I have hunted coyotes of and on for some time with my deer rifles but now that I am addicted a want to purchase a varmint rifle. I am having a hard time deciding between an older remington 700 heavy barrel .223 which is in mint condition and a tack-driver or a brand new weatherby vangard in 22-250. I am leaning more towards the .223 due to cheaper ammo and surplus supply's. Any Imput on If I should go up to the 22-250 or stick with the .223 would be much appreciated!

if most shots will be 300yards or less the .223 has all the punch you need. and it is quite a bit cheaper to shoot.

Prarie,
Do you have a 30-06? You could use .224 Accelerator Sabot's and save you
the cost of a new rifle.They have them for 30-30 also.

I would take that .223 Remington 700 any day of the week if I knew it shot good, and the price was right. Find out which load it shoots good now, buy the rifle, and forget about things. If you buy the Weatherby, you don't know if it will shoot worth beans, and it will take some time and money to figure that out.

Surprisingly due to popularity the 223 is actually not cheaper and in some cases more expensive then 22-250 ammo. But if you do use surplus ammo then .223 will deffinately be cheaper then 22-250 ammo. The only problem with surplus ammo is you will be limited to FMJ's and sometimes match hollow point ammo, match hollow point ammo is not designed to expand so i really wouldnt recommend it for use on game.

I had actually gone through the same problem trying to decided between .223 and 22-250 for a varmint gun, as a handloader i decided on a 22-250 because of the versatility of the 22-250. I can load up to 22-250 velocities or tone them down to 223 velocities depending what bullet im wanting to push. Either is a good choice, what you have to do is think about what exactly you want to do and weigh the pro's and con's of each caliber and see which one suite your fancy the best. good luck

Those weatherby vangards have very good out of the box accuracy, a friend has one in 30-06 and with federal premium vital shok 150 grain sierra gameking BTSP's he was shooting dime size groups at 100 yards.

I never really gave those vangards much thought, but after checking my friends rifle out they are made very well and the accuracy is very impressive. I am half tempted to buy one too.

...have NOT had good result with accelerators. Have shot them in 30-06 and 30-30. Can't report on accuracy...there wasn't any.

Just go with the 223. Ammo is real cheap at walmart. I use the Winchester Varmint JHP and the seem to shoot well in my rifle. And you can get good deals buying bulk ammo out of magazines too. Id stick to the 223, and that sounds like a nice rifle too.

Rebel hog who makes that kind of .30-06 ammo, my uncle has heard of this and whats to know where he can buy it

i would not tell anyone to buy accelerators. they are very very inaccurate. at 50 yards it was doing good buy putting 5 shots into a pie plate.

the 223 over the 22-250. i would go with the 223 if i was a non hand loader. their are just more bullets to choose from and you won't notice much different shooting the two until you get out past 350 yards. and with factory ammo i would say your best off keeping your shots inside of 300 yards weither it is a 22-250 or 223. but if you handload that is where the 22-250 shines. you can push it really fast or you can use a mild load and pretty much be shooting with the same balisitics as the 223

plus i would take a rem. 700 that shoots over a vanguard any day, even if i new the vanguard also shot well. the 700's are just a lot better quality gun IMO