dbozz

Thanks for all the good input guys! 100 yds.is a long shot in the terrain I hunt, and although I would like to step up to a. 223, or, .22-250, I'm also dealing with noise-shy landowners.

Scottdnramember

I have to point out that if a noise shy land owner can tell the difference in report of a 12ga and any of the centerfire .22 variants, I'd be surprised. PLus if there are so many coyotes running round that the noise of you shooting them is bothersome, just show them the dead yotes! They will get real agreeable once they see how many there are. If not, then it one or two shots a trip. No big deal.

Bernie P.

Neither is a good coyote gun even under 100yds.Stick with the 12!!!!

Nomercy448

I'd disagree here. Either of the .17HMR or .22WMR will be better at 75-100yrds than a 12ga. Either rifle will have better range than the 12ga.

Relatively speaking, 00 buck pellets have energy somewhere between a .22lr and a .22mag (200ft.lbs. per pellet vs. 110ft.lbs. for a .22lr, and 325ft.lbs. for a .22WMR). The downside is that they're ROUND with a terrible BC, and are SLOW (1300fps for the 00buck, 1900fps for the .22WMR). The low momentum and energy, plus the blunt "nose" of the pellets give them relatively poor penetration.

For T shot, on the other hand, each pellet has about 1/3 the energy of a .22lr. Again, the same problems with the low momentum and energy yielding poor penetration, and the low velocity and poor BC giving a TERRIBLE trajectory.

So if you connect, it's not going to penetrate as well.

But what about connecting? I can almost guarantee that I'll connect with my Savage 93 .22WMR at 100yrds on a headshot. Hitting a 1-2MOA target is childsplay with a rifle. I've patterned my Benelli Supernova's with different chokes and 00buck and T at 100yrds, I CANNOT guarantee a kill shot connection at 100yrds. Heck, based on these patterns, I wouldn't even bet on it. With 1oz (9pellet) 00buck, the best patterns I can get at 100yrds are best measured in Minutes of Coyote, not MOA.

For the noise aspect, then the .22WMR is the clear answer of the two. The .22WMR is lower pressure and lower velocity than the .17HMR, so in general, it's all around quieter.

Bernie P.

Granted the 12 or even a 10g is useless at 75+yds but with 4 buck or Heavy shot T they will get you around 55-60yds.Coyotes are tough critters.Beyond shotgun range you want a good CF like a .223 vs any RF.

Nomercy448

In general, I definitely agree, it's dam hard to beat a .223rem for coyotes. The OP has a good reason for wanting to use the rimfires.

One thing I have to throw in the ring, as you might have read in one of my threads posted today, is that while "in general" rimfires aren't ideal, they certainly do work.

Recap of my other thread: I was visiting my dad last weekend, and we were planning to run hounds that night for coons. My dad suggested we go coyote calling that afternoon, even though all we had with us were our coon rifles (3 Marlin 60 .22lr's). My bro-in-law felt the way you do, that rimfires just aren't enough for coyotes, so he didn't want to take a rifle, so my sis came along and used his instead.

All 3 of us shooters got a coyote, and my sis got a double (her first). All of our shots were head shots under 100yrds, with the closest shot around 40yrds, using CCI Mini-Mag 40grn solids.

Of course, I'm not saying a .22lr is the ideal coyote rifle, but I think it really puts some perspective on how much gun you really "need" for coyotes.

Bernie P.

Now we're up to killing bears with RF's.I know Bell killed over a thousand elephants with his .275 Rigby/7x57 but lets stay in the real world here folks.

Nomercy448

I think the "rimfire for coyotes" quote/unquote debate is very similar to the cartrdige debate for hogs. There are guys out there that have been knocking down hogs for generations with small caliber, small cartridges, with well placed shots behind the ear. Then there's the other half that treats a hog like any other big game, taking vitals zone shots, needing a heavy 30cal to punch through their fatty, gristly shield. Both work, but you hear the 30cal guys knocking the 22cal guys year after year, saying they're undergunned.

But it's hard to argue with dead hogs...

For coyotes, there's the 22CF guys that keep preaching that no RF is big enough. In my experience, if you ask these guys where to shoot a dog, again, they revert to their big game mentality, "shoot em in the vitals". It's a no-brainer that a .17HMR won't likely penetrate and produce an exit wound on a dog at 300yrds, but nobody's talking about that range. At 100yrds, putting a 17cal hole through a coyotes skull or heart is child's play.

At the end of the day, it's hard to argue with dead dogs...

So ultimately, there's no denying both work (22CF and mag RF's, even .22lr's occasionally).

It's hard to not have at least a mild case of "magnumitus" when we've been exposed to it for so long. If we look back at hunters that "used what they had, and it worked!" stories, you'll see tons of tales about Bell's elephants, or the .22 Hornet being used for polar bears, or Teddy and his .30-06 making a trip to africa, etc etc. We're so used to blowing exit wounds out the back side of animals and over powering game, we forget how little work REALLY needs to be done to take one down.

A bullet through the heart or brain will kill any animal on earth. A .17HMR or .22WMR (or even a .22LR) can push a bullet through a coyotes skull or rib at 100yrds, and most shooters with modern rimfire rifles and good optics can place a bullet inside 2" at 100yrds. If it has the "stuff", and you can get it there, odds are, it's going to do the job.

And it's dang nice dropping a single X-stitch closing up a single 22cal hole in my hides, rather than "footballing" out a golfball sized exit wound.

Nomercy448

This is one of the things I think guys easily forget. A .22WMR has as much energy at 250yrds as a .22lr has at the muzzle. I'm not saying that a 22mag should be used at 250, but in all fairness, nobody is going to argue that a .22lr at 10ft is pretty dang effective, sure seems to do the trick on my trap lines at least.

I actually had this same conversation with one of my cousins over Christmas dinner a few days ago. He's an avid trapper (45yrs and counting) that uses a .22lr to KO animals on his trap line, but he swears a .22WMR is just too "underpowered". It's inexperience talking. He's never used a .22WMR at that range, and never considered the relative energy levels. But he didn't have a good answer for "why will 90ft.lbs. kill a coyote at 10ft but not at 100yrds?"

Beyond that, most guys, even on this board, will agree that a .223rem has plenty of punch even past 500yrds for coyotes, and that accuracy is ultimately the limiting factor for not shooting that far. Relatively speaking, a .22WMR has about the same energy at 100yrds as a .223rem at 500yrds.

Moral of the story, if a .22lr works at 10ft, and a .223rem works at 500yrds, then the .22WMR is dang sure going to work at 100yrds (higher energy than either of the other two cases).

IndyHunter83

I read this post and can't help but shake my head. I'd say its been six months since i've been on this sight and still the same arguments. The fact is that the 17 HMR can kill a coyote and a 22 mag will kill one just as well. In fact I'd wager that they've probably killed just as many if not more than the 22 CFs.

But the fact also remains that just because you can do something doesn't mean tha you ought to try. I've hunted yotes with a 17 hmr the past three years. The one thing I've found is that body shots generally don't have much effect on them.

This past fall I had to trade off the 17hmr. I had surgery on my right shoulder and my 270 was too much rifle for it. So I traded it off for a 243 win. Head shots had the same result but the body shots with this cartridge had much more deadly effects than the rimfire cartridges.

I would say go for a small center fire such as the 223 or 204 the 22-250 is also a very good cartridge.