Cold Front moving in

The weather Man says a cold front is coming through tommorow AM and it won't be over 100 tommorow, only 80 or so.

I wonder if that will make the critters move around a little more.

I hope so!

.357

Here is the POS without the grips and side plate. The long spring in the handle is listed as the main spring. The spring ends in a bushing. On some models, but not mine, this part is listed as an adjustable bushing. I'm not the most mechanically inclined person but I don't see any way to adjust the tension on this spring.

For Brian, 

I would live to thank Producers Co-Op for have the cheapest pig bait in the county. Because of their low prices I went to fill the tube feeder and set the trap this morning and caught this guy out for a morning stroll 

this was the biggest pig I ever shot and it also has the biggest teeth I have seen up close 

My revolver

Gentlemen,

I'm having an issue with my piece-of-shit Taurus revolver and I am hoping that I can fix it without having to go to the hassle of mailing it back to the factory again.

The firing pin is hitting the primer hard enough to make a small dent but with insufficient force to fire the bullet. This happens about 1/3 of the time. I have tried two different bullets that worked fine in my other .357.

Is there a simple adjustment I can make?

Boar Pig with long hackles on back of neck taken from Normangee Sept. 18th 

Ghost Monkeys and a Big Boar

A few weeks ago on eof my wife's co-workers asked her if she knew anyone that would like to help them with their hog infestation. Since Lindsey is a wonderful wife she hooked me right up with 1000 acres of prime hog country in Leon County just east of Normangee.

On Saturday I went with the Rancher, Mr. Bailey and got the grand tour of the property that I am allowed to hog hunt until rifle deer season. The property is a long rectangle that runs north and south with dense forests and creeks along both long ends. While mostly cleared pasture there is a small wood near the north end which is peppered with deer hunting stands and broadcast feeders. South of this is a large pasture and then another forest that spans the width of the property where caney creek runs from east to west. About 1/3 of the property is sounth of Caney creek and as such apparently is home sweet home to a bunch of pigs.

Jeff and I arrived early in the evening, I drove him on the same tour I got from the rancher and we shagged up 4 does while driving the pickup. When we reached the area of caney creek we got out of the truck and walked through the forest and into the two back pastures. All the creek beds in the forest were completly covered with pig tracks and there were large areas of extensive rooting in the forest near the creeks. We advanced back to the southern pastures and Jeff was awestruck at the level of pig rooting which had occured there.

We explored a bit more and found a plethera of set up spots for box traps and sitt'in with rifles or more likely shotguns. We found another pair of does in the forest and moved to within 25yards of them before they decided to move on. We returned to the pickup, got a drink of water, saw three more deer and a bunch of long tailed tree rats and then we decided to set up at early dusk near one of the creeks in the forest and JEff was tormented by the large numbers of squirrles that lept from tree to tree.

Suddenly we heard a curious noise in the creek bottom, I for one was certain it was the scream of a monkey but it could have been a pig. Both of us trained our .270s on the bend of the creek bed and waited but nothing happened so we snuck around and found yet onther great spot to set up a pork ambush but no sign of the monkey.

Having allowed the ghost monkey to evade us we moved back to caney creek and set up a second time right on Caney creek but the forest fell silent but for a few curious noises to the distant south. Somewhat dissappointed we gave up on Caney creek with the notion that they must come through quite late at night. I convinced Jeff to take one more look in the back pasture just as the daylight faded. By the time we got into the open of the back pasture it was quite dark and we could find nothing but cattle. We (Jeff mostly)would occasionally hear something that was decided un-bovine but we would go in the direction and it would vanish.

We gave up after many attempts to find the noise makers and started to leave. When suddently the pigs let out such a racket that we had no trouble determining their direction. We walked up the the low fence dividing the pasture and shone the red light back and forth but found nothing, they mus tbe on the move. We went around the fence and moved into the pasture in a rush to close the distance. After a long dash we hear no more pig noises so we stop and shine around. We give up for the third time that night and as a last ditch effort I remove the red filter and shine 360 degrees when we see off the the right a low black swarm of pigs. It is possibly the largest group of pigs I have ever seen at one time, at least forty adults, likely many more and lots of piglets. The most unusual part is that they are completely oblivious to the million candles that are lighting them up. Jeff is taking aim when I tell him that we can get alot closer than the 100+ yards we are at. We turn off the light, and quickly but quietly close to within a 100 yards, I light 'em up again, Jeff quickly chooses a target that is quartering toward him and lets a round loose. Chaos ensures as pigs go in every conceivable direction. We follow some to the left but the head straight for a buch of cattle that are curiously watching so no more pigs are shot.

We shine back to the right and jeff sees a piglet very near us that he chases and tries to tackle, but when I can't keep the light on the piglet it makes it's escape.

We Find the pig and it is at least one size bigger than the standard ones seen in Gause or the Kuder road pig hole. It is 8:30 pm when we walk back to fetch the pickup. When laid across the tailgate the boar is six inches shorter than the gate, I reckon it is about 150lbs or more.

We find an old bent up T-post that we use to hang the pig from a low branch. The big boar has .277 inch diameter hole on his left side just a little back of the third rib, inside one lung, stomach and liver are in bad shape, There is another considerably larger hole through the short ribs on his right side. After all the fun is done we head out and reach the highway at 11:00pm.

wind, rain, and bull reds

I picked up a couple of buddies and hit Sargent beach on Friday afternoon. We were greeted with a strong easterly wind, big brown surf, and rain showers. Not surprisingly, we were the only people out there. It took a little while but we finally caught enough mullet to get started. We drove back to our usual surf spot and within 15 minutes, Kasey is fighting a fish on his new rod. After a good battle, which takes him down the beach, he lands a 44” (32lb) bull. Not bad for his 3^rd redfish ever! We followed that fish up with another 2 bull reds just before dark. I was about to take some more lines out when my friend Jeff walks into camp. He was muddy and thirsty after walking several miles. Jeff decided to take the back road because the surf was high and he found a nice mudhole to bury his jeep in. I took him back to his jeep and we returned a little while later in separate vehicles. Another bull red had been landed while we were gone. We got back to fishing and quickly landed two more reds. These fish were caught in the first gut. We built a fire and cooked fajitas. After dinner I couldn’t drag myself away from the fire so the fish were given the rest of the night off.

The next morning Kasey and Jeff each caught a slot red. I caught two big gafftops on large baits that I kayaked out for the sharks. We left the beach at 11 am and were at the barbecue place by noon.

From feathers to Feast

Sat morning bright and early I met up with some of the boys from work, east of town. We all met up at a truck stop next to a XXX store and headed out to get our BANG on. Sun rise caught us swilling a bit'o wiskey and slurping down a Nattie or several. The guy (Kenny) who has access to the place said they will be flying hard around 8:15 or so, and he was right. We were hunting on a scattered prairie dog town with about a 8ac playa on the north side, about 1,000yds from where we set up. Morning finds dove seeking structure, and structure was what was holding me verticle. We were setting near a fenceline leaning on some ole ranshackled corrals. Grass about 2' high around the corrals and not quite beer can tall except in scattered patches across the prairie. We had access to about 5 sections but only needed a scant few acres to ply the bloody trade of high speed Pb euthanasia. I was on the ole Ithica 20ga and put the loan out on the 870.
We had a wind out of the south blowing in at about 10-15. The first of the dove began to drift in at about 7:45 and I splattered the first one at a distance of about 5 yds. Left a dramatic puddle of feathers and not alot of bird. However, it does boost the ole confidence. From there we had a few driftin in, headed right to us. Kenny was right, 8:15 was the witchin hour and we proceded to let the ghost out of ALOT of dove. With them coming in against the wind, and headin right at you, it makes for dove shooting not dove hunting. One of the guys was on his first hunt EVER. I had coached him over some clays in the weeks before, and he got 8 or 9. Being the fine upstanding American I am, I helped him fill his limit.
Highlights: I got a double and also shot a dove one handed whilst taking a leak. When we began to become concerned about limits and started countin, I was rusteling about in my vest and a dove came to life, beat hell out of my back and found his way out of my pouch. He took to flight with the wind at his back, I shot at him twice and missed. Gone. That has never happened to me before. I figure I musta hit him with my wad and just dazed him, he slept it off in my pouch and woke up in horror. Imagine waking up in a pile of dead bodies with a HUGE hand rootin around amungst you. I'd flown the coop too.
But let me tell you dinner was good sat. night. I did the "only dove recipe" and Steve, remember when you gave me that box of latex gloves? Well I used it. I figured cuttin and corein 30 jalepenos, gloves would be something the misses would appriciate, and she did.

INTRODUCTION
I spent some time last night building .270 bullets using hogdgen 4831 powder and a couple of different bullets, 130grain Boat tail spire point (BTSP) Nosler Partiion and some 90 grain Jacketed Hollow Point (JHP)Sierra Varminter.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
I began by reading in the lyman book for reference starting and maximum loads. Then I loaded four each of the 130 gr BTSP with 54 56 and 58 grains of powder while four each of the 90 grain JHP projectiles would be propelled by either 56 or 58 grains of H4831.

I followed the advice of chris on bullet seating and I adjusted the bullet seating such that when chambered a black sooty bullet would just barely come back without any marks.

I went for lunch today and shot all four of each loading with one exception where I had only three cartidges.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
My worst groups were those designated as starting loads with groups just over two inches and the best I managed was a three shot group of 26mm, just a hair over an inch. I resisted the temptation to run real statistical ananlysis like SAS or SPSS on the grouping data only because of the low sample size and lack of chronographic data. I still felt the need to calculate mean and standard deviation of bullet distances for each of the loads. My best load (90gr JHP with 58 grains of Powder) had an average distance between any two shots of 19.3mm and a standard deviation of 14mm.

FUTURE RESEARCH
While not earth shatteringly good I am pleased with not being blown up and furthermore I am pleased with the accuracy from this intial run and look forward to fine tuning where I will shoot more bullets per loading yielding greater sample size, better calculations of true standard deviation and opening the door to Analysis of variation to find combinations which result in significantly better accuracy.

A good mornin

Well, well, well, it looks like I may be leading the pack at present. This morning I was out with the sunrise. Had myself a little flatlands safari. And, as usual, I missed the first five. I soon got er figured out, had a small sip of truck whiskey, and settled down. From there, I went 10 for 10. The death toll stands at 5 dove, 3 misc birds who had that look in their eye like they were about to start depredating some crops. (And that is a community service, I’ll be writing off 3 shells on my taxes as a charitable donation.) Then 2 “moon cricket quail” then I missed another dove but spanked a biggole jack rabbit on my way back to the truck. I breasted out my birds, bagged em and pitched them fellers in the fridge to be joined by some of their brethrens this evening. Washed my hands and made it into work by ten past 9. So far, its been a good day.