Sage Rats in Central Oregon, first blood 2026!

TheCZKid

Well-known member
Well, I got out for the first time this year, and tested out a couple new (to me) rifles in the field. A buddy has a small dairy farm, and a half pivot, and I was able to get out in the cool wind and shoot some sage rats, aka bending ground squirrels.

It's a bit early in the year for sage rats, but it's been warm this winter locally, and I wanted to break the ice, so to speak.

17M4 in field.jpg

I've got two rifles I shot today, which I recently purchased, and had only been used to make small groups of holes in paper. Above is the CZ 527 in 17 Mach IV, with 25 grain Berger over 8208 powder.

The other rifle is a Sako in 221 Furball, and it did well also.

It was time for field testing, can they make Skippy fly... and the verdict is, Yes!

Sage Rat Gooo!.jpg
 
I was doing load work for these two rifles, ya know, and had all the money invested in the guns and the scopes, so I was jonesing to see if they were field worthy.

We folks can get a lot of funds, load development time and materials involved before that moment of truth, if you know what I mean. After months of anticipation it was great to have some time on a live target!

And my friend who owns the dairy farm had a early teen daughter shooting a 10-22, and not having much success. So I let her use my CZ 455 in 17 HMR, got her a front and rear bag, and coached her a bit on how to shoot. That was cool too, as she was eager to learn, and ended up getting a few longer hits on rats. It's satisfying to help someone who's interested in shooting at an early age, reminded me of my early start.
 
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