Just returned from the first annual Varmint Paloosa. Two of us from Montana, a guy from Japan (Idaho originally) and another from upstate New York.

We were rained out yesterday (thank God, we need it) but had two great days of prairie dog shooting.

The most fun for me was watching the other three shoot their first dogs. They were all shooting guns new to them, two guys had purchased and sighted in the day before! It took them a bit to get used to their scopes and triggers, but they had plenty of targets.

We went to a place North of Forsyth (PM if you want the outfitters contact info, he was awesome) the first day. As Varmint Paloosa coordinator I wanted them to have very good shooting. As a MT resident it goes against my grain to pay for p. dog shooting. However, we found a happy medium with a place that lets you stay at the ranch house, provides breakfast, lunch and dinner and amazing shooting all for what you�d pay for a hotel and meals anyway. The shooting was fabulous. I told them to be ready for a 400 � 600 round day. We all shot about 350 � 500 rounds. We also saw a HUGE bobcat on our drive out to the dog town. The outfitter and I were sure it was a lynx for a while. It didn�t really run away, just loped along side of us about 60 yards away. Through the binocs it was clear that it was a bobcat, but it was the King Of All Bobcats for sure. This was good, because the four of us shooters all went to grad school at MSU.

We shot from about 9:00 till about 7:30. Many discus dogs, flippers, good hang time, floppers, gainers, twisters, etc. I was spotting a few mounds and was sure that I was looking at the sumo wrestler of p. dogs and smacked him. It turns out that it was a jack rabbit, saw quite a few of them.

That night we arrived at my dear mother�s house in Billings quite late and tired. She�s a better outfitter than the outfitter. A huge early breakfast and plenty of sandwiches, drinks and snacks for the next day. We traveled North to a place that was only charging an tiny trespass fee, but with unknown quality. As we were getting turned around here and there a rancher drove up and asked us if we were lost. When we told him we were on our way to a dog town he laughed and drew a map to his ranch and his massive town and asked us to slay the wicked creatures. I could only shoot until about 1:00 (wedding in Bozeman that night) but the other guys stayed until quite late and had great shooting, but not as good as the day before.

Yesterday was too rainy for our planned gopher shoot near Ennis, which was just fine.

It was a gas and the guy who lives in Japan had the most fun. He bought a Bushmaster from Shedhorn in Ennis on Tuesday night and sighted it in on Wednesday. What an awesome and accurate gun. I watched him shoot a dog on the run at about 200 yards. On the fifth shot he nailed him.

The other Bozmanian purchased a Handi Rifle (H&R?) in .223 and a cheap scope. It shot quite well, but needs a better scope.

I had my Savage 12FP in .223 with Weaver Grand Slam 6 � 20 on cross sticks. It shot great, I�m very happy with it. Tough to beat it for the price and accuracy. I especially like the scope�s clarity and magnification range. It was easy to survey on 6 power and, once a victim was identified, crank it up to 15 or so for the delivery. Again, the Accutrigger is just excellent. However, it sometimes failed to feed the last round from the magazine reliably.

Non of the other guys particularly liked their scope magnification. One guy had a 8.5-25(?) VariX-III that was clear, but tough to use for surveying and had terrible eye relief, way too close, just didn�t feel right. The others had either 3-9 or 2-10, a bit too low from some longer range shooting.

The guy from New York drove out with the Arsenal of Democracy: a 10/22, a 454 Casul, another handgun of unknown chambering, 2 shotguns, a 17HMR, a .223, a .22-250 and a Browning .338 semi-auto, just the thing for day long dog shooting.

Here�s a first: as he was driving out he stopped at a Cabela�s somewhere in Nebraska and bought out the .223 and .22-250 varmint ammo. Non was left! Then, a few hours later he comes across another Cabela�s (does Nebraska have two?) and bought them out too. The guy behind the counter offers to call the other store to see what they have in stock, but the buyer informs him that he�s already stopped buy earlier and bought it all! Obviously they were low on ammo, but buying out two Cabela�s is quite cool.

We had a gas and planning is on for next year�s shoot, which will be at least twice as long.

Al,

What a great report! YOU are on the writer quality of Varmint Guy. Makes the reader feel just like he was there. I am going to be shooting north of Billings right around the first of June, going to a nephew's High School Graduation. He is off to one of the military academies this August.

I am delivering a custom built 6mm Remington for his graduation present.

I have had similar experiences around Billings, were one of the farmers stopped us and asked us what we are doing, and then invited to stop by his place and shoot as many as we could if we got tired of the spot we were at. Drew us a map and all. Even called some elderly neighbors and had them come over and ask us to do the same thing! Kept us busy for 3 days.

Yeah Nebraska has the original Cabelas store in Kearney Neb, and then they have their big headquarters there in Sydney one I 80 about 50 miles past the I 76 cut off down to Denver. The Kearney one is sort of small, but the Sydney one is top shelf.

Glad to hear you boys had such great fun. Besides the fun of shooting prairie dogs it is all the comradery that goes with it.

My buddy is Billings had a few nephews come up from Colorado to play in a baseball tourney in Billings. When they were not playing, or practicing, the three came out and shot prairie dogs with us. I had a batch of 223s with me, that I let the boys use. They were highschool ages. I had more fun spotting for the boys and watching them have so much fun, than shooting on my own. I never got to have those experiences when I was there ages. Or only problem was once we take them back to their hotel, the next time, we had about 40 to 50 boys wanting to come out and shoot prairie dogs, instead of just hanging out at the hotel.

As an adult those times were priceless. We are going to have a couple of guys come up from Colorado this summer who are brothers to my friend in Billings, but they have never shot prairie dogs before. Both are in their mid 50s, actually the dads of the boys we took out during the baseball tourney.

Funny but I think that their dad's will probably be bigger kids than their high school age sons are. ONe owns a company in Denver and the other is an engineer with about 100 plus patents under his name, but neither one has ever been out to shoot prairie dogs. It is all about just taking the time, to have those memories.

Glad to hear your friends took the time and got to enjoy themselves so much. Those experiences are really the major reason I hunt and shoot.

Cheers and Good shooting
seafire