Centerfire handloads for Small Game?

[clem]

I like to hunt rabbits with a rifle. I find it way more rewarding than a shotgun. I 100% understand that the .22LR is king of rabbit hunting, BUT here's my conundrum: out here in CA, there's a lead ammo ban -- which in every other cartridge, I'm 100% on board with because mono's are the tits -- but lead-free .22LR ammo suuuuuuuucks. Doesn't matter the brand, they're all "accurate" out to about 50yrds max, then it just turns goofy. So I'm looking for an alternative that I can use to take shots up to about 150 yards.

I'm one of these sickos who loves reloading, so I'd like to find a chamber that I can reload to get the appropriate energy and accuracy (probably using Hammer projectiles). Anyone have any experience trying something like this?

 

[Reddish]

.22 Hornet? Not sure how OAL would work with longer bullets, but Barnes makes some lighter ones.

.221 Fireball has also been a favorite of mine. I used to push it fast with LilGun and 40gr VMaxs, but you can use a bit heavier bullet and slow it down and it may not blow a bunny apart.

 

[Dented]

I load 30 06 to stupid low velocity for this very thing. Works like a charm. Pick a caliber. Any caliber. There's a ton of data available for this type of application. I have a load i use for pigs/ rabbits/ small game that's perfect. Mono bullets. It's complete crap past 125 yards. I don't care, it works exactly like I want it to inside of those distances

Pushing pressure and velocity can get dangerous. Downloading generally isn't.

Now, let's see how many "but what if a bullet's stuck in the barrel" replies we get...

 

[Wrench]

Fireball is good...but pay attention to the twist. Most are very slow and that doesn't play well with monos.

A good ol' 223 or 223ai is always a great choice.

 

[wowzers]

Patrick Smith wrote about developing different purposed loads for one cartridge.

Hand-loading For All-purpose Use of Big Game Rifles (Written in 2000)

HANDLOADING Discussion: the usual condition of starting well below the following Big Game and Dangerous Game loads should be observed; some of them are a mite hot. My approach is to make my rifles into tools that feed me and protect me, wherever I roam. I use three parameters to do this: Small...

kifaru.net

 

[Marbles]

I'm looking at downloading my 223. 18 grs of H4895 is giving me 2034 average fps from a 16.5 inch barrel using 75 gr BTHP. My hope is that at the low velocity and the longer neck length for expansion the bullet never expands and meat damage is minimal. The heavy bullet is because I don't want to stock other options, for non-expanding and minimal meat damage, a TSX leaving at about 2000 would be great, but hard to pay $0.70 for a single bullet before including powder/primer just to shoot squirrels. Theory is I should get damage about like a 22 mag, but have significantly better range.

I have the H4895, and velocity's for full power loads were low compared to VV N135/N140/N150. As Hodgdon lists it for down loads, I figure that will be a good use for it. Once I run out, I will look into Blue Dot and other reduced loading technique's.

I'll be giving them a try on ptarmigan tomorrow. Nice thing is I'll throw some full power TMK loads in my pocket and if I see a wolf/coyote/wolverine be able to take it at longer ranges than I could with a 22LR.

I know this is blasphemy, but I'm actually trying to limit the number of rifles I own. Functional things that don't get used are sad to me, like caged animals. So, that is another advantage of downloading.

 

[Bert01]

I have downloaded 223 and used some 30 or 35 grain hornet bullets to duplicate 22lr loads. They weren’t monos but there’s no reason you couldn’t make it work. I kept a dope card and just dialed the difference when switching back and forth.

 

[omegahunter]

Don't believe I've ever even heard of a lead-free 22lr round.

I know a guy that has played around with starting loads of H110 and 52/53 grain bullets in his .22 Hornet and has had stellar results. Tight groups and long shots on squirrels.

You may be able to do the same with some Barnes bullets.

 

[joeharold]

20 practical is a blast. 223 brass is all over the place..