Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Predators and Varmints What rimfire round for a pd hunt?

For bigger varmints, and even deer under the right circumstances, I agree 100% with you that the 22 MRF is a better killer. But for ground squirrels and pdogs, the fragile 17 grain plastic tipped bullets fired from either the 17HMR or the 17HM2 really tear 'em apart. I have a couple of heavy barrel Savage 93R17BVSS and a Savage 93R17BV with a heavy Green Mountain 77/22 barrel that I'm really happy with. I know that several guys at my gun club bought Savage 93s after shooting mine and, for some of them, shooting their 1st ever sub-MOA groups. The rifle with the Green Mountain barrel was originally a Savage 93R17F, but I could never get that light barreled rifle to shoot in the same zip code as my heavy barrel Savage rifles, so I restocked it with a laminated stock via eBay and rebarreled it with a Green Mountain barrel via the GM internet specials.

JEff

17M2 out to 100+ yds with a solid rest

upper body hits DRT

How many rounds before these 17 rimfires need a cleaning?

I'll run 100 rds or so before I clean with 2-3 patches

on my M2

I agree with JB on this, a couple years ago me and my nephew hunted on a private ranch that only rimfires are allowed. we shot 1000 rounds each through our 17HMR's we found out quickly that the HP's suck, luckily we only had 1 50 round box. we shot a few at the 300 yard mark but they are really out of gas at that range. but it was a really calm weekend and we shot many at 250 yds.
Only problem was cost......2000round's of HMR is spendy.

btw on larger varmints like rockchuck's 150 to 175yds is max

My shooting pards and I have stretched the 17HMR out past 200 many, many times and out to 300 more than once. No, the kills arent spectacular compared to the centerfires and you'll find yourself praying for a lull in the wind more often than not. But they offer about the most you can ask for in accuracy and distance when it comes to rimfires. Whoever mentioned using them "in between" while the centerfires barrels are cooling is spot on. We like to start the shooting off with the HMR's and don't break out the bigger stuff until everything inside of 200 has been well hammered.

Yep, that's a good technique. The mild report of the .17 HMR doesn't scare dogs into their holes nearly as quickly as even a mild centerfire like the .17 Fireball or .22 Hornet.

Exactly. I have noticed that on PDs at 100 yards or more, the 17HMR frightens them no more than a 22LR with subsonic loads does inside 100 .

Haven't used the 22 that much but to at least 100 it's a kick--

The 17HMR will take em to 200 yds with NO wind. Other times you will even score a triple with one shot.

I've shot rock chucks that are as big as a small dog with tricked out 10/22 using .22lr Winchester Xperts with the large hollow point if the range is under 75 yards. When I hunt them we have one place where the range is that close and there isn't much challenge to shoot them with a hot .224 center-fire with a 6x24 scope at that distance.

Those Xperts will do the job on the rockchucks although a follow up shot is a good idea. I would think that the PD's are smaller so if the range is close I would try a .22lr.

Calm wind or not, if you have high magnification and target knobs, you can walk your shots in from a long way off with a 17 HMR for squirrels and p. dogs.

22 mag has a lot more knock down power on chucks, depending on the yardage.

I had a 2.5-20 leupold with the target knobs marked for yardage in 25 yd increments to 200 yards for a 22 mag. A parnter and I killed what seemed everything out at 200-250 on one calm day with the 22 Mag. However, the 17 HMR is a whole lot flatter shooting than the 22 mag.

The 17 HMR kicks up very little dust so you can't exactly see where your bullet hits, hence the need for a stronger scope if you want to stretch the range to 350 like we did one day on a calm day in Wyoming.

They look plenty dead to me. I like it when they don't get down the hole.

Hey, I like 17HMRs as much as the next guy, but those Dogs did not die from being hit with that rifle.

It's obvious they were part of a radical religious Prairie dog cult that believed the end was near .They all drank poison Koolaid...

Good shootin'..

As an easterner, I don't have the prarie dogs to test things on, but woodchuck cannot seem to tell the difference between the 17hmr and the 22 rounds and the hits are more consistant with the 17 and they are a pretty big animal. Have stopped one or two at around 250, but 200 yards seems to be the consistant limit.

As said before, with the 22's they just fall over. The 17 HMR's are like a baby 223, they will bust them open out to about a hundred yards.

A 22 mag does well also.

We use 22 pistols to shoot out the window as we're looking for a long range shooting spot. I can't wait to get a PMR-30!!!!

A .22Mag with 30 grain bullets does things just right!~