The always instructive Ian McCollum on a .22LR submachine gun from the 1960s:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J50N5lQoAFw

Might be the right tool for your job. If you can find one.

Figures. The ones I’ve seen have always been manic and have always been red.

I’ve seen a video of YouTube of someone dropping a Cape Buffalo with a heavy caliber air rifle. Quite something and not to be attempted without some conventional backup.

Reminds me of this hunting story:

Hemingway’s Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber — one for all the Rose-tinted Glasses Brigade in the Wimminz Dunnit Thread.

http://www.standardsinstitutes.org/sites/default/files/material/winter16_ela_9-12_day_2_session_1-macomber.pdf

Kim du Toit has been posting in his blog about his new (old) Mauser 1938 vintage. He said that when as a teenager he proudly took his first Mauser along to a family gathering back in the Old Transvaal or wherever, one of his uncles said:

U: What do you call a Boer without a Mauser?
KduT: Enlighten me, Ancient One.
U: An Englishman!

Of course it is. I was only stating the opinions of Graves & the other author, whose name escapes me because she now uses one that is different than on the byline of my copy.
As I said, “Whether one accepts the author’s claims or not, it’s become a touchstone of feminist theology.”

@ Zaphod
I have a complete set of Renault’s books, including her early contemporary romances. Once she moved her attention to ancient Greece, her writing improved, but they are all still romances.

“They must be hard to hit with a regular air rifle — little blighters don’t sit still much at all. …”

They are and don’t … some of them.

The generally inoffensive Fox or Greys are easily taken, even when on the move because of their size. Though one is tempted to let the suburban ones do their thing, even if it means their stripping your pear trees of half grown fruits, and ensuring that you never see a developed English walnut from your plantings. In other words “tolerance” and benevolence, until you finally either give up on your own projects, or upon living alongside them peaceably.

The whitetail deer have even become a nuisance and very bold all across American conurbia. Down in Charlotte and environs, they mosey across the landscaped lawns of mini-mansions, and languidly browse the flower beds and ornamental trees.

Red squirrels, are exactly the creatures you allude to. Looking almost like Chipmunks at a glance, save for the stripes and the cuteness, they constantly dart about as if on amphetamines. And if you want a creature expert at boring through fascia boards and soffits in order to get into attics and dormers, you could not choose a better animal.

They are hard to lead on the run, as they shift speed so often. And sitting still, as briefly as they do, they are a much smaller target at 90 feet than a fat Grey perched on a cottonwood limb eating a stolen apple.

I use a Spanish made, Beeman .177 knockoff of a famous German break barrel design. It has enough velocity to catch the Reds on the run. My childhood “Sheridan” .20 (famous among generations of American boys) is a bit too slow at distance, and one usually ends up over-pumping it in hopes of getting up beyond the 700 fps mark. Its virtue is that it shoots smoothly. I suppose the effect of the piston rushing forward in a break barrel design, is somewhat analogous (somewhat, I said “somewhat”) to shooting for single round accuracy with an open bolt rifle.

True air-gunners must be insane. At least by judging the prices they seem willing to pay, when a very accurate – if plain Jane – rifle could be had for less than half the price of some of them.

The .22 Short is a round that probably deserves a comeback.

Yes. Disapproval of Biden does not mean that they would vote for a Republican if forced to choose.

Courts don’t function.

Police don’t function.

Military operates as a junta (Milley, Austin).

Where do we go from here?

That rings a bell… Sounds like The Praise Singer featuring the poet Simonides. I thought she did a good job of capturing the whole Mediterranean Thing… Could almost see those Alma-Tadema skies and seas — if not the Victorian Hussies got up as Greeks and Romans.

But then I’m not jaundiced by the Squirrel Problem.

If you lived on the other side of the Wallace Line you wouldn’t have to worry about squirrels. But the natives would have confiscated your collection of all the good stuff. Those things that got stolen and mislaid long ago.

They must be hard to hit with a regular air rifle — little blighters don’t sit still much at all. We have a kind of Mini Wallace Line here: Monkeys in the Mainland parts of New Territories, but none in the Islands or on Hong Kong Island itself. Squirrels catch the subway in this mad place:

https://coconuts.co/hongkong/news/passengers-go-nuts-squirrels-spotted-mtr/

@AesopFan:

Have you read the works of Mary Renault?

I might have; once, back in High School. Something about ancient Greece or the Minoans.

There is some young hero, and some women he runs into. And some strange orgiastic homicides in the hills or an event like that. And then a volcano or a tidal wave happens. And then the survivors – it is implied have an orgy. And then, well, I don’t recall much more other than the feeling that they should all be killed for being so annoying.

I think that that was Renault’s book.

“You might enjoy them. “

What I would really like is a pneumatic powered BB machine gun like they used to have at carnivals. Then I could really deal with the Squirrel Nutkin “tree rats” which infest my walnut and fruit trees.

I wonder how the Cretans dealt with squirrels. Did they even have squirrels in Crete? https://greekreporter.com/2021/05/13/minoan-language-linear-a-linked-to-linear-b-in-groundbreaking-new-research/