Sneaking Back to the Farm

The Thunderstorms are due back after Noon. I’ll be beating it back to town shortly, having concluded a very productive trip to the farm, and one of the best days I’ve ever had. I’ll give you some highlights.

As soon as we heard they were relaxing the quarantine, The Shamanic Dream Team started planning a return to Turkey Camp. We couldn’t hunt them– nonresident tags were quashed– however, we did have plenty of other things to do.

For starters, I had to mow grass. In places, it was getting waist-high. I stopped in Falmouth on the way to buy a new battery for the mower and stopped to pick up grossities and gas while I was there. I had one last stop at the bait shop to pick up fishing worms for #1 granddaughter.

Friday night, Moose and Mooselette arrived in time to get a view of several turkeys and a few deer out grazing at dusk. The gobblers were rather vocal and active.

Saturday morning, Mooselette and I went to scout turkeys. She said she’d left her pot call at home wouldn’t look for it. This started a pattern of Mooselette acting like turkey hunting was something that was being inflicted on her. That started to turn around when I called a gobbler out of Hootin’ Holler using just my voice. The gob clammed up after a bit. I think he had a hen with him. The kid got antsy, so we went back, but that got the spark going. I schooled her on how to pussyfoot as we went. By the time we got in sight of the house, she was able to put the sneak on a hen down below Fountain Square– got with about 50 yards without getting busted. We got back to the house and she was changing out of her dew-soaked duds when the gobbler I’d been calling showed up in the pasture out in front of where we’d been posted just an hour ago.

I brought her out to watch and listen to the bird. “If we’d just stayed put a little longer. . .” I said. That rang something in the Little One’s head. She immediately produced the turkey calls she’d “accidentally forgot” at home and proceeded to take off in search of the gob. I’ve never seen the turkey hunting bug hit so profoundly. She spent the latter part of the morning out calling.

In the afternoon, Mooselette and I went out to the pond to fish. I stocked that pond with bluegill and bass on the weekend Moose and MooseMama announced she was in the oven. It’s been 9 years now, and they’re still going strong. I managed to catch a near-legal bass with my first worm.

The late afternoon was filled with various shooting projects. The big news was that I got the adjustable gas plug for the Garand dialed in.

Back after Christmas, I decided to make my M1 Garand a fresh project. Since Moose stopped using it as a deer rifle, it has been somewhat dormant. It’s a really nice specimen– manufactured in 1942 at the Springfield Armory. It has all the original parts and a gorgeous stock. One thing that looked like a reasonable addition for this redux was a new gas plug.

Schuster MFG has just such an item. For one thing, it moderates the flow of gas, so it saves wear and tear on the Op-rod. For another, it allows a fairly high degree of tuning for maximizing accuracy. You start with it all the way open. You close down the valve (operated with a supplied hex wrench) until the action works fully, but all the extra gas is bled off. I made up some 147-grain FMJ off-MAX loads using H4895 and used those to test. I’ve got a 100 rounds of “LC” brass waiting for loading now that the test is successful. After ringing the gong a few more times this summer, I’ll change out to a 150 grain Hornady softpoint and use the Garand on a deer.

Was it hard to dial in? No. The first round did not cycle the bolt at all. I turned the gas plug a quarter-turn. The next round opened the bolt but did not eject the brass. By the 6th round, I had it ejecting but not loading. One more twist and the deed was done. I’d been firing at a box at 100 yards, and getting just over a 1-inch group– best I’d ever had with this rifle. Once the rifle was dialed in, I switched to the new gong Angus got me for Christmas and proceeded to ring it like a bell for the next 2 dozen rounds at 200 yards.

CHING!

The other project that I got to work on was a batch of 100 223 Rounds I loaded on the Hornady LNL AP. I was looking for the absolute cheapest 223 loads I could make. The results were so-so. For accuracy and overall function, there was no problem. The hitch was in the components.

I tried using range sweepings for my brass. Everyone who comes down donates their brass to me as sort of an informal range tax. As a result, I get a lot of very mixed brass of variable quality and provenance. Were I sorting the brass and loading on a single stage press, things would be much different, but trying to do it on a progressive just was a bit beyond my skills. I compounded the problem by using the cheapest pulled FMJ bullets I could find. I think the pulling process must have changed the dimensions of the bullets somewhat because I could not achieve a consistent OAL. In the end, it was a bit of a fustercluck, but I got 100 rounds loaded, and they did better than some steelcase imports I’ve had the misfortune to buy. My reloads went BANG and they hit the target, and they did pretty well at ringing the 200-yard gong. However, it was not worth all the hassle.

Hassle? I had to send my Hornady LNL AP back to the factory for warranty service. I had to grow a lot as an owner of this press in the process. I have to say Hornady Customer Service was kind and patient. I had several parts break along the way. They’ve been good about replacing them for free. Bottom line: this was a nightmare.

I’ll probably be buying a load of 223 REM mailorder when I have a chance at a good deal. I’ll save that brass and use a more consistent bullet and this will all be just a bad memory.

Angus arrived Saturday afternoon. His new job at the sheet metal fabricators is making him work lots of overtime. They’ve got contracts for the new Amazon logistics hub. It’ll be Amazon’s biggest to date. He would have missed most of Turkey Season anyway this year. He’s making gobs of money though.

He and Moose had a few projects of their own. Angus tried out the low-velocity 22 LR loads I bought him for his birthday. Moose shot his Mosin Nagant and his new Mossberg AR.

We had steak on the grill and then retired.

This AM, I couldn’t get anyone up at first light. However. The gobs were vocal and I had a good time out at the Thoughtful Spot drinking my coffee. Along about 0800 three nice gobblers showed up in the yard. For this, I was able to get the Mooselette aroused, and she got to see them strutting in front of the tobacco barn.