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Old 07-23-2019, 05:25 AM
JSH JSH is offline
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Default Honest numbers........

I was cruising around this past weekend reading on some varmint stuff. I see some of the round counts from folks. I really have a hard time swallowing some of it. Then again there are some pretty hard core folks around.

I have shot some pretty big matches in years past, times events. 80,60 and 40 round matches, you have two minutes thirty seconds to load and fire five shots. Do 4-5 40’s in a day is a work out, do 3-5 80’s and that’s a marathon. Sounds easy, try it and keep all your shots MOA or better at various known distances.

Ran across a few post on prairie dog hunting this year. I won’t mention what the total amount was. But, by my math giving the party a 10 hour day a shot was fired EVERY 1.7 minutes for 10 hours. I will even give the person a 12 hour day and that is still one shot EVERY 2 minutes.

Maybe I am just slow? I got into a large dog town this year that had seen very little shooting if any. It was a whole section long, 1 mile and any where from 300 yards to a half mile wide. Had dogs from a few hundred feet to over a thousand yards. We parked in one place and never moved all day. There were a lot of shots fired through the day, but I will guarantee there was no one that shot a round every two-three minutes for the whole time we were there.

Not saying it can’t be done or is impossible, I just know at that rate with any kind of good hit ratio, it will go from fun to work in short order.
Jeff
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Old 07-23-2019, 05:47 AM
georgeld georgeld is offline
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Come on Jeff!

Surely you've never been into a BIG p/dog town with such comments.

Back in the early 70's my folks lived on a ranch west of here just covered with 'em. No one other than Dad and he only rarely shot 'em, or I ever shot out there that I know of.

I was trucking for a living and only got home 2-3 days every few weeks. I had a .222 mag and only 100 cases. While home, I'd take a six pack and 100 rnds and go shoot 'em up. Up close to out so far there wasn't a chance of a hit.

When I ran out of ammo, I was about out of beer too. Would drive the mile or two back to the house and load 'em up, more beer and go back at it.
Quite a few days I fired 400 rounds at 'em with those 100 cases.

I got quite a few 98/100's and one 99/100, but never did nail 100/100.

That was driving my car around and shooting from the window at whichever caught my eye. that's the most I've ever shot in a day.

Supplier in Denver went to Black Hills to get reloading supplies and they'd take several rifles and .223's by the bucket full. Claimed "we had a couple 700 shot days this trip". Beats me.
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Old 07-23-2019, 01:24 PM
redrock ranger redrock ranger is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by georgeld View Post
Come on Jeff!

Surely you've never been into a BIG p/dog town with such comments.

Back in the early 70's my folks lived on a ranch west of here just covered with 'em. No one other than Dad and he only rarely shot 'em, or I ever shot out there that I know of.

I was trucking for a living and only got home 2-3 days every few weeks. I had a .222 mag and only 100 cases. While home, I'd take a six pack and 100 rnds and go shoot 'em up. Up close to out so far there wasn't a chance of a hit.

When I ran out of ammo, I was about out of beer too. Would drive the mile or two back to the house and load 'em up, more beer and go back at it.
Quite a few days I fired 400 rounds at 'em with those 100 cases.

I got quite a few 98/100's and one 99/100, but never did nail 100/100.

That was driving my car around and shooting from the window at whichever caught my eye. that's the most I've ever shot in a day.

Supplier in Denver went to Black Hills to get reloading supplies and they'd take several rifles and .223's by the bucket full. Claimed "we had a couple 700 shot days this trip". Beats me.
That was the 1970's,this is 2019. Realty check time. It isn't what it used to be!!!
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Old 07-23-2019, 02:11 PM
L Rivard L Rivard is offline
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Since retiring to Northeastern California my passion has been shooting Beldings ground squirrels in the alfalfa fields of local ranches. Highest round count has been 7434 rounds in a season and just under 400 in a day. Both numbers are about half that the last few years since California started to allow poisoning to control squirrel population. Criterion barrels loves me.
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Old 07-23-2019, 03:47 PM
TRnCO TRnCO is offline
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I've also read some numbers that make me shake my head. My only guess is that someone is taking long shots and missing a lot. If a guy can't hit his target and it takes several shots for each kill, he can blow through some ammo in a hurry.

I had a buddy over this past weekend and we killed 695 pdogs in two days. We had very near 80% kill ratio, mainly because we held our shots to under 300 yards. BUT, even at that we still had hot barrels from time to time. And that's why a guy takes several rifles.

With just two guys it doesn't take long to pack up gear and relocate 300 yards, set up and do it all again.
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Old 07-23-2019, 05:02 PM
moorepower moorepower is offline
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While at the range earlier this year, I was discussing a couple of the pdog hunts I went on the last couple of years, and he showed me a picture of his brother holding 2 one gallon bags of empty .17WSM brass, 900 pc from a GS hunt in Utah, I think it was a 3 day hunt, with a large smile on his fence. Before the plague went through I shot on a 50,000 acre ranch with an additional 50,000 acres around it with permission/ please shoot them to shoot on, and they were running around like cockroaches in several towns, and did not really look like they had be shot at much. I had 5 cf rifles and a .17HMR, and a .25 Marauder with me. It took 3 days to break the 500 mark, confirmed kills. I did it by driving town to town, and setting up my big game swivel bench. and or driving down fence mending trails and shooting out of my window with the .17HH. The little gal that showed me where best to go, told me I could start shooting as soon as it was light enough, which was really early north of Douglass, Wy. Every rifle that I took except the HMR and Marauder, "air rifle" got hot enough that I had to switch rifles and let them cool, including a .22H single shot, on a town where no shot was over 200yds.. "IF" I had hunted as hard all 3 days as the last day, I "might" have been one of those guys,shooting dawn to dusk. I am really glad I was able to do it that year, because it may/ probably not every be like that although I hope a GS hunt in the next year or two will be close. It's almost close to work when you shoot that much, almost. FYI I did not count rounds fired, but there was enough misses, due to wind and my not understanding my dope on every rifle as close as 10yds away and a thing called wind. IF I would have taken my Bull barreled AR and cooled the barrel with cold water, I could have shot a lot more in places. I have also went out and could not get 100 shots in 2 days, which is closer to normal. You can do a lot of shooting in an 11-12 hour span of time if you are ever fortunate enough to find the holy grail some day.
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Old 07-23-2019, 06:15 PM
JSH JSH is offline
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Opinions are like elbows, everyone has a couple.

My thoughts fall into these high round counts being a lot more misses than hits. I think most everyone will “walk” a few in then get a good correction on sights then go to work.
I came to like the 204 Ruger once I figured it out this year. I flipped a dog at 300ish, happened to look about 30 yards in front of me nailed that one. The 204 got to a point I thought it was throwing a few. I decided to do a 30 minute cleaning on it. Well of coarse when one does this they seem to sense it and come out and set up all over the place!

I had not shot the 17FB much as far as a bunch in a long string. Everyone says the smaller powder charges don’t heat up nearly as fast. Well I can say it is true. I had two lots of 50 with different bullets and loads. I got it figured about the way I did the 204. Got enough elevation in it and was good for the closest and farthest in that town. Out of that hundred I missed more towards the end than the beginning. Eye strain was the biggest culprit. FYI the 17FB rig weighs right around 21-22 pounds you get to see all the action.

One of the guys I was with made a comment on us not breaking out the ARs, “they allow you to miss faster if you so desire”.

You guys and the ground squirrels, I think they must be dumber than prairie dogs. I visited with a guy from California a while back about ground squirrels, he swore every one he shot turned into two. The amount of 17HMR and 17WSM ammo he said he went through on a good weekend was staggering, and always shot at least a brick through his Kidd.22. That was just one weekend. He would laugh and say you ate breakfast at 0 dark thirty or you didn’t eat. Supper was when the little devils quit coming out and the guns were cleaned.
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Old 07-23-2019, 06:54 PM
Screaminweasil Screaminweasil is offline
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Around here, in a "good field"........shooting as fast as you can acquire target, shoot, reload, repeat is common. I've shot 500 rounds of 17 WSM in an afternoon on squeaks from a camp chair without having to move locations. Ground squirrels are much different than PDs.
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Old 07-23-2019, 09:50 PM
SS427 SS427 is offline
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Those are the same rifles that come up for sale "with only 500 rounds" down the tube!
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  #10  
Old 07-23-2019, 11:22 PM
SmokinJoe SmokinJoe is offline
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In my experience 500 - 550 rounds of carefully aimed shots per day is realistic if you keep at it, have plenty ammo and several rifles in smaller cartridges like Hornet, Fireball, Vartarg. The guy that says he is doing this with his one & only favorite 22-250 is likely pullin your leg. I shot 1200 rounds in 3 days this year with over 500 on the 1st day, but I can't physically keep that up anymore. I had 6 different rifles available but never shot more than 4 on any day as I remember. We had 2 afternoon shoots with bad wind; that slows you down a bit.
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