Handgun shot load for rats?

hdwhit said:

The answer to mice and rats is a hungry cat.

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Ha, ha, ha!

Not with my cats. They get mad when they don't get their nightly can of food.

They are much to refined to kill dirty mice.

Now my JRT is a killer. He believes the only good mice and snakes are dead ones.

A good pellet gun is a better choice the shotshells.

A buddy of mine used to shoot rats all the time at his girlfriends house, her dad had pheasants and the rats would go after their feed.

He found out that CCI .22 shotshells did nothing out of his Single Six, and with a rifle the muzzle would have to be within about 4-5 feet of the rat to work.

I'd try centerfire handgun shotshells, I think they use larger shot which will carry a bit more energy than the .22 shotshells have.

.22 CB's would probably be great as well.

Bsa1 wrote:
Not with my cats. They get mad when they don't get their nightly can of food.
They are much to refined to kill dirty mice.

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Stop providing that nightly can for a few days and after an empty belly argues with their propriety, they may find hunting is not beneath them. They may even find they prefer the taste of warm meat to cold cat food.



My family pretty much only takes in strays. The attitude is much the same as my wife and I had towards children; when God decides we're ready for them, they'll show up. So, most of our cats arrive already knowing how to fend for themselves, but the occasional one that doesn't picks it up pretty quick from watching the others; like this guy.

I load my own .38's and .44's using Speer Shot Cups. I load them with 7.5 shot.

Chicken coop rats flushed out of a tunnel with a water hose. Wet one was last rat out. Short barrels work best.

S&W K-frame model 12 in the picture



Also works good on pit vipers around the house.

I would think the judge owners would chime in.
1/2 oz of #6 in a 2.5" .410 should be good rat medicine

Last time I used ye olde crimp nose "rat shot" in a .22 LR was a bad experience. Dad and his boss paid me for dead rats, mice and sparrows that for some reason seemed to dearly love the seed cleaning and bagging plant we ran. Mice and sparrows fell easily to common Daisy BB guns. Rats got ticked off being shot with them. I used my Daisy CO2 200 that hit harder than common "94s" and such, but rats would sometimes stand and chitter at me before running off. The boss tripled the bounty for rats and so I showed up with a .22 and rat shot.

Rats like to run along walls. In this case steel building walls and polished concrete floors.......I think you see this coming.....about half the shot struck the floor, reflected up against the wall and came right back at me. It was OK though because the other half hit the wall and was reflected to the floor and then back at me. Fortunately I still have both eyes. The rat turned to see what all the noise was about, sniffed and then continued to stroll away.

I shot a rat from three feet with a .22LR from a Beretta M21A. He ran off leaving a bit of blood and a .22 caliber hole in the edge of the tack room roof. I searched but did not recover the body......nor smell it during the following week when doing barn chores.

I did once find that a .36 C&B Colt Navy 1851 revolver repro with round ball did work on rats when you hit them.

My best rat kill ever was from a measured nine feet and with a 200 grain HP from a Colt Officer's model ACP......45ACP of course. It was standing between my pard's cowboy boots and everything north of the rats "wishbone" area disappeared in a red spray. Worst part is Pard will not let me forget it even if I did not hit him after that quick draw.

-kBob

dirtman said:

Geez Armored, after seeing your squash I would think you would just fast draw rats with 22 rnd nose solids… just think of them rats as squash running away.

dirt.

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I've posted this before. I can verify that a mouse gun will kill a rat.
I was going to snap a pic of my trophy but the fire was too Ooo hot.

my experience with shot capsules and pistols with rifling are thus. They are not made for each other.
A smoothbore or bullet is almost a sure thing.

Where I used to live we had rats that would get in the pecan tree and the fig tree. My chow dog would alert me with a different bark. Instead of a deep Woof Woof he made more of an Erf Erf sound. I knew right then Chopper had a rat. I killed way over 200 rats. They were either shot with CB 22s or my .22 Crosman pump rifle. It was about half for each gun. I never tried any shot shells from a gun. Way too loud for in the city. You might even make one of these. My dad said when he was growing up on his dads farm they used a barrel with water in the bottom and a board that tilted when the rat walked out on it. This is just a newer version of the same thing.

Sunray said:

Rat control is why there are Jack Russell's. Maybe you can get one of the pythons from Florida. And warfarin isn't just a blood thinner.

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Animals are one thing, poison is another. Especially in an urban or suburban environment.

Warfarin doesn't go away with the rats/squirrels that first ingest it. If somebody's pet then finds the rat and eats it, that pet is also going to suffer the same fate. I dealt with this not too long ago, one of my outdoor cats (a great squirrel and rat removal device BTW) started to get real weak, couldn't stand. Took him to the vet, they said rat poison. Just so you know, the animals (including pets) bleed out slowly, until they die. If you're lucky to catch it in time, you may be able to treat with vitamin K.

My brother has actually made a pretty good sporting event out of rats... he uses a .22 cal air rifle (started with the spring, liked it so much he now has upgraded to one with an air cannister). He got the ones with the integral silencer, so they aren't loud.

Couple trips to Harbor Freight netted him a cheap surveillance camera system with IR capability, a cheap motion-detector light that he put IR bulbs in. Rigged it up so that the back yard will be hit with IR floodlights, completely dark to the naked eye but visible to the IR cameras. Also set up so a red lamp comes on inside whenever the motion lamp is triggered.

Found an older Sony camcorder that has an IR setting, and with a little hoseclamp and rigging, fixed it to the scope on the air rifle. That stays on a benchrest set up by a back window in the sunroom... the camcorder both functions as a night sight, and records the event as seen via the scope.

The light will go off, he will check the security camera (has it set up to view through an old TV). We get a bright look at the entire back yard, and the IR lights will reflect off the rat's eyes so you can spot critters pretty quick, even if in foliage. Then, it's sniper time.
When I first saw the setup. I thought it was pretty overdone, but he's taken a whole lot, and it's pretty darn fun to do so.

He might have $150 at the most invested in the entire setup minus the actual rifle.

Isudave,

"Found an older Sony camcorder that has an IR setting, and with a little hoseclamp and rigging, fixed it to the scope on the air rifle. That stays on a benchrest set up by a back window in the sunroom... the camcorder both functions as a night sight, and records the event as seen via the scope."

I would VERY much like to see this set up.

A friend some years back had a passive viewing scope (think "Starlight") on a head band and he used a cheap laser duck taped to an air rifle as a pointer. Kept his head up so as to not interfere with the starlight viewer and just looked for the laser dot which showed up as a bright spot in his scope viewer. He killed a few rats that way.

-kBob

Pellet gun first. Then you can make your own shot shells or use the plastic ones already made up. #9 shot. You wont be using them from any distance, so there's no need for larger shot. I would be reluctant to use a 22 in close confines, even shorts (which I myself have not seen on a shelf in many a year).

I couldn't help it....

RPRNY said:

Pellet gun first. Then you can make your own shot shells or use the plastic ones already made up. #9 shot. You wont be using them from any distance, so there's no need for larger shot. I would be reluctant to use a 22 in close confines, even shorts (which I myself have not seen on a shelf in many a year).

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Wallworlds in my parts have quite a bit of .22 rimfire on the shelves, including CCI 22 Shorts. When I stopped by the day before yesterday they had about everything .22 except the 550 round Federal 22LR bulk packs. It's coming back.

I once saw a video of folks in a place like India that get paid to hunt rats. Paid by the head. They beat them with sticks. If a stick will kill them I imagine a pellet gun would be fine. Over penetration I imagine would be likely with a pellet gun.

http://dnr.wi.gov/news/breakingnews_print.asp?id=481
I know of a plant nursery/farm that used fly attractant and beer in hopes of fixing a couple of troublesome raccoons (coons climb treeswhich break limbs. Broken trees are ugly trees and can't be sold for full price.). Next morning there were over 30 dead coons together. They stopped after such unexpected amazing results. Later got told how illegal that was.
I imagine it would be worth trying on rats. Possibly much better results that a firearm ever could achieve... Maybe... I hear rats learn from the death of other rats and learn not to eat certain things or go to certain traps that brought results.

My Sheridan 5mm works well for me out 20 yds. handgun shot loads are maybe effective out to 15 ft.

kBob said:

Isudave,

"Found an older Sony camcorder that has an IR setting, and with a little hoseclamp and rigging, fixed it to the scope on the air rifle. That stays on a benchrest set up by a back window in the sunroom... the camcorder both functions as a night sight, and records the event as seen via the scope."

I would VERY much like to see this set up.

A friend some years back had a passive viewing scope (think "Starlight") on a head band and he used a cheap laser duck taped to an air rifle as a pointer. Kept his head up so as to not interfere with the starlight viewer and just looked for the laser dot which showed up as a bright spot in his scope viewer. He killed a few rats that way.

-kBob

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Next time I visit I'll take some photos.

Just to clarify- this isn't the same as active night sights, it's an IR setting on the camcorder. You need the IR lamps to light up the area. But when the IR floodlights are on, it works great.
You look out the back window, it's black out there. You look at the TV he uses as a monitor for the security cameras, it's bright. You look through the camcorder (and through the scope), and it's bright.

When I was a young lad (early 60's) we had a fishing hole about 5 miles from my house as the crow flies. If no adult was available to drive us we would walk cross country jumping a few barb wire fences in the process. I occasionally carried a Crosman pellet rifle or my friend a bolt action .22. The kind where you pulled the firing pin back before shooting. Along the way was the town dump. Not the ECO landfills that most towns have now but a dump filled with household garbage, cars, furniture and anything else you could imagine. Usually on the way back we would stop at the dump and shoot rats or field mice. Both were abundant.
One day I got the idea to bait a hook with stink bait and throw it out there. Within 30 seconds I had a bite, set the hook, and reeled in a nice fat rat. He fought just like a catfish. We landed five or six that first day and averaged around that for a year or so. Found out sardines worked best. Word got around our small town and we began finding older kids and young adults out there doing the same thing. Was fun for awhile but lost it's amusement a couple of years later. Still friends with a couple of guys I use to do this with. We look back on it with nostalgia now.

Carl N. Brown said:

CCI had .22 Mag shotshells. I haven't checked recently but I did buy a box for my .22 mag a few years ago. I have had no occassion to use them beyond patterning tests. Marlin made a number of smooth bore .22 WMR garden guns for use with .22 WMR shotshells.

I have used CCI .22 LR shotshells -- missed a northway rat with a Garcia Bronco but a few years later nailed a 2' snake coiled under my mother-in-law's clothes hamper in the bathroom from about 2 feet with a Ruger Mk II. The shot shell does not functon the action so you use it like a Fiala manual repeater pistol.

Rat Invasion (sounds like a SyFy channel / Asylum studio movie of the week). Last time I tried CCI .45 ACP shot shells they would function my 1911A1 clone but I had bad results in a TM1 Thompson semi-auto replica (that would not stop a good CGI FX crew).

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I saw a Winchester or maybe Remington one time that researched put to be made for smooth bore for shot.

Alte Schule said:

When I was a young lad (early 60's) we had a fishing hole about 5 miles from my house as the crow flies. If no adult was available to drive us we would walk cross country jumping a few barb wire fences in the process. I occasionally carried a Crosman pellet rifle or my friend a bolt action .22. The kind where you pulled the firing pin back before shooting. Along the way was the town dump. Not the ECO landfills that most towns have now but a dump filled with household garbage, cars, furniture and anything else you could imagine. Usually on the way back we would stop at the dump and shoot rats or field mice. Both were abundant.
One day I got the idea to bait a hook with stink bait and throw it out there. Within 30 seconds I had a bite, set the hook, and reeled in a nice fat rat. He fought just like a catfish. We landed five or six that first day and averaged around that for a year or so. Found out sardines worked best. Word got around our small town and we began finding older kids and young adults out there doing the same thing. Was fun for awhile but lost it's amusement a couple of years later. Still friends with a couple of guys I use to do this with. We look back on it with nostalgia now.

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I think thats hilarious, but PETA would have a cow over it!!!!!

During the last week, I've killed two rats in my tack room, using CCI .22 shot shells in my Colt Woodsman.

I tried to entice my pit bull to eat one, but his response was "EEEEEU!" and he lit out for the front porch and wouldn't come down until I had disposed of the rat in the woods.

I saw a review of CCI .45 ACP shotshells. The reviewer, if I recall correctly said they pattern tight and cycle the gun. All I can suggest is Google and see if you can find out.