Shooting with the Sheriff

[sixshot]

Some of you know that good friend Russell Cottle recently lost his wife of many years & have paid your respects here on the forum. Russell has been visiting me for the last several days & we've done a fair amount of shooting, he's got a few ground squirrels, we've shot at the pistol range, wrangled a few sheep off of the airport runway & today he got his first 2 rock chucks!
We did some 60 yd shooting at the range at steel clangers & plate racks from the Keith, reclining position, me with my OM 41 shorty which is fast becoming a real favorite with some 212 gr HP's over 8 grs of Unique. This load, even from a sitting position at 60 yds is crazy accurate. I've put a little paint on my 2Dogs front sight & I'm seeing these targets really good for old eyes.
Russ let me shoot his 8 shot S&W 9mm revolver & it also was very accurate, making it easy to ring the steel, especially with my 127 gr powder coated HP's. Then it was off for badgers & rock chucks. We were driving down a dirt road when we spotted a rock chuck running right at us! Then it ran under a fence & started climbing a hill, just before it went out of sight Russ, being an old retired Sheriff just went instinctive & hit that rock chuck on the run at full speed with his Ruger Blackhawk 30 Carbine & a Ferminator 135 gr HP, bingo, that chuck locked up like it had been welded to the ground & then started a slow tumble down into some rocks where we couldn't reach it. What a shot!
We found badger holes every where we went but could not locate a live badger, we won't give up, one farmer said they are just destroying his fields & we'll go there until Russ has to leave, there were dozens of huge badger holes. This is Russ standing between 2 badger holes.



Dick

[Ken O'Neill]

Knock 'em dead, boys! Wish I was with you!

[contender]

Two old friends,, rambling the wide open country, burning powder, removing a few varmints, and swapping tales. Mix in some excellent eating,, and all I see is pure bliss!!!!!!!!!

[Fowler]

Give Russell my best, I'm sure all things considered this is just the therapy he needed. A lot of good comes from two old friend rambling around old country roads laughing and looking for trouble...

[z1r]

Awesome. Sounds like a much needed therapy session. Don't get any better than that! Thanks for sharing.

[COR]

Good luck Russ...Doc’s been wearing sweat pants since his visit. Dicks cinnamon rolls will go straight to your hips.

Glad to see you getting together...

[jfs]

Good for you guys...............

[sixshot]

Russell decided he liked my homemade Blueberry Cheesecake so for breakfast I fixed my special blend of buttermilk pancakes along with bacon. He seemed to like the pancakes just fine so we finished up some bullet business I had to attend to then cast him up a bunch of 127 gr HP's for his 9mm revolver to take back to Oklahoma with him. Russ is a hard core Coyote hunter & says they will be just the ticket for song dogs.
We decided to make another trip to the pistol range where we found a lot of empty brass that we gathered up then we set up the chairs & started slamming some steel clangers & plate racks with another of my 41 magnums (5 1/2" Bisley) & Russell unlimbered a Ruger SP 101 327 & a long slide 1911 45. He knows his way around handguns. Here he is getting ready to hammer some steel with his SP101.



Dick

[contender]

[rjm52]

...no better time be had....

[sixshot]

Well today we were back after it, both Rock Chucks & Badgers. The land owner was sill baling hay & we were seeing Badger holes but for some reason could not be in the right spot at he right time. Some of the holes we checked yesterday had tracks around them today. It was cooler today & we saw more Rock Chucks & Russ went to work on them with his TC 257 Raptor, that's a 222 mag case necked up to 25 caliber & it's a neat round that runs a 75 gr bullet fast & accurate.
By now Russ had found the right technique for getting steady & he was making hits at long range, nailing a couple at 196 yds from the window of my truck. You'll see in photo #1 he has a sandbag on my mirror & my walking stick across the dash to rest his left arm, that's the real key, you have to get that left arm rested. Still it's almost impossible to retrieve most of these Chucks, they fall down into a deep crevice & you can't reach them. You see them, or blood & guys but it's not worth falling into one of these deep lava crevices for a Rock Chuck.
Some we could see but just couldn't reach. Here's the one Russ did recover after a long walk.









Dick

[akray]

Your shooting and hunting stories are great, Dick! The pictures just add so much to the posts too. I'm sorry your friend lost his wife.

[sheriff]

It didn't take me but once to come to the conclusion that recovering a rock chuck just isn't worth the effort. I don't bounce back from broken bones like I used to.😉

[Deleted]

Good to hear y'all are out burning powder. Tell Russ to watch out around those rocks. Looks like a good place to get intimate with a rattler!

[45MAN]

Jul 26, 2019 20:30:11 GMT -5 sheriff said:

It didn't take me but once to come to the conclusion that recovering a rock chuck just isn't worth the effort. I don't bounce back from broken bones like I used to.😉

RUSSELL: AS I WAS LOOKING AT THE PHOTOS OF YOUR RECOVERY EFFORTS I WAS ASKING MYSELF: WHY IS HE DOING THIS?