Steve: I had a .223 as my primary varmint rifle (CZ) sold it and bought a .17 HMR also a CZ. I really only shoot squirrels of the ground and tree variety so nothing larger was needed. For my style of shooting involving lots of walking and shooting kneeling or sitting off of cross sticks the .17 has the same effective range as the .223; limited of course by my skill set not the inherent range of the cartridges.
I had a Swiss Arms Special Green for several years it was fun and I had a passing fancy of putting a 6mm barrel on it and hunting deer with it. Never followed through with it as I do not really like the semi auto platform. It was sold a couple of years before the Trudope OIC ban.
On the rare times I put any effort into shorting coyotes I have used “deer” cartridges with varmint bullets, .270, .260 and .25-06.
I find myself solidly in the bolt gun camp, I have owned and hunted with single shots both break action and falling block, lever guns, bolt guns of course but never a semi auto. I now only have bolt and lever rifles.
The go to calibres for everything over squirrel variants over the past 7 years have been; .260, .270, 7-08, .325 WSM, 9.3x62 (since sold). Next up in the development team 6.5 PRC (rebarreled my .325), .375 H&H and .243 I’ve had for years but has never met expectations.
I do not see myself ever moving into the AR based cartridges. If something lighter is needed “downloading” a larger cartridges works well. I recently loaded hunting ammunition for a buddy who took his slightly built 14 year old nephew hunting, the .243 with the 85 grain TTSX loaded a third of the way up from minimum charge provided an easy shooting load completely capable of killing deer within the 200 yard limit set by my buddy and his nephew.
Sorry for the long drawn out response when a simple “not interested” might have sufficed but I did want to provide the background for my response.
