Hey , It's Saturday ! March 14 th !!

[1Southpaw]

A good morning to all . Hopefully you all survived Friday the 13th   
Weather warming up again , just passed the freezing mark . 
Yesterdays wind left some thing to be desired but it sure shrunk the snow cover .
Perhaps this afternoon will be time for another "gopher " outing ...
Man I love spring !!!   

[Double D]

Good Morning Montanan, dpe, Southpaw, Forster, MT_Sourdough, Atlaw, pab1, newstart2k, Skunk, kitchawan kid, lurker, CJ, Bilmac,thxmrgarand, Syncerus, Mcwoodduck, Brennemanj83, Old Shooter!

Got up this morning and it wasn't even freezing...37 degrees, windy and cloudy.  My snow pack is reciding also. 

Don't know what I am going to do today, no schedule for  me....might drive north and check the gophers also.  Don't really like to shoot the gophers right now. Right now they are running around breeding. I'm a hunter not a farmer.  I do like to make a token pass so the my farmer/rancher friends think I am on the job.  But the more escapement the more for me to shoot.  The more for me to shoot the more the farmers want me.

Southpaw is a retired farmer, he still wants to get them before they breed and eat his crop.  Ernie, you're retired, gophers are your new crop! 

[Cottonwood]

Still got plenty of snow on the ground over here.... no gophers up yet.

[brennemanj83]

Good Morning Montana...................Hope all is well in the Big Sky Country today.Its cool and raining here  so I guess no range time today.

[Skunk]

Good Morning Montana,

It's starting to look good here in NE Wisconsin. We are supposed to get into the 40s today (already at 36), and its supposed to get up to 55 by Monday.  We have beautiful sunshine and the world seems blessed (at least at this moment).

Speaking of weather and blessings, I found the following on another forum. I'm sure all you Montanans have probably seen it a million times, but for those that might not have, here it is:

BLESSED MONTANA

On the sixth day God turned to the Archangel
Gabriel and said: 'Today, I am
going to create a land called Montana.

It will be a land of outstanding
natural beauty; a land of beautiful lakes,
each one full of fish.

It shall have tall majestic pines, peacefully
flowing rivers, landscapes full
of Buffalo, tall grass, and eagles, beautiful
blue skies, forests full of bear, elk
and moose, rich farmland and fair skinned
people.

God continued, 'I shall make the land rich in
resources so as to make the inhabitants prosper
and they shall be known as a most friendly
people, people who practice being nice every
day.'

But Lord,' asked Gabriel, 'don't you think
you are being too generous to these Montana
people?'

'Not really,' replied God 'just wait and see
the winters I am going to give them.'

[1Southpaw]

Yep, we love the winters , keeps the riff raff out 

"Good Neighbor Don" stopped by for a cup of coffee and a game of cribbage .  I won !!!!! 

In the course of the conversation the Blowing ball Mortar project came up . We decided to take a little road trip down to the "Oil Patch" . Rounded up some possible materials for construction , all free of course .. One of the important factors in a project ....

And as long as we were heading to prime habitat for Gophers .... I grabbed the the Savage 17HMR .
25 shots ....25 dead . We took turns out the windows . Any day a gopher goes is a great day !!   

Sorry DD , we did leave quite a few for breeding purposes , we just cleaned the gene pool of the dumb ones. Ranges from 15 ' to 100 yards ... this time of the year they are still wondering what a pickup is doing in their territory .   Heh, Heh .
Heres a picture of the materials gathered .

[Double D]

I have another "round" of ammunition...

[Cottonwood]

And that is when God sent guy's like Double D and 1Southpaw into the meadows to complete the task at hand.

[Double D]

It's the humanitarian in us that says use a big enough gun for a clean kill!

[dpe.ahoy]

1Southpaw, looks like ya might have ta clean up the crown on that cannon just a bit.   Or is that a new-fangled rifling?   DP

[dpe.ahoy]

Being an old muzzleloader, just wondering how many yards of pillow ticking you use up for patches?   DP

[Oldshooter]

Well I dunno fellas........................sounds like you Montana boys have been couped up in the cabin a might too long. You got yer prayin gophers, bowlin ball cannons, taking down the oilfiels to make bowlin ball cannons! shootin out the truck winder at defenseless gophers, 

Maybe you need to come down here and thaw out for a while and get yer heads on st8. We dont have any gophers in this part of Gods country but there are skeeters here that can catch a 17 caliber pill in the air and chunk it back at ya! And we have some oil fields that we dont even use full time, plenty of "spare parts" available there. Heck we can go over to the San Jacinto battleground, there are a couple of cannons we took off of Santa Anna there that nobody uses much anymore, we could do it like a Texas to Montana "lend lease" thing! I'm sure nobody'd mind. I'll give you directions and a letter of introduction and send you on over there to pick em up! OK!

Yall come ya hear !

[1Southpaw]

If the lend-lease is any thing like the neighbors here , once you lend tham some thing you have to ask permission to borrow it back .

Spring is springing ..saw a flock of Geese out in one of my  barley fields this morning . Need to get my nesting tire refilled with material .   

One year they were trying to nest in a power pole I set up for a hawks nest . Was funny as all get out to watch that mother goose trying to get in the small wicker basket I had affixed up there . Finally got a bale of straw from "Good Neighbor Don" to put in the pond . He was my Corporate Sponser for that wild life project.

[Oldshooter]

Nice pics, How did the hawks take it ?