this rifle. This rifle loves IMR4064 powder and shoots most accurately with 170 to 220 grain bullets. My favourite bullet for hunting in bush is Hornady 170 RN. In open country the 150SP gives much better range. 220 grain bullets give best accuracy for target-shooting but they are scarce.

Hornady 150SP (red) delivers about the same energy 100 yards farther than 170RN (blue)with similar height of trajectory.

900 ft-lb is the recommended minimum for deer

Beautiful, isn’t it?
It was made in a time when German craftsmanship was still prevalent and factories were not being bombed back to the Stone Age. It was shipped to Spain in the hope that Spain would be an ally of Germany but the Spaniards were tired of war so they kept it in storage. I was privileged to touch such a fine work of art. I fired a couple of rounds of hunting ammunition of calibre 8X57JS and 170 grain round nosed bullets. I have seen deer just drop where they stood in the bush with that combination. I think it is superior to the much more popular .308 Winchester and the more usual 150 grain pointed bullets. You can’t beat the original sometimes.

One of my shots hit the target right where I aimed. The other was a bit further away… Either would have killed a deer promptly. I will work on my consistency over the summer. My increased hiking distances are a start towards a successful hunt this fall.

- Robert Pogson

Shooting an Oldie But a Goodie

Published by Robert Pogson March 9th, 2013 in firearms. 4 Comments

Today I was privileged to shoot an ancient “Commission Rifle”, a rifle designed by a committee in the 19th century. It was crude by any measure these days but far superior to many designs of the day. Key developments in the design were a very nice 8X57J cartridge very similar to the modern 8X57JS still in production today. I made up two groups of rounds to test the tolerance to pressure and to test the accuracy. No signs of pressure emerged in a range of loads for 150 grain bullets. A moderate load with a fixed charge produced reasonable accuracy for off-hand shooting in the standing position. Even a young lady with little experience managed to shoot a group small enough for deer to 200 yards.

The rifle was a joy to shoot. The stock was obviously made for real people to hold. Even thought the load was powerful enough to dispatch deer to 300 yards, recoil was moderate and a young lady fired several rounds with no discomfort. 120 years has scarred this rifle but it still does the job at normal hunting ranges in the bush. Accuracy could likely be improved with heavier bullets and slower-burning powders in the badly worn bore.

- Robert Pogson

Hint: When Hunting Pythons, Use Bait

Published by Robert Pogson February 17th, 2013 in hunting. 9 Comments

"You can go out there for days and days and days and not see one python," snake hunter Justin Matthews said last month. "I don’t care how much experience you have. It is going to take some luck."
see Plenty more where those came from — final take in Fla. snake hunt is 68 pythons – CNN.com.

Achh! With possible 10K+ pythons to be culled in the Florida Everglades, people have been walking around looking for patient and camouflaged hunters… That’s just stupid. I have never seen a python in the wild and don’t want to but they are snakes and I know how snakes hunt, by smell… Hint: Use bait and guard the bait, 24×7. Pythons also sense heat so it may help to have live mammalian bait.

These snakes hunt in the trees and swamps so make a trail of scents at the boundaries of forests and swamps and leave the bait where you can watch it. Watch the snakes pile on. Be patient. Snakes move slowly but waiting and letting them come to you is much more efficient than walking miles where your motion alerts the snakes to be still and their camouflage developed over millions of years works for them.

Many years ago I had plenty of experience with garter snakes. They live in similar although colder terrain and they hunt by smell. Let a frog, earthworm or small fish come withing metres of them and the tongue (the sense organ) will flick more and more rapidly with the head moving from left to right to judge direction as they home-in on the prey. When they are really close and the tongue touches the prey, they lunge and it’s all over. They can catch a jumping frog in mid-air. Amazing.

Once again, knowledge is key to a successful hunt. I have been hunting more than 50 years. Simple things like knowing what the quarry is doing makes the job much easier and faster.

Here’s how not to do it. You can see a snake tracking a rat here. See that tongue flicking? That’s what it uses to hunt. If you want to hunt snakes you have to guard the bait at night, too. Smell and heat-sensing work best then.

Smell can also be used againtt the pythons using dogs.
“So far Jake and Ivy have located 19 pythons, one of which had 19 eggs.”
Two dogs did better than 1000 humans walking around.

- Robert Pogson

News For City-Dwellers: Wolves Are Predators

Published by Robert Pogson January 7th, 2013 in hunting. 0 Comments

“The Sakha agriculture ministry says 16,111 reindeer were savaged by wolves in 2012 – a 4.3% rise on 2011. That meant a loss to reindeer herders of more than 150m roubles (£3m; $5m), as each reindeer is worth about 10,000 roubles (£205; $328).
see BBC News – Russia: Raids by wolves spark 'emergency' in Sakha.

When a new species (humans) is introduced into an ecosystem, the usual predator-prey relationships are upset and must be adjusted. In this case, caribou were domesticated and must be protected by humans. Humans are in direct competition with wolves and the only solution is to hunt/trap the wolves in order to maintain a new balance. A country filled with starving wolves is neither safe for agriculture nor human habitation.

This may be news to city-dwellers who think of wolves as cute and cuddly ancestors of lapdogs. This may be news to city-dwellers that humans have to kill animals they don’t intend to eat but it is reality. City-dwellers should remember this the next time they conceive an idea to purge society of hunters and trappers and their tools, firearms and traps.

- Robert Pogson

Florida Tries Culling an Endangered Species

Published by Robert Pogson December 7th, 2012 in technology. 3 Comments

Florida is offering rewards on Burmese Pythons found in the wild in certain places to see whether the numbers can be controlled using the public. This is despite the fact that the Burmese Python is endangered in its native range. Really folks, capture them and deport them. Make the world a better place. If it’s worth $1000 to inspire killers, would it not be worth $25 or so to return one to Asia?

“Earlier this year, researchers at Virginia Tech University, Davidson College and the U.S. Geological Survey reported that populations of rabbits and foxes have disappeared and numbers of raccoons, opossums and bobcats have dropped as much as 99%.”

see Florida tackling python problem with hunting contest – CNN.com.

Certainly, it would be very difficult to capture some pythons but offering a bounty greater for live specimens than dead ones would be a flexible way to handle that. One could also promote the population of prey-species with breeding programmes or create natural barriers around protected areas for prey-species to make the “problem” disappear. Eco-tourism for pythons could more than pay for the costs of saving the pythons.

When I was a boy on the farm there was a “problem” with a shortage of hares, our prey. My father cut firewood in the forest and instead of scattering brush began piles of brush/tree-limbs. The “problem” disappeared as the hares had an abundance of tender shoots for food all winter and a hiding place from foxes, coyotes, owls, their predators. We had so many hares, I used to harvest 4-6 every day before school to feed my family. As the pythons can swim and climb and pass through small openings, protecting prey-species would be challenging but not impossible. Design enclosures for feeding/breeding that prey-species could exit but pythons could not enter. One could even create python-detectors that would repel the pythons along some perimeter.

- Robert Pogson

Steak Dinner

Published by Robert Pogson November 16th, 2012 in Uncategorized. 6 Comments

I passed on hunting deer this fall. I was fighting off a severe cold in my chest with a lot of coughing that persisted for weeks. Yesterday, I did get out to the bush briefly. A hunter had bagged a large white-tailed deer and needed help retrieving it. When I got the call via smartphone, I was given the location and headed out. The deer was killed in the afternoon but by the time the task of dragging it out was fully appreciated it was dark.

The deer was a beauty, probably 250 pounds and in the prime of life. The shot had been perfect, through a rib on the left side, the heart and breaking the opposite front leg. Still the deer had to be tracked down in the forest. It must have died in seconds with such injuries but still travelled ~100 yards or so.

Dragging it out through a foot of fresh powder was a killer. Fortunately, by the time I arrived, the deer was at the vehicle. Since my SUV was easier loading we raised the head and slid the deer in a bit. With one pulling and me lifting we got it halfway in and then with two pushing finished the task. We skinned the deer and quartered it in my garage.

Today, we began to cut the quarters. In the front quarters we made a pile of ribs, steak and stewing/soup bones. The hind quarters remain while we reorganize freezer-space. After all this work we were rewarded by a steak dinner cooked by the little woman. It was excellent even though she cooked it rare and spicey. It was the most tender steak I have ever eaten. The deer was very fat, probably grain-fed over the summer, and the steak was supremely easy to chew. I think one barely needed to chew but it would fall apart with only a rub of the tongue…

The only downside to the whole affair was that the deer was shot at extreme range and the bullet did not expand promptly. It turned sideways to pass through the heart and break the leg. 100 yards less range probably would have dropped the deer in its tracks. Still it was a quick, humane kill, just not as quick as such an accurate placement should have been. If the heart had been missed the deer might have suffered long. A lesson had been learned for next year. The ammunition used was .308 Winchester 180 grain round-nosed. It should only be used within 200 yards. The shot was close to 300 yards. A 150 grain pointed bullet is the ticket for the situation at hand. It is no problem to carry two weights/styles of bullets for long openings and dense bush.

Ballistics of 150 SP and 180 RN from .308 Winchester follow. A 150 SP will have a muzzle-velocity about 2800 ft/s and have a 10 inch high trajectory with a 350 yard zero. The 180 grain RN will have a muzzle velocity about 2600 ft/s and zero at about 250 yards in the same rifle. The 150 SP will have about 1000 ft-lb of energy at 350 yards and be quite lethal on deer while the 180 RN will be down to that energy at 250 yards.

It is good to see young people learning the hunting craft and being able to feed their families by hunting. It definitely is the right way to get red meat… Some of the red meat sold in stores in Winnipeg was killed in Alberta and shipped by truck. It is within days of expiring even in a refrigerator. Still, hunting is not for everyone. There just aren’t enough deer in Manitoba to feed all of us carnivores.

- Robert Pogson

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My observations and opinions about IT are based on 40 years of use in science and technology and lately, in education. I like IT that is fast, cost-effective and reliable. I do not care whether my solution is the same as yours. I like to think for myself.

My first use of GNU/Linux in 2001 was so remarkably better than what I had been using, I feel it is important work to share GNU/Linux with the world. I have been blessed by working in schools where students and school systems have benefited by good, modular software easily installed in most systems.

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