Hi boys,
I wanted to introduce you to the newest unit under the Texas Crow Patrol umbrella. It is the “SST1” or Skunk Suppression Team 1. Texas Matt heads up this elite squad and as commanding officer I must state his personal ability to spot/drop skunks is simply amazing.
With our triple digit temperatures still in effect here in north Texas, our crow shooting options are quite limited. We were forced to adapt, improvise and overcome to find a relatively high volume target that ranchers want us to liquidate. Our prairie dogs and jack rabbits populations are at low ebb, so we thought skunks might offer us some good hunting until crows can be re-engaged later in the year.
Last Saturday night we rented thermal imaging and NV gear from
Thermal Outfitters to help boost the number of potential nighttime varmint targets. It worked! Our previous record was 16 skunks in one night and we smashed that TCP record with 32 taken in a 6 hour shift.
Equipment Deployed:
For guns we primarily used suppressed .22LR pistols and rifles. I had my Ruger 22/45 “Full House” with Crimson Trace Carbon Fiber Laser Grips, complete Volquartsen Custom fire control system, Leupold DeltaPoint Reflex Sight, Streamlight TLR-1s and SWR Spectre II can. Fun gun on skunks, but not the best choice, when a sounder of 20 plus hogs suddenly appeared on the port side of our Z71 Chevy Suburban at 2:30AM! Matt was wielding his new Savage .22LR FV-SR II with his Sparrow suppressor. This rifle’s action noise, even when dry fired, is louder than the report of Matt's favorite CCI Segmented Subsonic ammo. We also had a Benelli M4 on hand when targets would not cooperate.
For skunk hunting our FoxPro ecallers weren’t used, but our new LightForce HID Corded Spotlight with their green filter worked wonderfully. It is a powerhouse. We used spotlights to find most of the skunks in the pastures and then switched to thermal imaging to pinpoint them if they hid behind goatweed or other ground cover.
In conclusion:
•One important observation Texas Matt made is that skunks feed on insects, in our case grasshoppers. Consequently, coastal pastures sprayed with insecticide do not hold skunks. Focus on insect filled fields, to find more polecats.
•Warm nights seem to offer more skunks sightings than cold ones, at least here in Texas. Conversely, cold nights will offer longer range thermal detection of varmints and reduce/eliminate false positives on rocks and stumps. It will also allow you to more easily scan trees for tree climbing varmints. SST1 will test this theory out later in the winter.
•Renting and trying thermal imaging and night vision equipment is very educational while boosting your hunting success. Next time, we are going to rent higher priced options to get longer range and wider angle detection of varmints. Thermal Outfitters is a great company to work with and they can steer you right for your night hunting situation. Thanks again, Bearclaw!!!
•Armadillo’s really light up on the thermal equipment because they have “hotter” surface temperatures than furry critters. Fourteen of them paid the price this night, too, for digging up the rancher’s pastures.
•Note I received a lifetime ban on taking any photographs of our skunk results because of an unfortunate incident about 4 years ago on this same ranch. An unanticipated wind change, while I was snapping such a dead skunk picture, filled the cab of Toyota 1 with the notorious spray. The Gadget man barely avoided a drum-head court martial.
Just like crow control shooting over valuable and threatened crops, skunk reduction will help improve your landowner relationship. In the case of skunks by protecting the rancher's dogs from being sprayed and reducing the threat of rabies on his property.
Our rancher host was absolutely delighted with our results on Saturday and we are invited back any time to hunt varmints. That’s what I am talkin’ about!
Regards,
