The .204 Ruger is a great round and super accurate, as long as it is a calm day, throw a little wind in the picture and you will deffinitely want something with a heavier bullet.

While I like the .204, he mentioned wanting to shoot deer, not sure about a .204 for deer...

I brought up the .204 for comparison to the .220 swift and the .22-250.

If anyone is looking for a dual purpose deer & varmint rifle, you'd be hard pressed to do any better then a .243 Win.

http://www.gunnersden.com/index.htm.243winchester.html

Personally I wouldn't shoot a Deer with the smaller caliber Varmint/Predator Rifles...will a .204 Ruger take down a Deer "Yes" if the shot placement is good but the chances of the Deer getting away wounded are pretty good and we are taught to make good clean Ethical kill shots.The lowest Caliber I would use to hunt Deer with is a .223,I use a Browning A-bolt Hunter in a .243 and I have shot several Deer with it.I've got several nice Big Does and have 2 nice 8-Point Bucks mounted on my wall that I harvested with the Browning .243 using Hornady Custom shells in 100 grains.


Each State is different so You need to find out what Caliber Rifles are allowed to hunt with...here in Missouri I believe as long as it is a Center-fire bullet Rifle You can use it...not too crazy about that because the Remington 17,.22 Hornet and even the .204 are smaller Caliber Rifles that have the Center-fire bullets,most only have bullets that are in the 30,40 grain range....I doubt if any go up to or over a 50 grain bullet?

I have used my Browning .243 for Deer and for Coyotes and it does a great job and I haven't lost a Deer or Coyote yet when using it.