GOOD news and possibly VERY BAD News

[Phantom 631]

As some of you know this last couple of weeks has seen me almost in tears, what with the divorce etc.... and most recently my beloved Air Arms S200 developing a leak on the air cylinder being the lowpoint!

 

Well a gentleman and fellow Hunter by the name of Dom (Redeye Jedi) helped come to my rescue, offering me the loan of an air cylinder for a couple of weeks, I sadly had to decline such an amazing offer. So....... being the gent and ledgend that he is (in my eyes) made me up a special tool to remove the front part of the air cylinder, so that I could then access the O-ring that needed replacing.

 

To you Dom;

I Shall be forever; eternally greatfull to you Sir

 

And its due to Dom's workmanship and enthusiasm to help me; That I today brought new life to my beloved baby :boogie:

 

After Replacing the seal, I pumped up the air cylinder to 200 bar, then fired of shot after shot after shot (with a T-shirt over my silencer) until the air vented due to ,lack of pressure

I repeated this five times in total, each time removing the cylinder and standing it upright in a glass of water to check for air bubbles rising from the section that I had performed surgery on.

All CLEAR yeeeeeeeehaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah

 

I then put some pellets in my pocket and made my way over to the paddock to check the pressure and accuracy (as my guage on the pump was not responding well, due to it being bent over as something dropped on it abd broke the glass).

The guage read 200 Bar, My estimate was 180ish Bar.

The scope was pointing to a Primary zero of 28 yards.

When I arrived at the paddock, Icould see a bunny at about 50ish yards. I pinged it with the LRF and confirmed it was 48 yards.

I couldn't remember the mildots for that range, so decided to unslip and load my baby at the gate and as I was wearing my waterproof RealTree jacket rather than DPM I made my way slowley towards the bunny.

I got to what I thought was 30 yards and agin checked with the LRF. 28 yards Bang on the Primary Zero.

Unfortunately I could not see the entire bunny So I looked hard and long,and decided that the bunny was 3/4 to full grown and I could see the base of the ears, so I judged the best place to land my FX 16 grain chunk of lead.

Relaxing against the fence post I placed the crosshair where I thought the halfway between eye and ear was.

A slow squeeze of the trigger through 1st and second stage saw the pellet away followed by a crack and the bunny rolled over to its left and a little gentle wave of the back right leg saw me heading over to recover my prize

 

Having spoken to Chris, Hull Hunter, earlier this week and confirming that I have been lucky enough not to have seen Myxie on any of my land for the two years I have been shooting there; this came as a suprise and a shock to me!

 

The question now is: Has my land inhabitants developed a resistance to Myxie and this is a bunny from across the way? or has my land not seen Myxie before and if this is the case will my bunnies be wiped out by this sickening, man engineered disease?

 

The bunny was a large full grown Buck, yet it weighed less than my immature Jill Ferret

It was litterally starving to death

I showed my wife the images I had taken and for the 1st time EVER, she said, "I hope you put the poor thing out of its misery?"

She despises me shooting cute furry bunnies

 

The question is not will Myxie make it to the cemy and bunny land? but when will it get there?

 

Phantom

Edited October 16, 2010 by Phantom

[andyfr1968 772]

Never mind the mixy, Tony mate, just concentrate on you and getting yourself in a better place.

 

It all happens for a reason, I believe and you'll come out the other side stronger....

 

Big respect to Dom for going the extra mile, good on ya' fella.

 

Take it easy, mate.

 

Cheers.

 

Edit to say... Been there three times. It feckin' sucks....

Edited October 16, 2010 by andyfr1968

[stealthy1 3,964]

As I said to you the other evening mate, burnt at the stake Rabbits do range quite a long distance from home, so mixy may well reach the cemy. My lurcher picked up a mixy rabbit today, one less to pass it on

[Sweeney-Todd 208]

Hiya Tony.

 

Excellent news me dear , so glad your up and running again with your "Baby"

 

What a gent Dom is for helping you out and making the tool needed for the repair nice one Dom.....SP for a sound bloke.

 

Agree with Andy, hope you find yourself in a better place soon.

 

All you need to do now is learn to shoot the ferkin thing

 

ATB.

 

 

 

Bill.

[hunter1989 91]

hi tony

 

nice one you got your baby back and we have tony back

 

your sorted now just me

 

atb steve

[sibaldib 6]

What an excellent bloke. Nice to have guys like that on the forum.

 

I hope you get through your other troubles mate.

 

Cheers

 

Sib

[CallumT 0]

Theres mixy rabbits on my nans,I put one out of its misery on one bank,but on the other they seem fine.I hope the other lot is clear of them i have a decent tree to shoot them from under if i get a new gun;)

[matt_hooks 188]

I try not to shoot mixy bunnies. The vast majority of them don't die, and it helps to build up the immunity in the general bunny population! I know it looks horrible, but it's not harmful to any other animal, and most of them survive.

 

Course if it's a clearance job, then I'm glad of the easy shots!

 

Imagine the missus' head on each bunny Tony, I bet you miss fewer!

[smithie 2,443]

mixy will spread like wild fire, it moved 5/6 miles in 2 weeks around our way when it last hit. its not true that most survive mixy and you most defenatly should get as many of the infected as soon as you can and move them away from the healthy bunnys, this way there might be more small pockets of bunnys to breed with next year.. some do survive but not many..

[matt_hooks 188]

mixy will spread like wild fire, it moved 5/6 miles in 2 weeks around our way when it last hit. its not true that most survive mixy and you most defenatly should get as many of the infected as soon as you can and move them away from the healthy bunnys, this way there might be more small pockets of bunnys to breed with next year.. some do survive but not many..

 

The mortality rate for myxi is around the 40% mark in the general population. Those that get the disease and survive build up immunity.

 

As rabbit numbers increase, the disease will pass round more readily, and there will be relatively high mortality, but as the cycles continue the level of immunity will increase. If you shoot myxi bunnies then you slow down this process.

 

Whether the numbers shot are sufficient to make a difference is moot. When myxi was first "accidentally" introduced, the death toll was enormous, estimates of up to 99% mortality. Now, 50 years later, that rate is down to around the 40% mark.

[Phantom 631]

Thank you gentlemen

 

I know that more and more bunnies are surviving Myxie these days, where the populus has been hit many times over the years.

 

I didn't know that this one had Myxie until I went to recover it, I could only determine that it was a good size and I could only see the ear tot he base of it so it was down to my practiced shooting skills to judge where the POA should be.

 

What I am worried about though, is if this is the 1st time its been seen on this section of land, its likely they local populus will not have any form of immunity to it and its going to be devastating to the entire population of bunnies on my little island of land.

 

Of course if they already have built a resistance to it, then it won't hit so hard. Fingers Crossed

A kit with the disease has a much higher chance (from what I gather) of surviving it. This one was almost a full grown buck but weighed in so light it was unbelievable. It was very much on its way out through starvation. Although I don't advocate shooting ones with Myxie as if they survive, they will pass on increased protection to their young I am very glad I shot this particular one; I did it a humane service and ended its very obvious suffering and I think rather than let it starve to death which it was doing, even the anties would agree with this one it was for the best.

 

Phantom

[SEAN3513 7]

sorry to hear your news tony

 

credit to the jedi.......top bloke

 

I to have experienced the "D" word ( discharge of air from the rifle)

 

hope it all gets sorted quickly and fairly

 

all the best

 

sean

[smithie 2,443]

if your saying 40% of the mixy rabbits will survice i have to disagree (based on my experiances). i had a field where you could lokk over the wall and clap your hands and 40+ bunnys would get up and run, six months later you were lucky to see 2 bunnys at any one time. i had similar experiances on 2 shoots 25 miles apart.only diferance was you might have only seen 20+ bunnys on the second shoot before mixy came..

 

im only reporting my experiances. if you got 40% you are more lucky than me.

 

smithie

 

 

oh and well done getting the gun fixed

Edited October 17, 2010 by smithie

[andyz 30]

Let's hope the mixi doesnt spread to your other perms, I personally would shot them as most land owners want the quart rid which is why you have the permission to start with.

 

Top bloke Jedi, another fine example of the caliber of people on this forum!!

 

Tony hope you get yourself into a better place, I'm sure you will and as already said come out stronger!

 

Take care,

 

Andy

[Phantom 631]

Thank you Sean, yes he's a hell of a good guy

 

Smithie; I think the offical figures by the government white coats and test tubes are what Matt is reffering to

 

Rabbits are deffinately on the increase again and this is down to a few factors including developing a natural resistance to the disease.

 

Nature huh? Just cant beat Nature

 

Phantom