Tips for hunting ground squirrels?

[sharptailhunter]

I went down to my buddy's ranch today to help him with his tractor. I took my .204 along in case we saw a coyote. Didn't see any yotes but we did see that he has a serious ground squirrel infestation. So, I put my new rifle to work. Most of the shots were at about 220 yards. The splatter factor with the 39 BKs was impressive. This is the first time I had actually ever shot a ground squirrel. While I managed to hit a good number of them, I want to get better at it, now that I know where to go to hunt them.

I was shooting in a relatively flat alfalfa field. It was about 4 pm. I noticed at about 5 pm, they all stopped coming out. So, when is the best time of day to hunt them? My rifle is sighted in for 200 yards. I was shooting prone from some grain drills. Since I'm shooting slightly down on them, do I need to adjust for my downward angle? For most of them, I basically just put the crosshairs on em and watched em fly. I'm new to the .204, so I haven't really had a chance to see the ballistics in real action before. How far out does a target have to be before I start to compensate for the distance? I ask because most of my misses were over the top of the squirrels. I wonder if I'm compensating for bullet drop too much? I know the best thing would be to go to the range and shoot it at different distances, but with new found squirrels, why would I want to shoot at paper?

Any other tips, like useful equipment and such would be really helpful.

[majcl5]

First off early morning is great it slows around noonish and picks back up again around 3 and yes about 6-7 the go beddy bye time. Do you reload? if not start. I zero my 204 for 200 yards and it is around 3/4 " high @ a 100yrds. Then 300 it is only a few inchs low. Just depend on your velocity but 0 300 only differs about 4-5". Invest or build a rotating shooting bench it will make a world of difference, like the br pivot is the best one u can buy.
Heres mine its Home made

[sharptailhunter]

Yup, I reload. I was shooting 39gr BKs at em yesterday, sort of seemed like an overkill though . I have some 32gr V-Maximuses that I'm gonna load up for em tonight. I love the bench that I see you and a couple of others on here using. I was looking for that model online only so I can copy the design, sort of. I can weld, so I can fabricate my own. Would you happen to have any plans for yours?

[RoadKill]

Anyone wanting to buy a new BR Pivot is in for a wait. Battenfeld guy says they are having problems with getting parts of acceptable quality. Per Battenfeld on 4/21/2011, I’m on the list but it would be another 30 to 60 days (now soon to late June) before they would be ready to ship.

[fiddlefadel]

Anyone wanting to buy a new BR Pivot is in for a wait. Battenfeld guy says they are having problems with getting parts of acceptable quality. Per Battenfeld on 4/21/2011, I’m on the list but it would be another 30 to 60 days (now soon to late June) before they would be ready to ship.

Me too!!!

Dave