Well, all I can say is I’m absolutely appalled. I have never in my life read such sick sh*t in my life. Such depravity, such callousness towards one of our furry little friends the cat, that brings so much love and joy to so many.

That being said I’d like to add one more thing: I laughed so hard tears ran down my cheeks. Also, I never knew that there were so many other people that shared my love of cats, er crats, AS TARGETS! Wow, it’s so great to find so many kindred spirits out there!

I whacked my first crat when I was about 7 or 8 with my trusty Remington Nylon 66. We had a big ranch with plenty of rats in the barn and plenty of crats to keep them in check. The crat population would explode over time and need thinning or one would get sick and need killing. My dad used to shot them with his 45 but when I got old enough I was assigned the task of “thinning out the herd†so to say. One year I got totally carried away and killed almost all of them. My dad just went down to the animal shelter in town and got more.

My first mass extermination was at a friend’s farm when I was about 14. His grandma had about 200 crats and wouldn’t let any harm come to them. Well, she was a sweet old lady but when she passed away my friend’s dad told us to kill every one of the G.D. cats on the property. Took us all summer to get the last of them. The first day was Armageddon though. We started the day at the feeding bowls. There were about 20 crats at the trough and they didn’t scatter until we had whacked about 10 of them. It was surprising how quickly they learned to run like hell from us, best running shot practice I’ve ever had.

About 10 years later a doctor friend asked me to come out and “sanitize†his hobby farm. He had about 50 crats, which of course his wife feed just enough to keep alive, scattered in the barn and every out-building. So, while he took the wife to Hawaii I came out to “work†on his barn. My technique had improved over the years and I killed the last one in less than a week. There was a big male in the lot, nearly 17 pounds as I recall, took three HP’s in the chest before he dropped. Serious fun.

Best crat kill was the “Big White Cat†hunt. I was living in a large lot subdivision and the neighbors approached me after they found out I was a hunter to see if I could rid them of the “Big White Catâ€. The crat was a large male, nearly 20 pounds at death, which was terrorizing the area. It tore up several pet cats, large vet bills and even mauled a small kick dog. It pissed on doorways and crapped in flower beds and even on the deck of one neighbor’s hot tub. It actually came into the homes of people with pet crats that had cat doors, ate the pet food and pissed on the walls. The Big White Cat was nocturnal and so it proved very difficult to get a shot. Finally I had an idea. The previous owners of the house I lived in were cat owners and had installed cat doors into the garage and into the house. I kept them closed off. (No cats in my house.) But, since this demon was pretty casual about entering homes I figured I’d give it a try. I bought a bag of cat food and put a bowl out by the garage cat door, bingo cat feeding activity. I moved the food inside and further across the garage floor until the crat would have to cross the whole garge to get at the food. I rigged a motion sensor light so that when something came into the garage via the cat door a small light would go on by the back door. Finally one night about 11:30 the light went on. I went outside and closed off the cat door from the outside. I entered the garage from the house with my Ruger auto pistol ready. (This being a close combat situation I felt that the pistol offered greater mobility and I could use it at dead close range in case the crat came for me. You know, stuff it in its ear while it chewed on my leg, that sort of thing.) I opened the door and flipped on the light. The Big White Cat stared up at me from the bowl of cat chow with a look of utter amazement. The black sights showed up well on the dirty white fur even in the harsh glare of a bare 100 watt bulb. At the shot he took off like a crat out of hell and after slamming into the now blocked cat door jumped onto the counter tops of the garage cabinets. He did a circuit back towards the garage doors knocking half the stuff off the counter and spitting blood on the rest. He leapt off the counter and went straight up the garage door as if he were going to run across the ceiling but ran out of gas at the top of the door. He hung there for a bit and then slid off, claws screeching on the door on the way down. Slumped on the concrete floor he convulsed a few times and lay still. Now I knew how Jim Corbett felt when he finally killed the Man Eater of Rudraprayag.

Have fun, I sure intend to.

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Have fun, I sure intend to.

As do I!


Smedley

Now that was one helluva tale, and well told I might add. Kudos to you Hunter and welcome to our world. Hell, that story about the 'big white crat' reminds me of the time my ex invented crat bungee jumping, what with all the Catrobatics and such. Pull up a log by the fire and have a drink or three.

Dan

POTYHC

www.WeAintSick.WereJustAheadOfOurTime

Aye, call me Ishmael.


www.mobeycrat.com

Dang HunterMontana--

Your yarn spinning talents are ranked right up there with poletax and DD--I look forward to the next one.

Your Nylon 66 made me think of my first kill--actually was a neighbor's crat that caught and killed my pet Easter duckling. I was righteously p.o.'ed and finally got the crat coming out from under the neighbor's house via a garden shovel used like a guillotine. Very effective!

Then there were all the tallies my running buddy and I got in his daddy's junkyard (PC name is auto parts recycling facility). We just drove the wrecker up and down the rows of cars using the spotlights and our .22s. Only thing dad didn't like was the occasional bullet hole in a perfectly good fender from a thru-and-thru shot. Also worked on our trapping skills. We found that a couple of traps on the ground below a dead bird or part of a rabbit suspended on a wire about 3' above the ground worked like a charm.

Welcome. They humor and the like thinking drew me in too.

BTW, I worked with a guy on the railroad from Livingston. He hated crats, but I think hated everything.

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The black sights showed up well on the dirty white fur even in the harsh glare of a bare 100 watt bulb.

You should write romance novels....

Welcome, another brother at arms against the evil hoard

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ate the pet food and pissed on the walls.

Welcome to the Insanity , HW.
I got all misty eyed when I read the above.At first I thought you were talkin' about my Brudder-N-Law.
I too have a Nylon 66.I've had it for 40+ years.I wish they made this in a pistol.I bought a Wolverine,but it ain't the same.
Jolly Good Show on the Big White Cat,Ole' Boy.

Wacked a couple crats this morenin, 1 in the trap and another with a 5mm pellet at about 40 yards out.

Damn ferel kittens cryin a couple nights ago under the nieghbors house! Its endless!