A Prairie Dog Hunt On Old Rte 66

There are some things I know that maybe I just shouldn't try. Take Cowboy Action Shooting for instance. I know if I try it I'm gonna get hooked. I'm gonna end up having to buy thousands of bucks worth of guns and gear, loading equipment, and more. I mean who wouldn't love all that gear and an opportunity to use it all with a bunch of other "cowboys" and "cowgirls"? You know on second thought, maybe....well that's for another day. But it sort of parallels my feelings about prairie dog shooting. I thought well it's gonna take a bunch of gear, time and money to try it out. Well I was wrong...for the most part at least.

My hunting buddy Jon and I had both acquired some "AR" style rifles a while back. I built mine from scratch with pretty much top of the line parts from Black Weapons Armory, and Jon bought a standard Bushmaster M4 style rifle and made some minor modifications to it. The rifle I built is also M4 sized with a 16" barrel.

Neither rifle is exactly your standard long range P-Dog rig but we got a bug to try to shoot some dogs. The first challenge was to figure out which optic to use on my rifle. It's no secret I'm a huge fan of Leupold optics. They make some of the best quality glass in the industry. They are American made and they have some of the best customer service I have ever experienced. I had a tactical style MR/T Leupold on the rifle but it is more of a CQB type of scope so I needed a longer range scope to reach out the few hundred yards needed to pop prairie dogs. So I took the Leupold VX3 6.5 - 20x40mm scope off of my long range 300 WSM rifle and mounted it on the AR. Then I started testing ammo and what I found was that Hornady factory loaded 40grain VMax with a stated muzzle velocity of 3800 FPS, was super accurate in my rifle.

This was a bit of a surprise for me because in the past with other rifles I haven't had much luck with factory ammo in terms of accuracy, but this stuff was remarkable. As it turns out this ammo shot great in Jon's AR and his Remington VSSF as well so we ordered 1,600 rounds from Hornady and were off to Seligman AZ to try our hand on prairie dogs.

Seligman is a neat little tourist town located right on Old Rte 66 and looks like right out of the kids movie "Cars". We had done some reasearch and we had some specific places to check out based on the advice of some friends of ours including some Arizona Game and Fish department wildlife managers.
I had some other Leupold toys along with me including an RX-1000 rangefinder and a Kenai spotting scope both of which not only came in handy they are downright essential to prairie dog hunitng. Now this all seems obvious to those of you who are experienced prairie doggers but hey it was all new to me! But what wasn't obvious until I reassesed the hunt is that I was able to use alot of gear I already had to have a great hunt. The AR was built for fun and self defense and now I know I can shoot prairie dogs with it. The other gear is essentially big game (deer, elk, antelope) hunting equipment. Now to be fair I am pretty well hooked on this prairie dog thing now. So of course I used it as an excuse to trade my way into a Cooper Model 21 Phoenix in .223 and mounted a brand new Leupold 8.5 - 25x50mm with their varmint reticle in it. It is more than a tack driver at the range with the Hornady 40grain VMax factory loads. It shot 100 yard groups under 1/4" and 1/2" at 200 yards! I can't wait to get back to the prairie dog mounds with that Cooper!! I think it is amazing that 4 completely different rifles shot that Hornady ammo exceptionally well. I think it's remarkable what Hornady is producing. Hornady came out with a new .223 load under their Superfomance brand. It is a 55gr VMax at 3465 FPS and I'd love to see a 40gr VMax at about 4,000 FPS if they can do it.

All in all the hunt was very successful for a first time expedition. Between Jon, myself and his two teenage sons we killed a couple hundred prairie dogs. I have a distinct feeling we will be going on more prairie dog expeditions maybe Montana or the Dakotas next time.

In the meantime we also hooked up with a local varmint hunters club here in Tucson and went to their Prairie Dog silhouette match this past weekend. You shoot varying sized steel "dogs" at distances from 200 yards to 500 yards. So it REALLY tests you and your equipment. I was really impressed with the Leupold 8.5 - 25 scope with the varmint reticle. Once you get the hang of it hits become more and more likely. In the Cooper rifle the Hornady ammunition was predictably excellent. The guys in the match were also very impressed with the accuracy of the Hornady ammo as compared to their handloads. I would not be a bit surprised to see some Hornady boxes in their range bags at the next shoot! I can't wait to get back out there with the Cooper to see what it will do on real live "dogs".



2008 Arizona Desert Sheep Hunt

I have been putting in for a desert bighorn tag for the past 9 years. I had 9 bonus points plus 1 "hunter ed" point, and 1 "loyalty" point, for a total of 11 points. I put in for units that were within 4 hours drivng distance from home so I could scout it more easily if drawn (not that I ever expected to be).

One morning my 18 month old son woke up at 5AM and my wife told me it was my turn. So while he was playing on the floor I decided to check my email. I checked the email and decided to see if I was drawn for deer. I logged on to the AZGFD website and noticed I did get drawn for deer in 30A and almost clicked off when I noticed I had been drawn for something else. I blinked a few times to clear my vision and to my amazement...I was drawn for a desert bighorn tag!! Now here's the problem...it was 5AM. Who the heck can you call at 5AM to tell them you were drawn for the most coveted big game tag in the US?? Pretty much nobody, because anyone who knows what it is will be so jealous that they will want to kill you, and the rest of the world couldn't care less!

I had to wait until football signup, for my 8 year old son later that morning, to tell anyone. That's when I told my business partner and hunting buddy Jon Tate. He was so jealous he wanted to kill me. It took him a few days but he couldn't resist and started to help me plan the camp, and scouting trips. I thought about hiring a guide but decided to do it on my own with friends. A friend of mine who is a well known hunter and conservationist in Yuma, AZ suggested that I call his brother-in-law Mike

Daily to see if he would help. Mike is a sheep nut who lives in Yuma. He knows about almost every ram killed each year in AZ and tracks sheep populations around the state. He is especially knowledgeable about what is going on in the Kofa NWR and the other areas around Yuma. Mike told me that the Mtn lions had hit the Kofa sheep pretty hard, but he thought that we could still get a good ram in there. Mike sent me a bunch of data going back to 1990 on the sheep killed in the unit that we would be hunting, 45A. The average ram was about 153" so I figured anything over 155" should do, especially since sheep numbers there are well below normal. The AZGFD survey flights flown in November confirmed that the numbers were down. A few scouting trips to the area by myself and Mike continued the bleak outlook. We saw 2 ewes and Mike saw 1 ram pre-season. So when Jon and I set off for camp, I figured it could easily take every bit of the 31 day season to find a shooter. We had a lot of helpers. For the 2 days before the Dec 1 opener we had about 8 guys out glassing different parts of the unit. We glassed every hour of daylight for 5 days and saw a total of about 5-6 ewes and 2 very young rams. I started to get a little discouraged but Mike, Jon, and Bobby kept my spirits up. Jon wanted to check out a particular part of the unit which was a pretty long drive on some rough roads. When Mike went to town to go back to work for a couple of days, we took a shot at this new place. It was midday when we stopped the truck in a very nice valley to have lunch and wait for prime glassing time. I went to set up my tripod and binos so I wouldn't have to later. When I focused on the mountain I instantly saw a ewe, then when I glassed a bit I saw 2 rams, and then Bobby saw a 3rd!! We hit paydirt...three Rams and one ewe through the spotting scope. Now I really wished Mike was with us because he was the best at judging rams on the hoof (although as it turned out, Bobby was right on). I ran to try to find cell service to call Mike back out there, but no service. We watched these sheep and "put them to bed" at dark.

Back at camp I reached Mike and he met us at about 5:30 the next morning. We drove within a mile or so of the spot, then we hiked on in to the glassing spot we had marked. At sunrise we found the sheep almost immediately and Mike and I started the stalk while Jon and Bobby stayed back to keep an eye on them. After about a 2 hour stalk, in some pretty rough stuff, we were within 400 yards and Mike was able to see the biggest ram. He confirmed he was a 160" class ram, which was my personal minimum, and we stalked in a bit further. At 325 yards I set up for the shot. But the ram was bedded looking away from us, so I had to wait another 15 minutes or so till he stood. As soon as he stood I fired and broke his shoulder and clipped the heart. He wobbled a bit and stood

there. I've shot enough animals to know that if they're still standing, I'm still throwin' lead. So I took a final shot to anchor him and he was down. Now came the real work!!

It was a great hunt and a great experience thanks to Jon, Mike, Bobby and the rest of the guys. Thank you for all your help.

Some photos from New Zealand

Todd Rathner with a very nice New Zealand Chamois

"Deer Delivery" The lodge I stayed in in New Zealand

New Zealand "taxi cab"

Some photos from my recent hunt in Australia

A Trophy Buffalo

A big Bull who is still out there!

A cow buffalo from a management hunt. This young boar has small tusks but a good sized body
A management bull and a trophy bull.

Alison, Todd and a great Barramundi fish.

A Management Bull

AIRPORT GUN BAN?!?

According to a recent USA Today article the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is considering a proposal to ban all firearms in all areas of ALL airports in the US. Including unsecured areas of the airport like lobbies, areas where the ticket counters are located etc. This would have a huge negative impact on anyone travelling with firearms. It could have a seriously chilling effect on international hunting as well as domestic hunters who travel. It will also have a negative effect on those with CCW permits who may be at the airport picking someone up or conducting other legitimate business.
The NRA is working on this issue and is asking people to contact TSA as soon as possible to tell them a ban on firearms in the unsecured areas of airports in not acceptable. Please contact them today. Click here to contact the TSA.

TJSC ON AMERICAN HUNTER TELEVISION!

The T. Jeffrey Safari Company will be featured on NRA's American Hunter Television Show on the Outdoor Channel. The story is about NRA Past President Sandra Froman and NRA Editor Karen Mehall hunting wildebeest in South Africa with the T Jeffrey Safari Company. The original broadcast ran in July and the show will re-run on:


Thursday, October 2: 9:30 p.m. (Eastern) Friday, October 3: 3 p.m. (Eastern) Saturday, October 4: 2:30 a.m. (Eastern)
Please be sure to tune in and watch!

The T Jeffrey Safari Company in the News

The T Jeffrey Safari Company has really had an incredible few weeks in terms of exposure in the press. This week we are featured in Forbes Traveler Magazine in an article entitled Bachelor Party Blowouts!

I guess the old fashioned bachelor parties are out and more wholesome, adrenalin pumping activities are in. This is good news for a lot of reasons, one of which is to have a prestigious mainstream publication like Forbes covering hunting as a positive activity! We have also been featured a couple of articles of NRA's American Hunter Magazine.

TJSC in the News

The article A World In One Country by Karen Mehall from the April issue of the NRA's American Hunter Magazine is available to read online here.

The article covers the 2007 Women on Target safari we sponsored in South Africa. It is an excellent article and I encourage you to read it.

TJR

A bunch of great trophies!

One of the benefits of owning a safari booking agency is getting to see all the great photos and hear the wonderful stories our clients bring back with them from wherever their adventure was. This afternoon I was sitting here putting together the April newsletter and TJSC client Kevin Warner walked in with his photo album and some CD's of photos to show me. We spent about an hour just talking about the hunt and looking at his photos. I have posted some of them here for your enjoyment.

That really is so much of what safari hunting is all about, participating in a wonderful journey (which is what safari means in swahili) and then sharing the stories with friends and family. I am honored that Kevin both trusted The T Jeffrey Safari Company to arrange his safari and that he came in to share his memories with us.

The photos we take on safari are so important because they are the memento most likely to bring us right back to that place where we had such an enjoyable experience. Safari hunting is often about the "trophies" we take meaning the actual horns and hide of the animal we pursued. But those trophies may not be here for a number of months and it is certainly more difficult to take them to a meeting or dinner party to share with friends.

That is why it is so important to have a good quality camera and learn how to take good photos.

Congratulations to Kevin and thanks for sharing your trophies with us - TJR

Gunsite Academy 2008

This was my second trip to Gunsite Training Academy. Last year I took the 270 General Rifle Course which starts out with the basics and gets you shooting well enough to hit a 9 inch kill zone at 400 yards. This year we asked Gunsite Master Instructor Il Ling New to come up with a custom class designed especially to suit our clients. The idea was to combine a basic rifle class with what Gunsite calls a Hunter Prep Class. So the 170 Rifle class was born! This is the general rifle (270) class reduced from 5 days to 3 days which gets you hitting 9 inch kill zones out to 200 yards consistently. Then we added a 3 day Hunter Prep Class right after the 170 class. Hunter Prep is set up to use "real world" hunting targets everything from flat targets to 3D animals. This includes turning targets, and a robot that is used to simulate an animal coming toward you, away from you and crossing in front of you. It is quite an experience!

A number of the target courses are set up to walk through so you experience targets in realistic hunting environments and at realistice ranges. This also includes targets with horns which require judging which trophy is the bigger animal. There is a little friendly competition involved as well as some timed shooting this helps to simulate the pressure you feel when you are hunting in the field. It's all designed to help you develop the skills you need to be a confident marksman while hunting. When you combine Gunsite's world class instructors with a very well thought out training program it's easy to see why those who take a class at Gunsite gain confidence in their shooting ability. We are planning to put together another TJSC class next Spring so keep your eye on this newsletter for an announcement, if you don't want to wait that long please call the Gunsite Academy at 928-636-4565 and sign up for the next class.

Leupold VX-7 Scope Review

Leupold VX-7 Scope Review

It's no secret that I am a big Leupold scope fan I mount one on every rifle I own. So when Leupold's Cindy Flannigan offered to send me one of their new VX-7 rifle scopes, I jumped at the chance to test it.

The VX-7 series is the pinacle of optics. From the time that they agreed to send it to me I knew this was more than the run of the mill rifle scope. I got an email from Leupold's custom shop asking me the details of the ammunition I would be using with the scope. This was in order to supply me with a Bullet Drop Compensating (BDC) custom elevation adjustment turrent made specifically to match the ballistics of the load I was using. With the BDC you can adjust the elevation of the point of impact quickly and easily.

When I unpacked the scope it was obvious that it had some features that were extremely well thought out. The adjustment knobs are a new design that Leupold calls "Speed Dial" you simply twist a bit until they pop up so you can make your adjustments. This system works extremely well and the adjustments make a positive click for each 1/4 MOA increment. This system also prevents the dreaded "lost scope adjustment cap" syndrome I have suffered from many times because the caps remain attached to the scope.

Looking through the lenses it was obvious that the glass and coatings Leupold uses on the VX-7 line are superior. The image was crystal clear.

One of the features I really like but have some mixed feelings about are the Alumina flip up scope covers. These are an aluminum version of the flip up scope caps you see from after market suppliers Leupold has offered them for a while but I haven't used them until now. I really like the way they work once they are installed on the scope. They fit tight and flush and flip completely out of the way when you are ready to shoot. My only complaint is that the front cap cannot be installed on the scope once the scope is mounted on the rifle, and of course I didn't know that until the scope was mounted! So beware if you install one of these scopes put the Alumina caps on BEFORE you install the scope.

On the range the scope performed extremely well. One of the most important things I look for in a scope is long eye relief because on heavy recoiling dangerous game guns this is critcally important. While this scope was mounted on a Kimber 84M in .308 Winchester I still like long eye relief to prevent getting "scope bit". Quite often the European scopes which this series was designed to compete with have a much shorter eye relief which I really do not like. Also, I am not convinced that the European scopes are as durable as the Leupold's are.

Last year I had a Zeiss scope mounted on the same rifle and after about 50 or 60 rounds of shooting at Gunsite the reticle just snapped. This year I fired over 600 rounds with that rifle and the VX-7 mounted on it there was absolutely no malfunction of the scope. It performed flawlessly.

In my experience Leupold scopes are extremely durable. I wasn't sure what to expect from this new premium line of scopes. Sometimes premium does not equal durable but based on a 600+ round test in the heat, dust and vigorous training at Gunsite I am convinced that the VX-7 line is an extremely high quality and durable product. Although they cost more than a standard Leupold scope they are worth the money when you consider what we demand from our optics. In the near future I will do a report on the custom BDC adjustment knob and how it works and I plan to do a report on the scope's perfomance while hunting. - TJR