praire dog load
 

Looking for a praire dog load for my savage 12 fv 1 in 9 twist. Criteria is inexpensive bullet, fairly fast and shoot under .5 moa. I was shooting the barnes varminators in front of H335 but barnes stopped making them shot well under .5 best group at .25 or a hair under.

RE: praire dog load
 

forgot to mention in .223
Thanks

RE: praire dog load
 

50 grain V-max should do just fine. About 3300 fps?? Sounds good to me. I fully concur with your powder choice. This bullet shoots real well in my RR Varmint. I am looking forward to the day I can chase PD's with this outfit. Tom.

RE: praire dog load
 

what exactly do you consider inexpensive?? because with me when P-dog season rolls around I put the V-max's away and whip out the $45 for 500 bulk Hornady SXSP's in 50 grains. out of my Savage model 10FP these bullets are grouping under an inch at 200 yards.

RE: praire dog load
 

I would want my bullets under $10 a hundred. I know my rifle can shoot the v-maxes and the sierras great, but aren't worth using for a praire dog load.

RE: praire dog load
 

I have got to get in on this PD shooting. It sounds like you guys are having way too much fun. I got to hunt Jack's a few times in Arizona, and it was the most fun I have ever had. We did that with 22LR's and 22 Magnums.

I thought V-Max bullets were fairly inexpensive, but if you guys are doing so much PD shooting that V-Max cost is prohibitive-then WOW I have got to get in on this. Our ground hog hunting here in WV and PA has went down hill a good bit. Alot of people blame that on coyotes. I do not know why, I just know that it has gone down hill. Tom.

RE: praire dog load
 

under 10 bucks per 100 I totally agree thats why im using the SXSP's. asmuch as ya miss for asmany time as you connect with P-dogs its senseless to throw expensive bullets. you outta try those hornady SXSP's they are every bit as brutal as a ballistic tip on impact but are deffinately considerably cheaper than V-max's.

RE: praire dog load
 

that would be my suspicion exactly coyotes breed like rabbits.. one bitch is capable of producing asmany as 4 litters a year with asmany as 6 pups surviving per litter than the female pups are breedable at 6 months old its possible for one litter to produce asmany as 42 more yotes in just 1 year and if not enough natural predators or hunters are doing enough to lower yote populations then yer gonna see a decline in small game species since a coyotes diet can consume their body weight worth of small game per day. I can go into more detail but i think ya see the picture. ya outta consider yote hunting too. I do alot of it out here, and seems to be getting quite popular aswell atleast so it seems since quail and ground squirrel populations are begining to boom again.

RE: praire dog load
 

Bull pucky! HighDesert, I challenge you to find one piece of evidence that says a female coyote breeds more than once/year! From the time a female gets inpregnated to the time the pups are ready to leave the den is over 4.5 months. It's pretty common knowledge that the breeding season is around Feb./Mar. for all coyotes in this country.With a liter of 3-9 pups, not all of them will make it past 6 months.As far as cheap bullets go, if you can build a load that is very accurate with the cheapest bullets, that's the way to go, it's tough to do sometimes though. And if you can't hit the target and have to shoot at it 2-3 times, then a single accurate more expensive bullet would be the better choice. I shot about 1000 rounds in the last two weekends at p-dogs, gotta take this weekend to catch up on work.[8D]

RE: praire dog load
 

I totally agree with you howler on the bullet part anyways don't know anything about the breeding habits of coyotes. I demand the accuracy out of my pd loads. I still think half the fun is taking the 400 yd plus shots and connecting.

RE: praire dog load
 

you dont live in Arizona now do you?? they breed all year long here

RE: praire dog load
 

Any help with a load. Anyone got a load that shoots under .5 moa

RE: praire dog load
 

This link will give you all the info you need to know about coyotes and I don't think that it makes any difference where you live.http://www.desertusa.com/june96/du_cycot.html

RE: praire dog load
 

I see pups all year long around here for that to be the case they would have to breed all year long. the yote population is insane in my area.. I hunt them all year long and kill 60 to 70 a year and it doesnt seem to even phase the population. ofcourse yer all arm chair experts on the subject but I tell it as I see it with my own two eyes. Now ya gonna call me a liar??

RE: praire dog load
 

Not all rifles are the same, even with the same exact loads. You really need to build YOUR load for YOUR rifle. Taking someone else pet load and loading 1000 of them for your rifle would be simply setting yourself up for dissappointment, if not soemthing worse.

HighDesert, my challenge still stands. If, in fact, the coyotes in your little neck of the woods do breed multiple times/year, then that is news worthy and someone some where would have it documented, so show me!
I know a couple of guys that kill over 100 coyotes/year in thier neck of the woods, but they aren't claiming it's because of mulitple breeding periods. Mother nature has the coyote wired to breed once a year and welp during spring time, because that is when the highest amount of food source is available for predators and gives the pups a better chance of survival, and even then only about 1/3 of them make it to the one year mark. Think about it, if pups were being born in the middle of winter, do you REALLY think they'd have a chance in heck to survive?
One other thing, not every first year female breeds and has pups.

RE: praire dog load
 

Not all rifles are the same, even with the same exact loads. You really need to build YOUR load for YOUR rifle. Taking someone else pet load and loading 1000 of them for your rifle would be simply setting yourself up for dissappointment, if not soemthing worse.

HighDesert, my challenge still stands. If, in fact, the coyotes in your little neck of the woods do breed multiple times/year, then that is news worthy and someone some where would have it documented, so show me!
I know a couple of guys that kill over 100 coyotes/year in thier neck of the woods, but they aren't claiming it's because of mulitple breeding periods. Mother nature has the coyote wired to breed once a year and welp during spring time, because that is when the highest amount of food source is available for predators and gives the pups a better chance of survival, and even then only about 1/3 of them make it to the one year mark. Think about it, if pups were being born in the middle of winter, do you REALLY think they'd have a chance in heck to survive?
One other thing, not every first year female breeds and has pups.

RE: praire dog load
 

they do when its still 80 degrees out in the dead of winter in most of the state... Im in Arizona for the 3rd time...

RE: praire dog load
 

It's not that the pups would freeze to death, but since there would be so much less food source such as deer fawn, baby rabbits, insects, fruit, etc., they would starve to death!

Once again, SHOW ME PROOF, otherwise, I stand behind my statement that it's bullpucky! You're trying to convince me that the coyotes where you live are different than all the other coyotes in this country! Show me proof!

RE: praire dog load
 

sure I know i was exagerating on my earlier statement. I know an individual female coyote only breeds once a year. but the coyotes here in AZ do breed all year long. its not like theres some law stating that coyotes can only breed 3 months out of the year... not all females are pregnant at all the same time either and neither do they come into season at all the same exact time.. for example one female may have bred in november when another that didnt breed untill february ya see my point now.

coyotes have two breeding cycles a year a female coyote comes into heat once in the fall and once in the spring, fall and spring are 6 months a part incase you didnt know.. thats why its possible for me to see pups all year long, when I said pups i didnt mean just born ones I meant anything under a year old. like I said I do see pups all year long. and yes females yotes are able to breed as early as 6 months old.. show me something that says differently.

so realistically if a litter of 6 pups and say 3 of them survive to the minimum breedin age of 6 months and two of them are females since the statistics show higher numbers of females. and those 2 females have litters of six which 3 survive and 2 were females. so figuring in a realistic survivability rate yer looking at 6 to 8 coyotes can originate from 1 female in a year now take away the realistic survivability rate and lets say all the yotes survive from each litter we are talking as high as 20 yotes originating from 1 female in a year. so it is however possible for 6 to 20 coyotes to originate from 1 female in a year.

Still my point even with many natural predators and hunters harvesting coyotes. its very difficult to get a handle on booming yote populations which in turn eat small game and thats why small game populations are going down..

RE: praire dog load
 

absolutely, lets get off the coyote debate!

My PD load came about by accident. I purchased some inexpensive remington hollow point bullets and set them on top of H322 powder.http://www.midwayusa.com/eproductpage.exe/showproduct?saleitemid=611894
Speeds are a little slow but shot sub 1/2 MOA. Ala Cazam cheap PD load.

RE: praire dog load
 

Never tried them, but might you check them out. MidwayUSA dogtown Rifle bullets $9.49/100. Sorry no load help, I'm a .243 and 6mm/06 varmint guy.