We were hunting property that was on the other side of the site for the former Salem-Shotwell bridge from Mr. Murty’s. Scott, our host told us it had some mean briars. Brag and I were ready for something like Mr. Murty’s briar patches which can make a grown man cry in pain and frustration. These briars were a walk on a golf course greens in comparison.
And rabbits? They were all over the place and their tracks littered the freshly washed clay roads unlike Mr. Murty’s where I suspect that the briars ate rabbits.

We had two kids on the hunt yesterday., Nate and Jeremiah. Only Jeremiah had a shot and he missed. I can’t say to much because I missed one that I should have nailed as an afterthought, Jeremiah’s was a running bunny.A running rabbit is a little different than shooting at a standing deer with a 3x9 scope while he’s feeding on golden acorns. Or the regular kind either. There’s no shame in missing a running rabbit cause if there was, it would be my perpetual state.

The rabbit I missed, on the other hand, had hesitated a second while planning his next move to avoid Brag. He might dodge my shot, but Brag hardly ever misses. No brag, just fact. Besides, Brag had been trained by the legendary Uncle NoPass who had served three years nine months and twenty two days without a pass. He’d wanted to be a driver but the army said he shot to good for that so…
I really couldn’t believe that I had missed the rabbit. I threw up the old Fox and pulled the trigger. I don’t even remember aiming. Since I seemed to have only hit briars it’s a pretty good bet that I didn’t.
Anyway, the rabbit chose a path that took him away from Brag and toward Cuz’s Boy. Now Cuz’s Boy is in his mid thirties and was toting a pump .410. It sounded more like an assault rifle as he rattled off four shots to stop him.

Rye, who broke his dry streak at West Winds, has scored on three consecutive hunts. As this picture shows, you can’t tell Rye nothing now as he will patiently explain the difficulty of the shot, the speed of the rabbit as it juked and twisted through his trash filled shot window.. even when no one is listening. Personally, I’m wondering how he got the rabbits to stop so he could hit them. As a matter of fact, the same thing goes for Tiny and Cuz. And the rabbit Brag killed was big enough that I probably could have hit it to.

And, as has been usual for the last two hunts, thank goodness for the “we” method of counting rabbits killed on a hunt.

The talk is to re-hunt the property next Saturday with gators. Now, I kinda look at gators like I do golf carts, as being for the lazy, if the property is only few hundred acres. But, they say they want to start at the back where the most rabbits are. Since we had jumped at the front and ran the dogs for a half day before 3 of Cuz’s dog’s had taken off at a deer. (Lucy tried to go but she got the electric pine limb upside the head a couple of times and came on back) I don’t know how it could be much better.

Final score
Cuz’s boy 2 with a 410 pump
And one each for Tiny, Rye, Brag and Cuz.
As for me, well, you know I don’t keep up with such.

And for those of you wondering if I had a decent picture of Tiny, here it is