X gun availablity

Price on XLs/XS Marlins

I've been out of the loop for a while with dadgum cancer but getting by fairly well now. MOG.com had deleted me and now I'm back for the wisdom that lies in within the site.

Wow...$358 for your grandson's new rilfe caught my eye. I bought my '06 pkg for $289 and an XS7Y 7mm-08 pkg formy wife at $309. The scopes went to less serious pursuits. I did some price checking to make sure I wasn't seeing things. I believe even at the somewhat higher price, you and the young man will find the X rifle one accurate piece. Restocking really enhances the look and eliminates the often-experienced barrel rub that depletes accuracy. Boyd's accomodated the MOG members and started the line they carry now.

My '06 will hold around an inch with several bullet weight loads I've assembled for it while I stumbled onto a recipe for the 7-08 that punches one small hole for 3-shot groups and opens a little with 5 shots.

I wish your grandsons (and you) a great fall season for 2012. I'm hoping to draw a 3-antlerless permit in Cooper county right near the house for the October special hunt. It's been a couple of years since I've harvested a Missouri deer.

Good luck one and all. Support and Defend the 2nd Amendment with all your might. It's the only thing that can preserve our proud heritage.

Herd Health

Even with the drought, we've got deer in fair-to good shape. The mast crop is very poor around this area. Even traditionally good squirrel woods are barren of reds or greys.

We have one huge doe that has triplets that feeds here around the house along with a young doe with twins. All are fat and sassy. I have noticed that the "woods" deer look poorer than the farm field deer in this area. DOC is really concerned with trying to control the CWD issue up north. I hope this disease process that's showing up in more and more places across the midwest doesn't turn out to be a zebra mussel for the cervid populations.

We also subscribe to shoot what you eat and eat what you kill. BIG extended family makes it easy if we have a bounty-filled year. A few years back I took a buck and 5 does, one son-in-law killed 5 and his buddies contributed another 4 deer to the pile. All that precious venison was consumed before the following May. We home processed into steaks, burger,sausages, jerky and flavored jerky sticks...it didn't last too long!

Thanks for the wishes with my illness. Hopefully I'll be around another few years to spend more time with all the grand kids with teaching them the right ways and about life, while continuing to fight the Fed and the liberal mindset that want to turn our toys and tools into evil gadgets.