.410 round ball for squirrels?

300BLK

Well-Known Member
Anyone who can hit a squirrel in the head occasionally with a rock lock is tops in my book. Not only because of the difficulty of making the hit, but of making the ball get there before the squirrel sees/hears all the lock smoke and fire and ducks.

You've watched too many movies or else never fired a REAL flintlock. It does require REAL blackpowder, a good lock, good flint, properly positioned flash hole, and a LACK of flinch.
 

Ian

Notorious member
I have fired a good flintlock rifle, on one occasion, but it didn't belong to me. Mine have all been cheap kits and toys which lack any sort of sophisticated tuning, hence annoying length of lock time. The advice always given me is "time is money" in that regard, and my interest was never strong enough to devote what was needed for really fast setups, particularly since percussion caps used to be a lot cheaper than flints and 4F pan powder. I did go on a few hunts with my .45 Kentucky percussion rifle, but the fox squirrels in the oaks and pecan trees around here seem to react to the flash before the ball can make it to them.

Generally when I hunt squirrels it's as much for the pot as it is for the sport, so I don't deliberately handicap the operation. Deer I hunt primarily for the meat. Pigs and ranch varmints are what I prefer for sport shooting, the elegant game animals seeming to me a little more majestic and rare each year, probably one day I will stop hunting deer and doves altogether in my immediate area unless they become over-abundant as they used to be.
 

Brad

Benevolent Overlord and site owner
Staff member
We have some black squirrels in town where I live but I have enter seen them in the field. Across the MO river they are quite common in town.
What we are seeing locally is an influx of grey squirrels moving north. Started to see them a year ago and are seeing more and more along the river and close inshore.
 

Chris

Well-Known Member
Interesting to watch how animal populations expand, probably an ebb and flow sort of thing if we had a long term perspective.

I am in an area that should not have gray squirrels, turkey, or gray fox. USDA zone 3A if you follow agriculture, yet in my lifetime I have seen them move in... and more importantly establish populations here that can survive hard winters. As far as I know I shot the first spring gobbler ever in town in 1995... weighed 25 and some pounds. Since then the population has expanded and is surviving, I have a dozen or so in my corn every morning.

So far we have had skunks and woodchucks try to move in but I think we have shot them off before they got a toehold.

Anyway, my understanding of the melanistic phase of gray squirrels is that the color phase involves a recessive gene that begins to show up where there is inbreeding... maybe why black squirrels are reported in certain towns, or here in the central Adirondacks where new squirrel blood is hard to find. Squirrels got to walk a long ways to get here and why would they want to?

Neat looking pelt though.
 

Maven

Well-Known Member
I've seen only gray ones for most of my life. However, lately I've been seeing some that are darker gray. In Bexley, O., where my son lives, there are more like the one pictured than lighter gray ones and at least two albinos as well.
 

Brad

Benevolent Overlord and site owner
Staff member
The greys we are getting a different species. Think of a skinny 2/3 size fox squirrel. They wouldn't be much for eating as skinny as they are.
We are at the far western edge of the range of greys.
 

Chris

Well-Known Member
Interesting. Guys, keep the reports coming.

Last week I saw a gray in the corn but it was almost albino, to the point where i was not sure what I was seeing. I snuck down and watched it carefully through a 4X Leupold and it was not an albino (pink eyes) but rather a really light gray with white patches. Never seen this before. I really wonder if what we see are recessive genes owing to inbreeding.

I let it live. Interesting that we are having these color phases and northwards shifts in range. Not in any way suggesting climate change etc., just observing.

Anyway, we can get back to how to kill them. I propose accurate shooting with .22 shorts or .410's at reasonable range. I am not a muzzleloader shooter but I hope you guys keep the velocity down to prevent meat damage. Barking them makes a lot of sense if you have a generic load that might rough the squirrels up a bit. Admire you flintlock guys... just don't ruin meat with velocity in my opinion.
 

300BLK

Well-Known Member
Black squirrels are found in the northern part of Pa and north. I hunted in Allegheny State Park in NY State, north of Bradford Pa, and saw the only black GROUNDHOGS that I've ever seen. Apparently , there are mixed litters with both grey and black as I witnessed.

The only black squirrels that I've seen south of Rt 80 were in a suburb of Philadelphia, but I've seen WHITE squirrels in both urban and rural areas. Grey squirrels are most common in Pa, but the fox squirrels do appear mostly where there is both corn and water. Red squirrels are mostly in areas with lots of pines.
 

KHornet

Well-Known Member
Chris, I recall seeing a gray with white patches when I was a kid, that someone shot.
The locals called it a "Palamino", and seemed familiar with seeing one once in a while.

Paul
 

JWFilips

Well-Known Member
hunted 52 years in Northeastern PA .....Never saw anything but Grey Squirrels when hunting ( yes a few red squirrel but they are not game in my book)
But In visiting; I have seen Black versions of Grays in Philadelphia area and also in the low country of South Carolina
 

KHornet

Well-Known Member
Grew up in western N.Y. Nothing but gray squirrels back there. Here we have mostly
Fox squirrels, redish in color, with a few that are coal black.
 

Elric

Well-Known Member
:confused: So... how does one load round balls in pistol cartridges? Wads? I assume a roll crimp just over the front of the circumference.
 

Brad

Benevolent Overlord and site owner
Staff member
No wad. Run the ball thru a normal sizer, it will create a flat ring around the ball. Lube with a tumble lube. Seat in case just deep enough for roll crimp to hold against recoil. Light charge of fast burning powder for caliber.
 

Edward R Southgate

Component Hoarder Extraordiniare
Yup ! In oval cans . Next to my wife and children it is the thing I hold most dear , that and two pounds of Winchester 680 .

Eddie
 

300BLK

Well-Known Member
Yup ! In oval cans . Next to my wife and children it is the thing I hold most dear , that and two pounds of Winchester 680 .

Eddie
I don't know when they stopped making the oval cans, but DuPont sold out to Gearhart-Owen in 1972, so there hasn't been DuPont BP in quite a long time. IIRC, Gearhart Owen was first marketed with a G-O logo, morphed to GOI, and then to Goex. Several year back Goex was bought by Hodgdon and is now sold in plastic containers.
 

Edward R Southgate

Component Hoarder Extraordiniare
I don't know when they stopped making the oval cans, but DuPont sold out to Gearhart-Owen in 1972, so there hasn't been DuPont BP in quite a long time. IIRC, Gearhart Owen was first marketed with a G-O logo, morphed to GOI, and then to Goex. Several year back Goex was bought by Hodgdon and is now sold in plastic containers.

I think the 30's but am not really sure. My pap had it in the 60's when I started shooting and I bought what he had before he passed. He was a hoarder like me and probably bought all the ovals he could find when they changed cans. I know Gerhart & Owens pretty well also. I got 15 lb of their powder in original cans and another 50 in the plastic + 25 of the Swiss . I don't plan on running out anytime soon. I also have Curtis & Harvey Austin Pistol and cans of Curtis & Harvey FFFF priming that I bought for $ 1.75 a can across the counter . The old Dupont is the best in my opinion. I also have Eley brothers musket caps marked " For Her Majesties Service In India " in the original packaging . Way over 100 years old and they are still the best waterproof musket cap I've ever used. Bannermans sold them by the 1000 roll in the 50's . My bunch been shooting muzzleloaders since before it got to be stylish again !

Eddie