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    • wildschwein
        June 16, 2012 at 5:51 pm
        Post count: 581
        #7455

        So as I mentioned in an earlier post, my home Province has recently allowed the hunting of Squirrels on private property. This had always been a hope of mine, silly as it might sound. But what can a person expect after reading all those Squirrel hunting articles in TBM.

        So anyway my Grandad’s land is covered in Squirrels. This Spring (no set season or limits) I decided to take full advantage of our new game animal. Now I know that the Doe’s currently have litters, so I have only been shooting at Squirrels that I can positively identify as Bucks. Its pretty easy actually, as all the Does I have seen show very obviously signs of suckling when standing upright. Anyhow I have bagged three so far and all of them Bucks. All were taken with my 35# Storm Creek longbow. Arrows were either cedar with Ace Hex heads or aluminum Legacy flu-flus with rubber blunts. Keeping them in the freezer until I bag a few more for a good sized stew.

      • Ben M.
          June 16, 2012 at 7:34 pm
          Post count: 460
          #62256

          Nice shots! How do you usually cook squirrel? I once killed one with a .22 to practice brain tanning (figured if I ruined a small skin on my first try I wouldn’t feel so bad). The meal I came up with was something akin to meat-flavored bubble gum. Chewy, chewy, chewy…

          They’re so tempting when I’m out stump shooting, but you know how it is: if I can’t make a decent meal out of them I won’t kill them.

        • wildschwein
            June 16, 2012 at 7:43 pm
            Post count: 581
            #62266

            My usual go to for all small rodents (Hare, Squirrel, Woodchuck) is to leave them in a salt water soak overnight. Then I roast them slowly in a roaster or crock pot until the meat is ready to fall off the bone. I then seperate the meat, dust it in flour/seasoning and brown it in a frying pan under medium heat. You can then add it to stews/pasta/salad or eat it as is.

            I find Squirrels go best with a home made blueberry ketchup, after cooking them in the above fashion.

          • bruc
            Member
              June 17, 2012 at 12:13 pm
              Post count: 476
              #62989

              Good shooting !! That blueberry ketchup sounds really good. My mother makes a ketchup using cranberries that is quite good.

              Bruce

            • Wexbow
                June 17, 2012 at 9:03 pm
                Post count: 403
                #63325

                Nice shots and sounds like you had some fun 😀

              • Stephen Graf
                Moderator
                  June 17, 2012 at 9:27 pm
                  Post count: 2429
                  #63344

                  Next to deer, squirrel is my other favorite thing to hunt. Never heard of blue berry ketchup. I’ll have to look it up. We usually pick about 100lbs of blue berries every year, so Maybe we can add that to the list of things we make…

                  Good Shooting! We have grey’s only. And they are used to getting shot at. I have only managed to shoot a few squirrel a year with the bow. 3 in a day is amazing!

                • wildschwein
                    June 18, 2012 at 1:55 am
                    Post count: 581
                    #63551

                    Thanks for the kind words folks.

                    And I totally agree with you Steve, shooting Squirrels is a blast. Fortunately for me the Squirrels in my area were not gun shy, and instead of bolting would heckle me from about 20 to 30 feet up. That being said, once I killed the first one the others became too flighty to shoot with the flu-flus. I swear one even did a back flip to dodge an arrow! So that afternoon I left my flu-flus at home and loaded a bow quiver full of hex heads. Still missed far more than I hit, and lost an arrow or two. Must of took about 30 shots total, but from what I hear about Squirrel hunting 10% ain’t to bad.

                  • Jason Wesbrock
                    Member
                      June 25, 2012 at 2:41 am
                      Post count: 762
                      #15058

                      Congrats! Bowhunting for squirrels is both fun and humbling. If you only lost an arrow or two you did very well. I’d hate to thing how many squirrel arrows I’ve lost over the years.

                    • vajd
                        June 26, 2012 at 12:36 am
                        Post count: 29
                        #16086

                        Young squirrels around hear are good for the pot but the big old squirrels are not worth shooting.

                      • Aaron Rushton
                        Member
                          June 27, 2012 at 11:56 am
                          Post count: 27
                          #17752

                          Great shooting! Grey squirrels taste pretty good i’ve found, i take off the back legs and grill em, taste a bit like rabbit.

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