Annual rockchuck hunt "pic heavy"

statikpunk · Annual rockchuck hunt "pic heavy"

wow, it has been a while since I have been to the ol' shed..so i figured i will fill all the lads in on what i have been doin'. i recently got back from our annual rockchuck hunt. every year me and my family go shooting the spring time rock chucks up in the humbolt-tyobe national forest. and I took a few pics so i could show you guys. this place is my favorite place, I can only hope that i die up in these mountains. I dont have too many pictures of actual rockchucks for you because most of them are impossible to walk to after you have shot them. we often shoot them well over 200 yards (especially this year most where averaging 400) and they are across canyons that can drop 500 feet or more in less than 50 yards. this year was kind of a bust, we usually get about 10 chucks per person per day, this year we only got 8 total! all weekend! but it was also down pouring rain most of the time we where there also, the pictures I took where from some of the few breaks in the weather that we had.

here is our campsite,

my dad got his bull elk in this canyon a few years ago

soooooooo pretty "I love the high desert"

and finally this is my pop (still pretty fit for a 63 year old) with a chuck that he shot close enough to get a picture of. you can see the large shale slides that the chucks like to live in they make their burrows in the deep cracks in the rock and then when its sunny (if its sunny!) they come out and bask themselves on the rocks. you will also notice in this picture his kimber 1911 handgun strapped to his right side (thats somethin' you dont get in your family photos much over there right?? heh heh

even though we didn't get many chucks this year, thats not what its all about. its about the tradition, being with the family, comraderee,and this was also my nephews first chuck hunt this year and it overjoys me to be passing on family traditions to the ones that will be keeping them alive for the next generation.

oh! but next year its gonna be a massacre!!

hare basher

i would love to do that is shooting them the only way to hunt them ? could you use dogs or somthing else they look like big guinnei pigs lol its good to be out doors i love it you lucky man

statikpunk

well i suppose if you could train a dog to run on those rocky shaily slides then yeah you could get one with a dog. but I would be nervouse about sending my dog out there. back east in the states they have the same critters and they just live in the woods (woodchucks) those one could probably get with a dog they are pretty slow, the one you see in the picture isnt even a big one, its an adult but they can get quite a bit bigger than that.

statikpunk

oh a also forgot to add to my post that for years we have just shot them for sport, but we have heard that the indians here eat them. so I cooked one up it tasted pretty good, but was really chewy. the next one I cook will roast in the oven for a couple hours. they will most likely not make it into my freezer too regularly though because they are almost impossible to skin, their hides are really attached to their bodies.. the stories we heard of indians eating these things, was described as having the indians just throwing the chuck on the fire whole then peeling the charred hair and skin off to get at the meat....we thought that was a bit weird but now i see why they did it...they would have starved to death before they got one skinned!