Call me Chuck Connors

One down, one million to go. Beginner's luck maybe, but I got my first kill this morning.

As that little rodent ascended to the top of my neighbor's fence, I took aim with my Crosman air rifle, got him in the crosshairs, and pulled the trigger with the barrel resting against the deck crossbar. Pow! He jumped about a foot into the air, and I'm thinking I just scared the critter. Not the case. He climbed back up the fence, jumped to my fence, ran about ten feet and then toppled over into my yard. It was the type of fall a stuntman would take in the old westerns after being shot off a balcony. He fell between the fence and the outdoor storage building, and when I rushed down to see what had become of him, he was not there. He went about another 20 feet, I guess hoping to hide and recover from whatever just struck him . As I neared him, he did not run, so I knew I had delivered what was probably a lethal blow. With the aid of a garden spade, I broke the creature's neck to end his suffering. Upon moving the body out to the water's edge for the rest of nature to feast on, I saw that I had struck him between the third and fourth rib, likely piercing his heart.

It was pretty freaking cool. I had anticipated missing, missing, missing, and then finally grazing a squirrel. I figured I'd need to adjust the scope and shoot at some targets to really fine-tune this pellet gun, but no.

By the way, we haven't seen any more squirrels at all today. Same as when the first casualty went down to the rat trap. I'm almost sad that I haven't had anything else to shoot at.