.223 Performance on Deer

[Dee]

teddy the problem with listening to to much advice on the internet is very little of it is first hand. To many are just repeating what they heard on the internet or from there buddy or from a gun writer trying to praise something that is paying his wages. One guy with a name says something works or doesnt and all of a sudden everyone that doesnt really know jumps on the bandwagon and repeats it to look like they know guns. Or one guy makes a poor shot with a .223 and rather then admit he made a poor shot or even is a poor shot he badmouths the gun or round. I havent PERSONALY killed a truck load of deer with the .223 but have shot a few of them and have seen my buddy shoot a few more and with a good bullet like the partition and a well placed shot i can about guarantee you that back straps will be on the breakfast menu.

Now Lloyd I would take issue with a couple of you points here. That is if I disagreed with any of them. Your dead on.

[Lloyd Smale]

Pal i have too and if you wont admit you missed you either are a lier or just havent hunted and shot enough game. Just two nights ago doing crop damage deer shooting my buddy and i both cleanly missed two deer at just 200 and 250 yards. They stood there after the shot looking at us and walked off into the woods. We did kill two others with shots out past 300 yards. Figure that one out! 

Lloyd, I've missed lots of pigs with my .223.  And my .243.  And my 7.62X54R.  And my 30-06.  And with some 00 Buck.  And with a variety of handguns.  It wasn't the gun's fault.  Sometimes I miss.  

[jmayton]

Pal i have too and if you wont admit you missed you either are a lier or just havent hunted and shot enough game. Just two nights ago doing crop damage deer shooting my buddy and i both cleanly missed two deer at just 200 and 250 yards. They stood there after the shot looking at us and walked off into the woods. We did kill two others with shots out past 300 yards. Figure that one out! 

Well, the way I read it in most of the gun mags and websites is that whatever particular caliber you were using is especially suited to killing deer past 300 yds but will either go around or straight through (without expansion and without doing enough damage to kill, wound, nor seriously annoy) an animal at less than 300yds.  If you'd had a switch-barrel rifle and an extra barrel in one of the sub-300yd chamberings, you'd have 4 deer instead of two!

Seriously, just pointing out that I'm not one of those that would say that I never miss and can kill anything with any caliber.  I gotta agree with Dee, Lloyd, you're spot-on as usual.

And Dee, don't let Lloyd know, but I'm just kidding about the missing thing.  I actually shot a pig the other night at 450yds at night, one handed out the passsenger side door of the jeep while driving across the field at about 45mph!

[Dee]

Thanks for the info jamyton, I was beginning to think I had put a ringer on a pedestal. I knew ya could do.

[nomosendero]

I have read where some (1 on this site) have said they have never missed or never wounded an animal. I find that quite remarkable, that is if they have shot alot of animals, you could say I think they lie.

Last year we went on a Mule Deer/Antelope hunt. Big brother had an antelope Doe tag & he had one close, 90-100 yds. He whispered he wanted to shoot my rifle, a Match Grade 25-06AI Sendero with 117 Sierra's. He had a rest & shot, nothing happened. We looked for blood & I thought odd, but shook it off. About 30 minutes later, I shot at a Antelope Buck & not over 200 yds, with a rest, a chip shot. Same thing!!
I concluded the gun was off, we finished the hunt with little brother's 25-06 & fairly long shots. When we got back to AR I was anxious to see how much my death ray was off. IT Wasn't!! 
That was not the only time I missed of course, but the only time in WY & I still do not know what happened!
Maybe those shots were too close!!

Anyway, it looked like confession time.

[Flynmoose]

My Grandpa always used to say that people that don't
make any mistakes aren't doing much. In my case, luck
works better than skill.

[teddy12b]

My Grandpa always used to say that people that don't
make any mistakes aren't doing much. In my case, luck
works better than skill.

There's a lot of simple truth in that.

[JWP58]

Its official.

I have read so many threads on NUMEROUS forums out there, i am going to document my hunting season this year using the .223 cartrigde, which will consist of Deer and Hogs.

I will be taking pictures of the damage produced and break down each shot ( yardage, position of animal, shot placement)...

My goal? To really see if the .223 is up to the task of taking medium sized game with properly designed bullets.

I will try and use a multitude of projectiles, including barnes tsx (53gr and 62gr) and other popular rounds. Note that my .223 barrel is 1/9 twist so i doubt i'll be able to use 75gr + weight bullets. But i will test some 70gr at the range to see if they key hole or not.

STAY TUNED!!! I might be going after some hogs as early as this weekend.....

[teddy12b]

Its official.

I have read so many threads on NUMEROUS forums out there, i am going to document my hunting season this year using the .223 cartrigde, which will consist of Deer and Hogs.

I will be taking pictures of the damage produced and break down each shot ( yardage, position of animal, shot placement)...

My goal? To really see if the .223 is up to the task of taking medium sized game with properly designed bullets.

I will try and use a multitude of projectiles, including barnes tsx (53gr and 62gr) and other popular rounds. Note that my .223 barrel is 1/9 twist so i doubt i'll be able to use 75gr + weight bullets. But i will test some 70gr at the range to see if they key hole or not.

STAY TUNED!!! I might be going after some hogs as early as this weekend.....

Sounds like a great plan!  Good luck hunting.

[equinoxbuilders]

JWP58,

Let us know how it goes
I'll be using a .223 this year for Northeastern Whitetail.
Not for me, but my two kids. One 14 and the other 12. Both 5' tall, approx. 100lbs.
They both love shooting the Saiga .223 over my modified Mini-14.
The Saiga shoots 62g Prvi Partizan very well.  Seems to be it's favorite.
I'll be getting a few boxes of either Black Hills or Corbon 62g. TSX..(not tried yet)
We only hunt horns, so any whitetail we get with these should be 170lbs dressed or more.
I'll also post info if we are fortunate to. (too bad the 10 pointer we have on cam is in a shotgun only town). 

[equinoxbuilders]

Good luck.

[bubbinator]

To : jmayton, 1st - great bullet choice and pics/post.  Being from AL, 22 Centerfire w/ expanding bullets is legal  here.  I most ly hunt from ground blinds after a near fall from a home-made club tree stand.  If I go to hunt as a guest, I take my .308 Rem 700 HB Sendero. Where I have time to choose the scenario, I have taken deer up to a 189# 8-pt with a .22-250 pistol(Sav Stryker-55 Rem HP), .221 Fireball; 222 Rem X 6;  223 Rem X 10; .220 Swift X 3.  Bullets have been Sierra HPBTs, Speer 63 gr Semi Pt(1973 USAF Marksmanship load that hammered a 6 pt-DTR in 1999!) and 2  WW 60 gr Nosler Partitions that exitted 2 does, but they never went more than 10 yds from POI. Note- That WW 60 NP load is a Ranger LE load issued to FedLE.  It pentrates almost exactly as much as a 150gr. 308!  I shoot other calibers as well, 25-06, 243, 260, 7mm-08, 308.  Have 30-06 that is a safe queen for yrs.  Everything I ever did with a 224 bullet did what I wanted it to, IMHO.  Never/will never own Magnum rifle, I'm secure with what I have.

[454Puma]

jmayton
  I haven't shot any deer with my .223 AR don't know if I would. But if I did I'd probably use the 63 gr SEI !
My Colt shoots them very well and the Yote pictured below was taken at 134 yards and the bullet did very well caliber size  in and about .75" coming out so it probably looked just like your 55 gr!

[jmayton]

Another note on killing power:  Conventional wisdom says that you need 1000ft/lbs of energy to reliably kill.  The little 55gr GameKings and I guess for that matter, most 55gr .224 bullets travelling between 2900 and 3100fps only have 1000ft/lbs at the muzzle.  The two deer I killed were killed with 900 and 850ft/lbs respectively.  The 55gr only has 778ft/lbs at 100 yds and we've killed deer and hogs all the way out to 240yds (519ft/lbs) with them.  I would certainly say that more energy is better (I'm wanting to build a 6.5-06 which will carry 1000ft/lbs out to 700yds with 140grainers), this does say something about the energy needed to effectively kill deer and hogs.

And before everybody jumps on the .223 is too small for deer argument again, I'm talking about well placed shots in ideal conditions and again, it's not my first choice, just what I have with me most of the time now when I'm out in the field.  If you're not sure, get something in a caliber that begins in .3.

[Dee]

I wouldn't worry too much about anyone saying that they know what is imperative to kill deer reliably. They kill elk with a bow and arrow. Yea, Yea, I know. A bow kills differently than a bullet. They also kill them with a muzzle loader that's way less in foot pounds than a 223. Yea, Yea, I know. They kill differently too.
Just hit'em with your pickup. It kills differently than a Peterbilt. jmayton puts'em down with a 55gr bullet and they stay down. Nuff said.
If it works, it works.

[jmayton]

Just to argue with myself a bit, I experienced the downside of the .223 this afternoon.  I came up on a water hole I always expect to see hogs at.  And sure enough, a big boar was standing on the bank looking at me.  As I raised the rifle, he turned away and I took the only shot I had, a quartering away shot aiming just back from the shoulder, which is just about the worst shot to take.  Anyway, I'm pretty sure I hit the boar, because he jumped pretty good and took off around the bank.  I tried to track, but there was no blood anywhere to be found.  I sure would have liked to have something with a little more ooompf right then.  But, I made up for it by dispatching a couple more this evening. 

[Dee]

jmayton, that's like squirrel huntin in quail season. You have your favorite 22, and low and behold you come across 4 covey's with over 30 birds in each covey. There ain't no perfect gun, for every circumstance.
My Grandfather had a 22 lever action, and single shot 12 gauge shotgun. I mean, that's all he had.
I never heard he complain, or debate, what if, what if, what if. He might have bought another gun if he could have afforded to, but he could not.
Gun magazines have poured out BS for the over 50 years now, and the so called experts are just as full of BS as the editors. Their salesmen selling opinions, and that's all they are. Opinions! And most times they are opinions with no basis. Stay with the same gun all the time like my Grandpa, and you learn to make up for it's weaknesses, and make it work. At that point you can do anything anyone else can do with a "so called" better suited gun.

[jmayton]

What we need, Dee, is a semi-auto variable caliber rifle.  You know, like those 4-color click pens.  You just select the appropriate caliber for your need, then fire away.  And, oh yeah, it needs to look like a standard sporter rifle, weigh no more than 7lbs, and be capable of .25moa in every caliber, and have the ability to change any one of it's multiple calibers at any time.

[teddy12b]

Could always put an extra upper with a loaded mag in a backpack.  Two pins and you could have a 458 socom, 450 bushmaster, 6.8mm spc, etc. 

[Dee]

What we need, Dee, is a semi-auto variable caliber rifle.  You know, like those 4-color click pens.  You just select the appropriate caliber for your need, then fire away.  And, oh yeah, it needs to look like a standard sporter rifle, weigh no more than 7lbs, and be capable of .25moa in every caliber, and have the ability to change any one of it's multiple calibers at any time.

Then some gun rag writer could do an article on it, and convince all the readers that it was imperative that you own this gun, as you could not really hunt without it, and to do so would be amateurish and inhumane.

[jmayton]

Exactly, and if we were the ones to produce said gun, then we could be raking in the cash!

[Wyo. Coyote Hunter]

  jm, while you did dispatch a couple more later, you may have lost an animal by using too light a gun..I have not problem with killing animals, Lord knows that, but there was a possible cripple you may have left to die a slow, lingering death...I know it was a hog and there are probably lots of them in your area, but all animals deserve a quick death at our hands..I am not preaching to you, there is not one of us who has hunted that has not lost game if we have shot very much, but we do need to carry a weapon that will do what we need done...a good friend foolishly took a .222 out the 4th day of Pa.s buck season several years ago...he was only going for a short hunt .. as luck would have it he saw the biggest whitetail of his life, trailing a doe...he made a careful shot and the buck fell with in sight...he stooped to pick up his brass and when he straighted up, all he saw was the bucks flag waving good by..a little blood, nothing to trail it by..not a good feeling...I think all of us who love firearms wonder what different guns will do when used on game...that is one thing that keeps my interest in hunting and shooting high, but a few incidents like loosing an animal with too light a caliber causes me to want a good strong caliber for the the game I am hunting..I seldom use the 223 on  coyotes..here ranges lengthen quickly, and the little round runs out of steam pretty quickly..enough said..I do not mean to be a jerk about the situation, it is one we have all faced...but it is something I think we should keep in mind when we select our weapons...

[Dee]

Unless on a game ranch you will seldom see a 7 year old hog. Due to their constant foraging, and eating anything available, including ground nesting game birds, their eggs, deer fawns, agricultural crops, and even small pets, their teeth wear down, and they become diseased, and sick, and slowly starve to death over a sometimes long period of time. They are a nuisance in this part of the country, and wipe out food sources for other natural game such as quail, turkey, squirrel, deer, rabbits, EVEN COYOTE PUPS, and farm animals.
Someone whom doesn't live here, and doesn't have a clue of the concept, of an animal not native to the area, that starts reproducing at age 6 months, and producing litters as large as 12 to 13 piglets, which in turn also start producing at age 6 months, and have never seen this decimation "fact" doesn't know what their talkin about, and this is the case of Wyo.Coyote Hunter.
If the hog lost by jmayton had the opportunity to breed, whether a boar, or a sow, it alone is responsible for producing several thousand offspring in a short period of time.
WCH, he ain't shootin elk, deer, antelope, or coyotes. He's shooting a pestilence that even the ag agents down here don't know what to do about. KEEP SHOOT'IN JMAYTON, AND SO WILL I. SHOOT AS MANY AS YOU CAN, THEY WILL REPLACE THEMSELVES 10 FOLD. IF YOU DON'T THERE WON'T BE ANY GAME ANIMALS IN THE NOT TOO DISTANT FUTURE, AND ALREADY ISN'T IN SOME AREAS.
Folks that don't live here, have not a clue.

[351 power]

if there was no blood then assuming that a pig suffered a slow death is just an asumption. we could also assume a miss and be just as correct. and as much as i would not cause intentional suffering i certainly would not lose too much sleep over a coyote that ran off to die out of my sight instead of laid out directly. the picture dee paints of pigs and their destruction causes me to think the same about them even though they are not in my area.

[Dee]

351 they are near plague status in some areas, and are a carrier of pseudorabies. They will get in a creek and follow it leaving nothing but rooted up vegetation. They will literally starve out a squirrel population, and even litters of rabbits are eaten.
Our local farmer have complained, hired professional hunters etc, but the Ag agents says there is nothing that can be done. They are a shoot on sight animal. One of my friends planted 300 acres last year, and that night the hogs came in and got 13 acres of the seed IN ONE NIGHT. They have such a good nose they can literally follow the planter rows. I have seen 20 acres of bermuda grass pasture ruined in one night by hogs rootin for the grub worms in the roots.
Because of hogs and fire ants, we have almost no bobwhite quail, (they eat the eggs), and in many areas no rabbits and squirrel. If they get in an area with deer, they will kill and eat the fawns, turkey eggs, you name it. The farmers and cattlemen have tried letting citizens come in and hunt but, they leave gates open, drive across crops, and on and on. Some from Dallas have came down and paid to hunt, but get mad if they don't kill anything. They think their huntin a game ranch environment, so the farmers let only a select few hunt that they know and trust.
I hunt virtually anywhere I want as I know almost everyone here, and I kill'em where I see'em. If I kill a good hog, I call around to see if someone wants him. If not, he stays where he lays, and the coyotes and other hogs get him.

[Wyo. Coyote Hunter]

  While it is true I may not have a "clue" on the numbers of hogs in Tx.  I do know that it is my ethical responsibility to kill and animal as cleanly and quickly as possible..I intend to use enough weapon to do the job...any other actions or statements plays right into the hands of anti hunters and anti gunners..

[rickt300]

Wyo, Coyote Hunter, I have lived in Tx since before the hog reached the numbers we have now and have seen the damage. It is incredible, unless you have seen it you can't imagine it. Their ability to do damage far exceeds what twice as many coyotes could do. Texas is also a tough place to hunt with many thorny bushes and trees. Even a well hit hog can make it to an impenetrable place impossible to retrieve him from. I too hate to lose them, not from a sportsmans point of view but because I don't get to decide his disposition wether it be feed the buzzards, take a picture or put him on ice. The way they populate an area so fast they often ruin the area for other animals so fast it is too late to even try to stop them. I used to give my fellow hunters a hard time for taking poor percentage shots but I am over it. Kill all you can for there will always be plenty to go around.

[Dee]

I guess your against foot hold traps, and trappin too. Of course you know, their not all drownin sets, and most trappers don't shoot'em, they punk'em?
If I'm squirrel huntin with a 22, and a hog gives me "any kind of shot", I gonna take it. If I'm shootin 7 1/2 low base shells at dove, and hog gives me "any kind of shot", I'm gonna take. The same people that criticize caliber, use rat poison to kill rats. There nothin humane about blowing a hole thru an elk, deer, turkey, whatever. Hunting is nothing more than "killing" a healthy animal and calling it by a different name.

[Wyo. Coyote Hunter]

  Don't get so worked up Dee because not everyone follows your ideas... As for my stand on trapping, I favor it... As for you ideas of shooting an animal and causing pain with out killing it, if you can live with it, it is nothing to me..

[jmayton]

Wyo., I completely understand your argument, but Dee's right.  Hogs are like big, mobile, prairie dogs.  They are about the most destructive animals that I've seen.  And on a couple of the ranches I go on, if I have a gun and see a hog, I'd better put a bullet or two downrange at it. . . even if all I have is a .22lr.  I would not take a quartering away shot on a deer.  Back to my OP, the deer I shot last year was broadside and the other one was quartered toward me.  Easy to get that little bullet to the heart with those shots.  But a big hog, quartering away, the best I was hoping to do was slow it down enough so I could get closer an finish it off.  That may not sit well with one's sense of ethical hunting, but to protect the other games species here that is what we have to do.  The general attitude here is to put them on the ground by whatever means necessary.  

351, you're right, I may have competely missed.  But sometimes the big hogs don't bleed without a big exit wound. . . there's just to much fat (I've seen it 2 1/2 inches thick along the back and nearly that on the shoulders).  All that fat just seals up the entrance wound.