what is the furthest you will shoot comfortably ? my brother and i shoot dabchicks ( small african waterfowl ) at about 350/400 meters with a .223, white faced ducks with an open sight .22 from about 650 meters ( fluke shots ).. and u guys ?

#1). Maybe you should be asking "how far can you shoot RESPONSIBILY?"...
#2). On .22 rimfire ammo boxes, the flap, there is often a warning that the bullet can carry a mile or more and be sure of your backstop...
#3). Elmer Keith wrote, to everyone's surprise, of shooting at 500 yards, 1,000 yards, etc. with a pistol. In the "bigger story" he was trying, with his 6 gun (colt probably, maybe S&W--larger caliber, .45 Colt or .44 S&W) to ruin the health of a grizzly bear that he, as a guide, would have to find and kill after it had been shot at and wounded by a man with a rifle. (.300 H&H I believe).

By is account, he fired 5 shots and hit with 3. 2 were in the vitals. He practiced alot and this was not "spray and pray" at all. Desperate, but then he was responsible for that wounded animal and the follow up.

#4). You seem to be having a bit of fun and developing your skill/judgement of distance. I have shot "plowed ground" and water at a mile of more to see what happened. Living creature, also a .223, prairie dogs, a rodent that lives in the ground in grasslands, maybe 600 yards. No, I did not say I hit on the first shot... But they are most helpful. They will look in the direction the bullet passed by. Enjoy, but please don't leave alot of wounded animals to suffer either. luck. happy trails.

it can very by the day and situation,
when i was a teen ager 22 rf rifles free hand shooting wooden match sticks at 15 yardswith iron sites, shot a muskrat in the head swimming away from me at about 325 yds with my second 2 last shell in my pocket. took a pigion off my grandfathers silo 75 foot with a 30-30 winchester lever action rifle ,braced up in the apple tree for support,shot at the head and thats what i took off. a few mice and goffers with my 10-22 rf rifle. 450 yard shot p-dogs out west 223 50 gr. v-max killed 2 in a avarage wind of 17 miles per hour.same 223 shot 3/4 inch 5 shot group at 400 yds.my good friend shot this same 223 at 600 yds and put 3 shots inside of 2.5 inchs. i tryed to beat him but couldn''t as hard as i tried,sometimes ya got too just smile and laugh at life .25-06 w/75 gr. hornady hp doing 3600 fps shot a p-dog at 771 lazered yards,ishot a circle around him with 5 shots my friends dad shot the same and my friend got him on his 6 or 7th shot with my rifle go figure, but thats shooting day in and out,some days we can drive tacks some we can''t.7mm stw 160 nosler partitions 5 shots at 1,000 yds held 1 minute of angle 10 ich circle ifin you think thats not shooting try it with what ever caliber you choise and report back.my mgm 500 brynell p-dog target takes a beating from 300 yds out to the range back stop at 625 yds,bang ring flop pop back up with paint missing wear the bullet hit great fun.tired of typeing i''ll stop now,
it''s your turn!!!
regards

Well after sighting in my 6.5-284 Encore pistol, it took a whole two shots to hit a prairie dog at a measured 517 yards. In the mouth and out the back of the head. With my 22-250 rifle I was hitting them at well beyond that distance. It just takes practice and knowing your gun and the load you are shooting. Sure it took a few shots to get the various ranges setup with my mil dot scope but once you have the references down it just comes down to proper fundamentals and good reliable equipment.

Now, I would not try a 500 yard shot on a deer with that 6.5-284 even though the more time I spend with it and the Ballistic Plex scope I am getting further and further away. The first shot at that 517 yard prairie dog was high by 3 inches. Which means that if it was a deer, it would have been dead with the first shot but that is not a chance I am will to take right now.

I'm comfortable shooting out to 800 yards with my 6.5x284 on varmints/coyotes and I'm working on 1,000 yards.

On game animals 500 yards is my personal limit if the conditions are right. I've shot one antelope at 468 paces, so it was probably just over 400 yards.

On varmints, my personal best on prairie dogs is 849 yards, ground squirrels is 697 yards and on coyotes it's 732 yards.

The longest 1st shot connection i ever made was a 906 yd. coyote with a 6.5-284 XP-100 handgun. We were calling coyotes on a ranch not far from home, and 2 showed up across the valley i was watching. No matter what i did i couldn't get them to respond closer, so i had an accurate system established for the Ballistic Plex reticle in my 3-12X Burris, but the calc'd. turret comeups weren't (beyond the reticle's lower post tip). I lasered the dog, and got set up for the shot. I was sitting in a soft-sided stadium seat cinched up nice and tight and had the rig on a tall Harris bipod with the front of the pistol grip pushed into my knees. The rig was quite steady and when it all felt right i touched it off. When i looked with my binocs again 1 coyote was running over the hill, and there was a white spot where i'd shot. The dog was sitting facing me when i shot , and the 129 SST nailed it dead center in the chest, and exited the backbone about a .5". The dog is now hanging on the side of my bookshelf, a reminder of the luckiest calculated long shot i ever made on game. I was lucky to have killed it tho, since i broke it's back. Had he been broadside, he probably would've taken off, and i'd have never recovered him.

Here's a good story for ya'. Couple years ago i was working up a buddy's big 270 WSM Nesika Bay with a custom barrel that i can't remember the make of. He had an 8.5-25X Leup. VX-III on top. I can't remember the load right off, but he was shooting the 140 Nosler BT. I'd calcd the comeups to 1000, and was out 1 nice day with my 70 year young mom, trying to shoot a dog at long-range. We were glassing a long open prairie valley , and i howled up a dog that was real dark looking. He was 500 some yds. away, and started approaching us. He got into a herd of antelope somehow, and they started chasing him. Of course he lost interest in us, and took off, but i was watching him. He slowed up a ways further out, and stopped on top of a low rise far side of the basin. he was 1/4'ing toward me, and i went prone quickly, trying to laser him, reference comeups, and get mom back on him thru the binoc (she'd lost him in the excitement). I wish she would've reacquired him, because somehow everything came together, and i lasered him at 775, got the turret quickly dialed, and on him prone off the bipod. I touched it off, and the big rig lifted a bit, and came back down just right so i could watch the dog fall over. I couldn't believ it, and let out a whoop of victory. Mom told me to shut up and not scare off anything else (she's into her spotting)--i'm not really sure she realized just what happened. Well, i went back to the truck, but gave mom directions to the coyote. When i start driving over the hill on the 2 track, mom's nowhere to be seen. I finally look over at a far hill, and sure enuf she's walking off into the sunset. If i hadn't blown the horn just then i'm not sure where she would've ended up. Turned out to be a mange dog, and i did him a favor with that 140 BT.

U know there's really nothing quite like making a long calc'd shot, and actually watching the connection. It's nice to spot your own pr. dog blowups locally, but there's nothing more rewarding than the long self-spotted connections on the 1st shot.

Wow, nice shooting!

Just like anything, a little practice regularly and you can do a lot of long range shooting.. it is what your eyes get use to...

I practice on a rock out on our range at 725 yds frequently, with centerfire cartridges...

If you know your MV, the distance and your trajectory chart.. or your scope.. it really isn't that hard to hit something see-able out to 800 and a 1000 yds...

but as always, I have to question many guys about their back stop... do they know where that bullet is going when they miss???

if you can't answer that positively, I don't think you have any business pullng the trigger, regardless of distance, close or far...

Seafire, i often shoot at rocks and grass clumps at long-range myself.

Here's another good story. In fact it's my favorite LR shooting story. I was out with a buddy's kid 1 day couple yrs. ago hunting coyotes. He was only about 15 or so back then, but he'd had a lot of shooting practice under his belt, and was quite a shooter (he's now in Trinidad Gunsmithing School, and building a 408 Chey-Tac). We were walking thru a pr. dog town, and he had his little Marlin 22 with him. The rig had a little Harris bipod on it and a 3-9X Simmons with plex reticle. I took a look thru the optic, and thought of something. I estimated the subtension of the plex post tip @ about 6 MOA @ 9X. I told the kid that if he cranked the scope down to 3X it would be about 18 MOA. I told him that with his sight-in distance that should put him on at about 300 yds. for the lower post tip. We found some cooperative 295 lasered-yd. dogs sitting on top of their mound. There was no wind that day, and i was sitting behind the kid spotting for him prone off the bipod. The kid shoots, and was just inches from the dog, so he compensates a bit and nails this pr. dog, and it rolled off the back of the mound. As it crawls back up he nailed it again, and killed it. All the other dogs are just freakin' of course so he picked the next 1 and nailed him too on the next shot or 2. After maybe 4 or 5 shots this kid's got 2 pr. dogs laying on the back of the mound @ 295. I don't care how long a shot he makes with his new monster gun, he'll never forget the "day of the 22."

quote:

Here's another good story.

I've found the most limiting factor isn't so much the range but the wind conditions at the time of the shot. I've shot coyotes at around 600 yards with a dead wind and missed 5 out of six shots at 275 yards at rockchucks due to a very stiff wind. Both episodes where with the same rifle, same loads and same rest.

If you are using a smaller caliber and if the wind is still you can connect at surprisely distances, provided your rifle is accruate and you shoot a lot.