Scott: Squirrels offer winter hunting option

When the late youth season closes Sunday, deer hunting’s “guns of autumn” will fall silent all across Missouri, and they’ll remain silent until next October. For public land hunters in particular, the sudden quiet can be almost eerie.

I couldn’t resist opening with a bit of drama, but the truth is that every classification of timber from 5-acre wood lots to 500,000-acre national forests really would be that bereft of gunfire were it not for a tiny cadre of diehard squirrel hunters who are convinced that the last few weeks of the long season (Squirrel season closes on Feb. 15) are the time to be toting a rifle in pursuit of bushytails.

I’m one of them. I’d go so far as to say that the last six weeks of the season are a well earned reward for anyone who is stubborn enough to use a rifle during the summer months, when even seeing a shootable squirrel is always somewhere between difficult and impossible.

That’s not the case in January. Given the hunter’s eyes are sensitive to motion, it’s now possible to zero in on squirrels literally as far away as the eye can see.

A pair of Alpen Apex 8x42 binoculars secured to my chest by a harness with elastic straps marketed by Kahles, moves the possible to the likely, despite my aging eyesight.

Knowing exactly where my quarry is while it’s still well out of range makes spot-and-stalk an irresistible tactic. It’s an effective one, too, but I keep all of late season hunting’s provisos in mind.

The most important of these special stipulations is the increased significance that line of sight runs both ways.

If it’s possible for the hunter to see the squirrel, it’s possible for the squirrel to see the hunter.

Fortunately, at least at long range, squirrels are more dependent on motion to detect danger than hunters are dependent on it to detect dinner.

While creeping up on a squirrel that has escaped being eaten not just by a human but also by a host of furred and feathered predators for several months, a wise hunter takes the first shot he’s reasonably confident he can make.

Hunters who try to slip just a little bit closer often catch the eye of their would-be target after they’ve moved inside its comfort zone.

In the case of gray squirrels — which sometimes insist on a comfort zone approximately the size of a township, the usual result is a lost opportunity.

Fox squirrels are more tolerant of such intrusions, but an unalarmed fox squirrel at 40 yards is much easier to hit than a spooked one at 20 yards.

Spot-and-stalk squirrel hunting late in the season is a poster child for the law of unintended consequences.

Chief among these is the fact that squirrels spend a lot of their active time on the ground at this time of the year.

Stalkers who don’t pay at least as much attention to their immediate surroundings as they do their original goal miss chances to take some easy shots at squirrels who failed to pay sufficient attention to what was going on around them.

But a little carelessness might work out fine.

For reasons which escape me, the Missouri Department of Conservation raised the limit on squirrels to 10.

I had every intention of sticking with the old limit of six, but there came a day when I found myself in the middle of a bushytail convention.

After the proverbial smoke cleared, I found myself lugging nine increasingly heavy squirrels back to the truck.

By the time I’d skinned, cleaned and gotten them packaged for the freezer, I was more than ready to return to my less greedy days.

As much as I like it, I admit that winter squirrel hunting has the potential to produce miseries far more serious than an overflowing game bag.

Despite what we’ve seen lately, January can — and no doubt will — get cold.

Hunters who think of squirrel season in terms of sweat and ticks can find themselves woefully unprepared mentally for late season hunting even if they’ve managed to wear the right clothes to keep physically warm.

Fortunately, squirrels don’t like venturing outdoors in sub-zero weather any better than we do.

They’ll stay snug and warm inside their dens, unless a prolonged cold snap forces them to seek food, making staying home an equally good option for hunters.

On the other hand, temperatures in the teens and low 20s are within the typical squirrel’s comfort zone.

Since squirrels will be active under these conditions, hunters need to be, too.

Even in the winter, squirrels are most active the first two or three hours after sunrise with a shorter active period near sunset.

That’s not to say that a few squirrels won’t be out and about throughout the daylight hours.

Speaking of activity periods, it’s time for me to gather up my gear for my weekend hunt.

Maybe we’ll defy the odds and meet up in the woods.