Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters The best deer/antelope bullet. 22-250

Talking about a 1–8 twist ruger American. The caveat being, here in WY 22 Centerfire s has be have a bullet weight of at least 60 grains.

60 grain Partition or 62 grain Barnes

64 grain power-point has worked well for me on Texas deer in a .223. I don’t know if the additional velocity in a 22-250 would have a negative effect on the bullet at close range.

Anyone have experience with the 70grain accubonds? Should be ticket....

77 grain TMK

My RAR 1:8 twist shoots the Federal 60 grain Partition ammo into .75" at 100 yards.

I'm going to try some of the 75 grain Swift Scirrocos.

I'm thinking .243 diameter miminum as the Law is a Good Idea. IMHO
I know some here will not like this but while I am a hunter I do not want any animal to suffer needlessly.

62 gr. Barnes TTSX

^^^This^^^

In my 220 Swift, the 60 gr Partition was a Deer & Hog killing SOB ! I’ve only used the 62 gr Barnes in a .223 & .556, But the results were the same. DRT 95% of the time. Maybe might run 20 or 30 yards the other 5% of the time.

Bullschitt!!! It’s that kind of thinking that leads to legislation being passed in some States that we can only use Bolt action guns for hunting. No more semiautomatic guns.
Or that you can only hunt with straight walled cartridges.
No need to give the anti-gunners more reasons to take away our 2nd Amendment Rights.

Killing game humanely is not about bullet diameter. It’s all about proper shot placement. Period.

And I’ve killed a truck load of hogs here at the Ranch with a .223 / .556 Heavy Barreled AR-15 that lives in my truck. It’s accounted for several deer and antelope too.
It also serves double duty as predator patrol for the Ranch. Two or four legged.

AGREED X2 that`s what i load 60 gr.Nosler Partitions

I worked up a load with 64 gr power points(these were designed with 223 wsm velocities in mind) for my 22-250 at 3400 fps. Shot 3 antelope 1 shot a piece , all drt. On 1 doe I put the crosshairs on purpose right on the ball and socket joint of the left shoulder to see if I would get full penetration with exit at 175 yds it did. 22 bullets aren't all created equal good luck. Mb

I'd use that without a thought, btw, the 63gr Sierra SMP's you rec'd for my old man buddys slow twist 22-250 had had him killing deer and pigs now for the last 5 years, still on the same bag of 100 rounds I loaded for him.

He obviously doesn't' waste ammo, says it just 'drops' em!

I do not want to cause a dust up here. In the prosperity after the 1950's no one hunts for true subsistence almost anyone can afford an entry level rifle, so I honestly want to know what is the reasoning or motivation for shooting a .22-250 at middle weight game animals. There have been quantum leaps in bullets, optics, re-thinking twist rates, since the days of the old hunters, but I can imagine the caustic comments of guys like Bob Hagel, Finn Aagard, Ken Howell etc.

They simply work.What more do you need to know?

If Hagel, Aagard, or Howell were caustic toward what obviously works, they'd not have the reputation they do. For them, the 22-250 was a varmint round with a 1:14 twist. If one steps up to a fast-twist and picks the right bullets, it's a death lazer on medium game (and bigger).

And there can be lots of reasons that people subsistence hunt that has nothing to do with "affording".

I like the 60 grain Partition.

I have a 1-8 twist Ruger American .22-250, and used it 2-3 years ago to kill the largest pronghorn buck in the area, at 350 yards. The bullet chosen was the 70-grain Hornady GMX, though I tried some others in the rifle, including the 62 TTSX. (The 70-grain AccuBond was not quite available then.). The Hornady shot the best, so got picked. It worked fine, penetrating to the far shoulder on an angling away shot, and retaining all its weight.

I knew it would work, having experience with .22 centerfires on big game going back to the late 1980s when my wife was using a .220 Swift with 60-grain Nosler Solid Bases, the soft-point forerunner of the Ballistic Tip. As far as I could tell, it worked just about identically to the .243 Winchester on antelope and deer, except for shooting flatter at "normal" ranges, due to a muzzle velocity of 3650 fps. And we never recovered one, if that makes any difference. They left an exit hole about like a 100-grain .243 bullet as well.

Also have a local friend, a retired outfitter, who's been using the .22-250 on elk for a number of years now. He only hunts cows anymore, and when he gets up on a herd, he put whatever 55-grain he's handloaded behind the shoulder, and the cow falls over pretty quickly. He much prefers the .22-250 to the 7mm Remington Magnum he used during his outfitting days, because it kicks less--and the bullet never exits, preventing hitting another elk in the herd.

Before anybody gets excited about this possibly being illegal, Montana has no restrictions on what caliber or case length or bullet weight or WHATEVER you choose to use on big game. You can hunt them legally with a .22 Long Rifle, but apparently our game department takes the view that hunters will use something that works, even if in somebody else's imagination it won't.

I had no clue the .22-250 was that effective, in my game deprived area the .22-250 cartridge (garden variety 1:12, 1:14 spin) is just hauled around in the pickup with the hay hooks and fencing tools. Used on ground squirrels, jacks and coyotes. I gotta get out more I guess.