Does anybody use FMJ for small game?

[AutumnsDad]

To avoid "over gunning" small game with a bigger rifle does anybody use FMJs to make shots less destructive? Does the shock of the big fast bullets still do "explosive" type damage to the little targets? Would they kill game cleanly? I'm talking about anything from a rabbit with a .223 to a raccoon or Coyote with a .308. I'm wondering if I can make one rifle more flexible by trying this. I have always used hollow/soft point bullets for hunting but have also used rifles intended for the size of game I was pursuing.

 

[toxicity]

I have used 7.63x39 FMJ , 52,55, and 62grn 5.56x 45mm FMJ, and 7.7mm .311cal FMJ. All have yeilded great results on soetheastern white tail, coyote, and pine woods rooters or hogs for me. I never take a shot through the body, only the head and base of the skull line though. I did put a round through a coyote from a long range and nearly took its whole head off.

 

[MCgunner]

I use solid point .22 short or LR on squirrels to keep meat loss down if I can't take a head shot. Head shots aren't as easy to make with a handgun and I'm usually hunting squirrel with a handgun anymore. I reckon shooting a squirrel with a .22 is about like shooting a jack rabbit with a .50BMG.

 

[Art Eatman]

Back when I was a kid, the sheriff gave my uncle a big ammo box with some 4,000 rounds of M2 Ball. Talk about a free lunch for a kid with an old 1917!

Sometimes a jackrabbit would fall over dead, DRT. Other times, they'd just hump up in the middle and look insulted for a minute or three before quitting this vale of tears.

With a .223, though, I've found that any bullet blows up if you shoot a coyote or jackrabbit inside of a hundred yards. Early GI stuff as well as 50-grain SPs. At 50 yards, ball ammo makes a messy exit wound on a coyote.

 

[AutumnsDad]

MCgunner,
The squirrels I have shot with a .22 LR didn't seem to show a huge amount of damage. It has been probably 5 years since I have shot a squirrel so my memory of the wounds is a little fuzzy. Did you mean .223? They sure are tough little guys though. I remember one I shot as a teenager. I hit the thing a few times and he was still moving to the other side of a tree to hide. Yes I do feel bad that it wasn't a cleaner kill. I think I wasn't adjusting for the close range very well with my scope. If it is any consolation, I killed a couple more with longer, cleaner shots that day.

Art,
Wow, I would not have expected that from ball .223. I guess the thinner jackets don't hold up.

 

[buck460XVR]

I would check with your state game laws. In many states, the use of non-expanding bullets on game animals is illegal.

 

[jglcolosprgs]

Back in the day......

I used to use FMJ 223 and 22-250 for my coyote hunting. We were trying to minimize damage to the pelts.

The 223 worked better for this application. My 22-250 loads were jacked up for flatter trajectory at extended ranges... unfortunately, every now and then, an unobservant coyote would wander in too close...... so much for minimal pelt damage.

Like the other posters have said, the high power rifles still do a LOT of damage at close range.

 

[MCgunner]

MCgunner,
The squirrels I have shot with a .22 LR didn't seem to show a huge amount of damage. It has been probably 5 years since I have shot a squirrel so my memory of the wounds is a little fuzzy. Did you mean .223?

Not hardly. I grew up hunting squirrel and quickly found that solids did much less damage than HV hollowpoints and killed 'em just as dead. In fact, CB shorts have plenty out to about 30 yards or so. It ain't power, but trajectory that keeps the ranges shorter on the CB shorts. And, they're QUIET. If you get several squirrel playing in a tree, those CBs will drop 'em and they'll think their buddies are having heart problems. Where I grew up hunting 'em was in a live oak creek bottom. Tall pines can present longer ranges.

 

[Deer Hunter]

I once took a big rabbit with .308 SA surplus.

Once the pieces landed, it didn't go very far.

 

[R.W.Dale]

FMJ and centerfires on small game (fur bearers excluded) are both forbidden here.

 

[desidog]

I've hit a groundhog with SA surplus .308; at about 50yds....no high-speed camera to verify, but i think that the whole body got rotated around itself in a donut-type /smoke-ring sort of pattern...needless to say, the remains were not worth skinning out...what i could find, anyway.

 

[MCgunner]

Shot turtles on a turtle infested tank once with a friend. We'd bought Mausers, actually 88 commission rifles, arsenal converted to 8x57S along with 800 rounds of maypop surplus WW2 8x57. I shot a turtle at about 30 yards and had a piece of the shell hit me in the hat. I suppose the hyrostatic pressure of the surrounding water had a hand in scattering the pieces. We cleaned that tank up a bit that day. 50 rounds of 8x57 out of that gun shooting in a T shirt banged up my shoulder a bit.

 

[AutumnsDad]

I found out that some of the girls I knew didn't like it when I shot little birds with a .22.

*poof* "Why'd you do that?"

I don't shoot little birds any more unless I feel threatened.