I think you will be well satisfied with the 17 Remington on prairie dogs.

Probably the biggest negative about the cartridge would be the wind sensitivity when the shots get long. And some of them tend to foul quickly.

As far as bullet performance, I have only shot prairie dogs inside 200 yards when using the 17 Remington. I was shooting a Thompson Contender pistol with a 14 inch barrel and it popped those little suckers but good. Great gun to have around to bust a few while you let the rifle barrels cool down.

I used 25 grain Hornady and Remington bullets, they both worked fine. I never did get to try the Hornady 20 grain V-Max, but I imagine the terminal performance would be even better.

I went ground squirrel shooting with a fellow the other day who was using a 17 Remington and 25 grain HP bullets, not sure what brand. I can tell you it blew those squirrels up real well, made a real mess.

R F

Been using a 17rem for varmits about 20 yrs or so also have a 17machlV. I'm getting down to about less then a 1k of the Rem bullets so will have to switch over to berger or hornady. They generally are explosive. I get about 50/70 rds before I need to clean and I keep my velocity about 3900fps been using 4320. With my oehler 35p it's hard to pick up the bullets when it gets over 4000fps. I guess I'm lucky in the cleaning as I've never had the fouling most talk about. Only problem I've ever had is the wind when getting beyond 300 yds. Well good luck

I was shooting groundsquirrels today with my 17Rem. built on a single shot L46 Sako. I was using the Hornady 20gr. Vmax at just over 4000fps. At 200 ranged yards a fairly stiff breeze would blow those 20gr. bullets off a squirrel causeing me to miss. Great squirrel roung when the wind wasn't blowing.

Well I shoot p-dogs with my 17 rem. I have a Contender with a 22" bull barrel from Virgen valley mounted on it.

The load that I use is: (use at your own risk)
bullet--20 gr V-max
Brass---Remington
Primmer-Remington 7 1/2 bench rest
Powder--h380 25.5 gr
OAL-----2.182
FPS-----3740 av

This load won't blow the dogs to pieces, but will leave a big exit hole in them and they don't go anywhere. As far a the wind goes, its always blowing in SD. Most of my shots have been at around 200 to 300 yds. Oh, and you can see your hits in the scope with the power set on 24x. I love shooting it. If the wind really gets blowing hard I put it away and get out my 243 win with 70 gr TNT's and use it.

I hope this helps ya out.

I load the 25 Gr Hornady bullet with 24.1 Gr.IMR 4320 powder,CCI BR-4 primer,RP cases, for My Sako S491 17 Rem. rifle. MV @ about 3950 FPS. For shooting Prairie Dogs under 180 Yds. I use the 17 HMR 17Gr.bullet @ 2575 FPS. The 17 Rem. is ok out to 300 Yds., no dog splatter at that range. Shooting the 17 Rem. is fun but you need to clean the bore more often than you would when shooting a 221 Fireball or 223 Rem. I,ll take the 17 Rem. out in the winter when less P Dogs are out. So far this year I,v shot about 650 P Dogs ,not one with 17 Rem. For spring P Dog pup shooting the 22LRHP,22 WMR.and 17HMR works well. Take a cleaning kit along , clean the 17 Rem. after fireing about 50 rounds . A P Dog is about a 3X9 inch target , pups about 3/4 that size. A good rifle with a 14x or 16X scope that groups 3/4 inch or less a 100 Yds is a fun P Dog rifle.

Thanks for everyone's responses. It however strikes me that the 17 Rem has no real world advantage on a 223, of which I own a batch of.

So instead of a rebarrel job to another caliber, I will just replace the barrel with another 223 barrel, but with a 1 in 7 twist, just to have something good for longer range.

Thanks again.

Cheers and Good shooting
seafire