Killer B comes out of retirement for rat duty (graphic)

[nervoustrigger]

Killer B comes out of retirement for rat duty (graphic)

Hi guys, I haven't posted here very frequently lately but a few weeks ago I was checking the game camera at the local pecan orchard and a couple of the night time photos showed some beady little eyes glowing in the infrared illuminator:





No telling how long they have been visiting the feeder. I know it often fails to trigger on larger mammals.  And experience tells me if 3 rodents appear on the camera at once, there are probably at least 10 hitting it at various times.  This sufficiently conveys my feelings on the matter:



So out comes the .22 cal B51, affectionately termed Killer B, since it is fitted with a LED flashlight and pressure pad for night time use.  It hasn't seen much use lately but was shooting JSB 15.9gr at about 900fps with horrifying precision the last time I had it out.  Over the course of 3 visits, it didn't disappoint.

Visit #1 - I arrived around 9pm under full darkness and trained a red LED flashlight on the feeder.  Like most night time critters, they seem perfectly willing to visit with a persistent light source but tend to spook if a light is switched on and swept around.  The light on the rifle would be used very selectively, if at all.

The distance between the feeder and me is 31 yards.  Easy peasy for the B51, even considering their small size. 

It was about 30 minutes before the first one made an appearance.  Under the red light, the brown fur doesn't contrast very well against the background so I almost couldn't see it with the naked eye from that distance, but fortunately the beastly Sun Optics 8-32x56 shows it about as well as an overcast day with the dial set to 10x.  A gentle squeeze of the trigger sends it the dirt below.

Over the course of 2 hours, 4 more fell to the Killer B.  3 of them were picked up by cats strolling through but here's a picture of the two they didn't get.



Meanwhile on some nights raccoons would come wipe out the feeder.  They would climb up and rake out every bit of food onto the ground so I built a new feeder with a small hopper on the front so they couldn't do that.  Here's a pic before paint showing the see-through hinged lid over the hopper:



And here it is installed:



Of course it didn't stop them from trying though:



Visit #2 was a slow night that netted two more.  Still, two fewer rodents is a good thing. 



Visit #3 - On this visit I figured since the Killer B was shooting so well, I should up the difficulty and go for head shots only.

The first visitor grabbed a black oil sunflower seed and perched up on top of the feeder.  He was quartering toward me so a piece of Czech lead into the head and out the opposite shoulder put an end to it.

The second visitor was a much smaller juvenile that grabbed a seed and scurried up onto the tree trunk just above the feeder.  I lined up on his head and squeezed the trigger.  I couldn't tell if I hit him but a little pock mark appeared on the trunk where his head was.  After rummaging around at the base of the tree, I finally found him in the brush.  Here are the two from that night.



The juvenile, it totally cleaned out his cranium. 



That's the most graphic example I've experienced.  Killer B lives up to its namesake.  That has been a good rifle.

Thanks for reading, guys!

[BenjiHunter]

Very nice shooting, Jason!!
And great pictures.

[A.K.A. Tommy Boy]

That's Quite an ingenieus set up you have Jason.      Excellent shooting too !          Very accurate rifle .        Best Wishes - Tom

[dk1677]

Very nice Jason!

[only1harry]

Great job on the rats Jason and nice pics!  That's a nice raccoon-proof feeder. 

Is that black oiled sunflower seed in the juvenile's brain?

[beachgunner]

That's a fantastic feeder Jason! Mind posting some plans?? I could put something like that to great use, and I too have had issues with the darn bandits wiping the feeder out.

Unreal shooting too. Targets that small from 31 yards...at night...unreal.

Continued success.

[WiseGuy]

Great hunt report! Love the pictures too bro! Great shooting and that Killer B is deadly with that precision placed stinger!

[nervoustrigger]

Thanks, Stefan!  Go figure The Eraticator was up at nearly 2am

Thanks, Tom!

Thanks, Dave!

Hi Harry, yeah he got that sunflower seed after all.  But not usefully so.

Thanks, Jimmy!

[cryptoad]

More Sweet Shooting, Jason!

I hate rats...

[nervoustrigger]

Hi Michael,

Thanks for the compliments on the feeder.  Whenever I make one, I just use scraps found in the shop and dimension things on the fly.  So I didn't make any drawings or work from any formal dimensions but I'll be glad to tell you a little about it.

This one was made with a fence picket which is convenient if you don't want to bother with painting and it will still weather well.  The two sides and front are made with 18" long cuts.  The back is about 5" longer so as to provide mounting flanges to attach it to a tree.  These four pieces are simply assembled into a rectangular wooden tube, so to speak.

The bottom is oversized by about 2.5" on one side and the front to give the critters a platform to walk around to the hopper.  The lid is plywood with a Hardi-board scrap on top to keep the wood dry.

I wanted an ample watershed (or call it an awning) above the hopper to keep the food dry so I attached a couple of 1x1 battens to the feeder and used them to attach an L-shaped piece of plywood which I then covered with Hardi-board scraps. 

The black stuff is roofing tar (leak repair tar) to waterproof seams and end grain.  Great stuff.  Messy and slow drying, but very effective for waterproofing.  Do it once and do it right and the feeder will last years.

The hopper is sheet metal cut from an old computer chassis side panel.  It measures 2" x 2" x 2".  Also, a flat piece of sheet metal is fastened to the front face in the vicinity of the hopper to protect the feeder from impacts.

That's about it!  BTW, I'm finishing up a simpler one right now and will post some pictures of it in this thread within the next few days.

[beachgunner]

Thanks Jason. I appreciate you taking the time to give me the details. Off to the garage in search of wood scraps..