Rick--My only .17 caliber rifles are both .17 Remingtons. I prefer to shoot bullets that weigh a minimum 25 grains, but preferably even heavier than that. Right now I am using some 27.8 gr. Hammett BT HP bullets and they seem to be working pretty good. I am looking for some 27 to 30 gr. cup based bullets for my .17 Remingtons too. The old North Dakota wind seems to be pretty tough on those little 20 gr. bullets, but with some practice you can make hits even with those light weight projectiles in stiff winds.
Last November, my son and I went down to the National Grasslands on November 11 (right during deer gun season) and potted a few prairie poodles. He had my Lilja barreled .17 Remington and was shooting my 20 gr. V-Max reloads (muzzle velocity slightly over 4,000 fps). I was using my Tikka Master Sporter in 22-250 and trying out some 50 gr. Sierra BlitzKings and 50 gr. Nosler BTs I had loaded to see how they worked compared to my usual 40 gr. Nosler BT loads. They worked GREAT!!!
The wind was wafting out of the west at a steady 20 mph (Caldwell Wind Wizard reading) so we tried to set up so we were shooting with the wind or barely cross wind. Here's a couple of victims of my 50 gr. loads from the 22-250.
This one was lasered at 225 yards:
Here's one that met a 50 gr. bullet at 250 yards distance. I had to have my photo taken with that one. The orange vest was worn to try to keep deer hunters from mistaking us for deer!!!!
The prairie dogs in this little town had obviously been shot at quite a bit and weren't giving us many targets to shoot at, plus they don't seem to be nearly as active when the wind is whipping 20 mph either. Our final shots of the day were over 250 yards and the wind was almost 90º to the line of flight of the bullets. Both of us have trajectory and wind deflection charts on our stocks and the numbers for wind deflection are for a 10 mph 90º wind, so we just doubled that number for wind deflection hold off. We were both doing pretty good at hitting the little prairie dogs considering the distances and conditions. My son had made several hits on PDs out at the 250 to 300 yard range. Finally, we spotted three or four prairie dogs around a mound that was a tad over 325 yards away and decided that I would count out loud 1 - 2 - 3 and then say FIRE and we'd try shoot simultaneously to see if we could each score a hit. My son had two prairie dogs sitting pretty close together left to right on the left side of the mound and I had just one on the right side of the mound. When I called off the 1 - 2 - 3 - FIRE, we both shot and I made a hit on mine. I asked my son if he hit his. He looked over at me, smiled, and said,
"I hit a prairie dog, but it was the one to the left of the one I was aiming at!!!" I told him, "See, it is better to be lucky than good any day!!!" We had a good laugh over that one.
There was one prairie dog a bit further out than those we had just shot. This one measured 353 yards on my Leica 1200 Range Finder. My son encouraged me to take the shot and I deferred to him. I wasn't real sure I could make the hit, even though it was only 28 yards further away than my last hit. He decided he was up to the challenge. We double-checked his wind deflection chart and the drop. I was spotting for him and told him to shoot when ready. He held off to the right and above the PD and squeezed off the shot. I could see just a tiny bit of
RED MIST!!!! as the prairie dog tipped over. We both stood up and I had to give him a high five on that shot!!!
We walked out to where the prairie dog had been standing and I had my son pose with the unlucky prairie dog. He, too, is wearing the orange vest for self-preservation against deer hunters who might think we look like deer!!!
We called it a day and drove home for some supper.
