Prairie dog hunting New Mexico

[brandon327]

I am going on an antelope hunt in NE New Mexico. I was told to bring a gun for prairie dogs. I am taking a .223. How many rounds of ammo should I expect to shoot and what is a good round?

 

[remy3424]

It sounds like a "casual" shoot. If you have a 3 day hunt scheduled and you tag-out in the 1st hour, you could shoot several hundred a day if the service has good dawgs to put you on. I would bring a couple hundred, it sounds like this activity will just be a "filler" if time allows. A 223 with the highest variable power scope you have available with ammo using 50 grain Vmax or similar will be perfect. Ask the folks sponsoring the hunt what to expect.

 

[hunter67wa]

53gr vmax and 1000 rds just to be sure, if you are driving

 

[brandon327]

Thanks , we are driving

 

[carl1775]

Take more than you think is imaginable to shoot. Along the lines of dove hunting. If... they have good towns to set up on.

 

[brandon327]

Has anyone used a hollow point match or a soft point bullet on prairie dogs? I can get them for about .25 a round .

 

[Zman99]

Those will work just fine. Pretty much anything you throw at them will work. Just make sure it shoots good. They are small targets. I would bring a few hundred rounds. 1000 seems excessive.

 

[hunter67wa]

Better to have it and not need it than wish you had it! But what do i know I can burn 300-500 rds a day in a good dog town

 

[hunter67wa]

53gr vmax for the BC but any bullet will do for dogs as long as it is accurate in your rifle.

 

[elkslayer44]

You lucky dog! I live in New Mexico and that NE corner has some nice speed goats. I assume unless you're on an MI hunt that you've been assigned to a ranch. If you're on a guided hunt, then I guess your guide is telling you about the pdogs. I've read it used to be good up there but dog hunting had deteriorated as of 3 or 4 years ago. There are good open Federal grasslands so who knows. The dogs seem to rebound so maybe they're back in numbers. Let us know. I like the 17 HMR out to about 250, then the 204. A regular AR15 223/556 is good out to about 600. I like 14 to 25 power scopes but heat distortion can be bad later in day. Good luck and report back on goats and dogs.

 

[MachV]

All 6 of my 223 shoot the 55sp the most consistent and they flat out kill prairie dogs.......not as much air time as a vmax but they dont skip around as bad as the hollow points.
Figure 250 rounds per gun per day, they get hot in a hurry.

 

[J Doss]

I am going on an antelope hunt in NE New Mexico. I was told to bring a gun for prairie dogs. I am taking a .223. How many rounds of ammo should I expect to shoot and what is a good round?

Take a couple of guns to swap out and allow the barrels to cool on. I usually take three if I am going out to shoot pdogs seriously. 200-300 rounds is what I normally take.
When I was guiding hunts, we had a couple of ranches that had some good pdog towns. We would swing by around mid day for a couple of hours if we had hunters who wanted to try shooting pdogs. We generally took a lunch break in that same time period.
If you get a speed goat on the first day, you have a couple of days to do what you want. It kind of depends on your hunted to guide ratio. We typically hunted antelope with two hunters per guide. If that's how your hunting, you may have to wait until one of the guides gets his/her hunters killed out so you have a guide loose to take you.
I've seen some crazy things happen to people on their first antelope hunt. Don't overthink a shot and be prepared to wait on a hunting partner who is having a bad case of W-T-S.
Good luck and have fun.

 

[hunter67wa]

Good luck. I killed a book goat in NM. I hope you have the same opportunity.

 

[sw282]

Hi, l am new here. l shot around Clayton, NM in June 2018... Very disappointing trip. lt seems it was great in 2017 in the same area, but Plague hit the area Hard afterwards. Be sure and call ahead before making very long trip...