Varmint hunting caliber

[younggun]

Hey every one Im new to varmint hunting and im looking for a good caliber to get started with. I would like one with pretty good long range capability so as i start to reach farther the round will be more than capable of doing so. currently my max range is about 500yds but as i practice it gets farther and farther. im seeing some good things about the .243 win but really have no good base for it. I also saw the sps varmint on remingtons site and that definately is looking attractive, but it comes in all sorts of calibers.

Basically im looking for something to poke at prarie dogs and some coyotes with but who knows i might get gutsy and take it antelope hunting too

Im open to any suggestions but would preffer to keep it on a rem 700 action

Thanks so much everybody!

 

[roninflag]

i have shot over 250 coyotes, and almost that many shot by calling companions. i like the .243.

 

[younggun]

Im gonna hijack my own thread on this one. Ive been doing research and ive come up with 3 possible varmint calibers that i would like to hear everyones opinions on: 22-250, .223, and .243. I realise i could use the .243 on deer and antelope, but i already have a .270 that i use for that purpose so this is going to be purely varmint hunting: pdogs, coyotes, jackrabbits ect. I do want to be able to hit them at extended ranges as the eastern plains of CO will give plenty of opportunities for that.

Any links or literature would be greatly appreciated

thanks so much

 

[sscoyote]

Buddy of mine made 3 1st shot kills on coyotes this last season at 785, 650, 535 yds. with his 243 AR-10. He's using the 87 V-Max which has a BC of .4. I also saw him kill a jackrabbit at 475 on the 2nd shot and a 470-yard coyote took a couple shots since we couldn't get an accurate range on it.

I always thought the 243/87 V-Max was a good ~600 yd. combination.

I also had a 6mmAI for many years that was a good long range shooter, but i could never get the 87 V-Max to shoot out of it--my choice for the best std.-twist varmint bullet.

A lot of guys drive the 105's and others out of the 243/6mm-based cases with excellent results as well using faster-twisted barrels.

 

[matt_3479]

I was in your shoes only a few months back. The gun i hunt with shoots a 223. rem which is a beautiful round but he wont shoot past 250 yards with it because of the light bullet. His brother shoots a heavy Ruger 22-250 which is an awesome caliber for coyotes but he wont shoot past 350-400 yards with the farthest shot to date on a coyote being 362 yards. Where i hunt i have the opportunity of a 1300 yard shot but im only comfortable and wanting to take game out to 600 yards. I know the 223. remington is out of the question here because i want something with a little more punch. The 22-250 was a nice option but most say no further then 400 yards with this gun.

Now a 6mm is a beautiful round for coyotes at long ranges. I picked up a Remington 700 sps varmint in 243. win and im currently trying to work up a load. There is a lot of options with 6mm calibers such as a 6BR, 6-284 (sweet round), 243, 243. AI, 6mm rem AI and 260 rem. All these are beautiful coyote calibers. A load of 75 grain v-max all the way up to a 115 grain bergers or DTACS are fantastic out too 1000 yards.


My vote is 243. win

 

[younggun]

thanks so much for the imput u guys!!! i think i will go with the .243 win. there is tons of support for it with all the dies and ammo and if i choose to i could always up it to the .243ai but that will be in the future...so here is the current plan and let me know if you guys have any better suggestions.

rem 700 sps varmint and immediately get rid of the tupperware stock for a B&C or mcmillan or manners ect stock and bed it. Then park a vortex viper atop that bad boy and shoot the hell out of it. Sound good? any other suggestions? i doubt ill need a brake cause i can spot my shots out of a sporter weight .270 just and to my knowledge the .243 has less recoil than that has(which is minimal).

what factory rounds should i shoot for the barrel break in that i can keep the brass for to reload?

Any additional tid bits of info that i should know or any corrections to that plan?

Again thanks so much for all the help

Sean

oh and i forgot the rem sps varmint comes with a 9 1/8 twist...what weight bullets is that good for? will i eventually need a different twist rate?

 

[roninflag]

it may shoot fine with the factory stock. there is a review of this gun on sniper central where they changed it out to the h-s stock . also the twist is fine for 55 to 100 grain bullets. i would break in with handloads and new brass