Yesterday Jerry and I met at Wade's house at 7:00am and loaded up his Megacab (MC). We had enough stuff to feed/supply a small (very small) army. 6 air rifles, many tins of pellets, 2 coolers, lots of water & drinks & food, 6-7 flashlights, 2 big 12v lanterns, etc. We drove about 1/2 hour and picked up Chad, who lived on the way. He brought another cooler and one AR. We got to The Farm about 8:30 and decided to let Jerry break in the day with some pigeon action. Wade parked the MC so Jerry was looking at a masonry block shed about 35 yards away. Pigeons all over the top. Jerry greased 4 in a row before they all took off. We then drove over to the main shooting destination and scouted it out. It was in the high 20's, foggy and perfect for starling shooting. About 9:00am we went into the barn with all the lights we had and our barn guns. There were maybe 100 starlings and a handful of pigeons fluttering around. I set up the two 12v lights where we were shooting from and aimed them into the far corner of the roof peak, where the majority of birds were. Chad and Jerry were shooting their .177 RWS breakbarrels, Wade was thumping them with his .22 "tactical" Mendoza and I had my .177 Bird Buster. The action was hot and heavy for about 12-15 minutes until there was silence.

We then drove a few hundred yards to the reject food piles. There are very larg mounds of potatoes, fries, hashbrowns, carrots, sweet potatos, etc. that the local food processing plants throw out for whatever reason. The starlings absolutely LOVE eating this stuff and I'm thinking get "drunk" off the grease or some other chemical in it, at they don't seem scared and come right back seconds later after a shot.



We decided to split up into two groups of two and stay on opposite sided of the food mountain so we couldn't see/shoot each other. Wade, with his .22 Mrod and Chad, with his .177 RWS-45 climbed up to the third row of hay bales and shot from there for about an hour. Here where they were shooting from and what there was to shoot at. The far end of the food mountain was about 45 yards.







Jerry, with his .22 Mrod and I, with my .22 H850 HPA shot from the opposite side. While Jerry was shooting I built this blind that worked AWESOME!!!!! With our quiet PCP's, camo on, being in the shade and having a dark background, the starlings were clueless all day. Here's what our blind looked like from the front. Can you spot the shooter in the blind?



From the inside. Many times there were hundreds of starlings at 5-25 yards on the ground in front of the blind or on the face of the food mountain. Notice the dead starlings on the ground in front of the blind and on the pile. The second pic is of Wade & Chad in the blind. We've noticed that if there are only a few 8-10 dead starlings scattered around, it doesn't bother them to land. When there's a bunch (15+?) of dead ones laying around, they don't want to land. They just hover around, acting skittish and when they do land it's only for a second or two. So, we would periodically go out with a bucket and pick up the dead ones. Then it was "game on" again.





After racking up a bunch of kills with Jerry, I let Chad have my spot and I built a second blind off to the left, shooting at the flank of this food mountain. Here's what it looked like.







Following Ted's input to follow them to their roosting spot after dark, we decided to hit the barn one last time in the dark, about 5:45pm. We went in with lights and guns again. I was out of air in the Bird Buster so I just spotlighted with the two 12v lanterns. The ceiling was about alive with birds. Hundreds of them!!! Mostly all starlings with a 12-15 pigeons and a hand full of sparrows mixed in. They didn't seem like they could fine a way out in the dark. Wade, Jerry and Chad were shooting/reloading as fast as they could. After about 15 minutes of this shoulder, tricep workout I started to hear comments about getting tired of shoot, but they troopered on and shot until there was silence. Here's a dim picture of the far corner, about 15 yards away and 20 feet up. Even with the lanterns on, a few other lights and the flash, it's still too dim to take a good picture. You'll have to believe me when I say it was the most intense shooting action I've ever seen.



After we had stopped shooting we decided there were way to many birds to actually count. So we counted starlings until we filled up a 5 gallon bucket. 110 starlings per bucket. 6.5 buckets = about 700 starlings. The grey, plastic bin has about 450-500 in it. We also collected about 30 pigeons. Here's the group pic showing the carnage. It's amazing how small a starling body actually is when their feathers aren't puffed up. This number didn't meet our goal of 1000 but it's not too bad either, it set's our new one day record. Here's Jerry, Chad, Wade and I about 6:45 pm.



We're now thinking of how to build cheap, lightweight, easy to assemble blinds we can use instead of building pallet/tire/weed blings. Camo netting over spreaders would be awesome. A cmall, camo, dome tent would work with no bottom in it. Camo burlap over small wood members. Something like that. Any suggestion that won't break the bank?

Later,
Doug

Bird Armageddon!

Jim
Semper Fi

there must have been 10,000 there, insane!!!!!good job


"i never was much for book learnin"

wow - what an amazing shoot.....

Great pics, a good read - thanx for taking me along hunting with you guys.

I wish we had a starling problem here in So Cal ..... I'd be all over that ! At least we have an abundance of Ground Squirrels ....

and last night. This spring will be a few trips to N.E. Oregon for some ground squirrel slaying action. Last year Wade and I had 205 confirmed kills in about 4-5 hours. This year we're taking him camp trailer and making a two WHOLE day trip out of it.

4x4 RV ...

Maybe I could join you in Oregon for your Ground squirrel hunt ... ?

all I need now is one of those giant military TANK camo covers for it ... LOL

Just over the hill on the 5 ....

4 exits before you get to Six Flags Magic Mountain.

I guess about 35 / 40 mins from Pasadena on the 210

James might have to look you up the next time I'm down visiting family. Perhaps I now have a reason to bring my airgun!

Was I the only one thinking "vodka" while looking at those mountains of potatoes?

And I bet the shooters made a few noises of joy, lots of Yee Haw and hooting sounds. It must have been a bit overwhelming with little time to rest much less take a lunch break.

RogerV

I was in the tire blind and could hear Chad and Jerry hooting and hollering and so on every time they made a long range kill. It made me chuckle. There's enough background noise that light conversation doesn't effect anything. We stopped maybe for 10 minutes to eat a sandwich and that's about it for breaks.

Wow, talk about a target rich environment!
Heck of a day..I'm envious..kelly

I think you need some extra hands. Roger has his Royale and I sure as hell would buy a new Royale
in .177 to shoot that many starlings.

We're in California.

I'll trade you guys a weekend of squirrel or bird shooting for an FX Indy or USFT. Nah, just kidding. If you're interested on going air rifle hunting up here, I'd be willing to take you. Starlings in the winter, ground squirrels in the late spring/early summer and pigeons most of the year.

Doug

I've never seen so many targets in one place! Is it like that year round or is it a winter time thing?

Target rich is an understatement, over populated is more like it.
Did you guys ever needed to aim?
From several of those pics you could just shoot into the flock and hit something.
I don't shoot birds, but in this case, I'd love to help you guys out. That looked like
fun, keep it coming.

S.W.A.G. it!

Shoot out the stealthed windows with comforts of home.

--------------------------

Diamondback

Truth is Stranger than Fiction.....

I can't believe those mountians are food discards. You would think there would be some way to make use of them with pet food or some chemicals etc. It also looks like it could be the start of massive rat infestations. Shooting the rats at night might be twice as fun as the birds during the day.

I'd have to find a source of funds for NODS.

I lightened up the Barn pic a bit
Regards, Tom

said, thats more fun than legally should be! more than any kind of other form of shooting out there, except for maybe wacking a hog.

What State are you in? sorry if I missed it in the reading.

Steve
Yellow Forums Owner
http://www.yellowforum.com

Steve,

No, we don't even make a dent in the population. I'd bet there's 10 million or more starlings in this area. On this 122 square mile farm there's three dairies and two cattle yards for beef. One of the dairies is the second largest dairy in the world I've been told by a worker. probably 100,000+ head of cattle at any given moment in these dairies combined. LOTS of feed for these bovine and as a result, lots of starlings. They're EVERYWHERE during the winter but there are so many cattle around we can't shoot at most of them. This is the safest (and most effective) area we've found.

We're in N.E. Oregon (Orygun to northeasterners). We live in Pendleton but this farm is outside Boardman, about an hour away.

Doug

Epic! Great write-up and excellent job!

You could get couple of pop-up 2 man hunting blinds along with Hammers shooting monopods/tripods for relatively short $$ from Amazon.

http://amzn.com/B002HHVK1M

http://amzn.com/B000BSWEFK

http://amzn.com/B001BXVOH8

http://amzn.com/B001ORBBP6

That second blind is just what the doctor ordered. Wade had the monopod you listed and it worked pretty good.

....in a purpose made blind. Better take about 1/2 million bb's just to be sure!

Randy

http://www.adventuresinairguns.com

I couldn't think of a better use for a DrozdMax Blackbird Tactical!

GREAT hunt report!

I have a package of Primos Mossy Oak camo material that you can have (60" x 12 feet). Shoot me an email with your address and I'll send it out.

Eric

I'd be willing to compensate you for the fabric. I'm at the superbowl party at Chad's right now so I'll e-mail you later. That sounds like the perfect size of camo material.

I won it and am glad someone can use it!

I emailed you. Email me back when you can.

Eric

Theoben H.E. Gas Rams,..Shock the system!!!

Are they using it for hog feed, or ?

Pest shooting Disney land.

time to charge for a hunting expedition. I'm sure alot of us would pay to have such a target rich expedition.
Make is a two day expedition, I'll come down to have some fun. only 4.5 hour drive from Seattle.

Eddie
Seattle

I can't say anything but it is "bird war" and mass destruction, I will love to join this war again the birds.

700 is huge number, I can't imagine the number

congratulation

Markus