I'm not looking to buy or necessarily for advice. I've been shooting rifles and groudhogs for over 40 years in central Pa. I'm just curious as to what other people use in cartridges, rifles and why you like them. I've used just about everything there is over they years from 17 Mach 4 to a 6mmRem Rem 700 varmint special that weighed about 12 lbs. Anymore, I usually settle for a 6lb.Sako 17 Rem or 222 or occaisonly I get out a 9lb 6BR when I want to shoot quite a ways off. Tell me what you like.

Knobmtn,

I started with the .22 LR and head shots with hollow points are effective. Then I had a couple of .222R's and shot the most chucks with them. They were only 225 yd rifles however although I got a few just under 300.

I had a heavy .243 Win all this time but never used it that much. It makes a lot of noise. When I got a .219 Improved Zipper on an old High Wall I was really in style. That rifle is heavy as well but better balanced than the 243 and I hit well with it. It was an R2 Lovell and has a 1-16 twist. It will shoot the 50 gr Sierra easily to 3600 fps. When the plastic tipped 40's came out I switched to them.

Now my primary varmint rifle is a 220 Swift. But I don't shoot woodchucks with it even though they are my favorite target. That's because there are no woodchucks left in CT or VT. None at all.

On a trip on I-80 thru PA I saw woodchucks.

When I was doing a lot of sage rat shooting, I liked the 700 varmint special in 22-250 'cause you could set up and shoot for a long time. Now, shooting groundhogs, I prefer a sporter weight .223 in model 700 as I seem to do more walking than shooting.

jeez, it's like asking me which child I like best!!!

It depends on where I am hunting, and the distances I'll be shooting. In small "farmettes" with neighbors, I like my Ruger 77/22 in .22 mag. Good little 100 yd. shooter.

On bigger farms where 200 yd shooting and walking are the norm, I take the Savage 112 fv single shot bolt in .223 cal. It's an accurate rifle that is well balanced and is simply a pleasure to shoot.

On the really big farms, where 400 yd shooting is possable, I take the Savage F110 Tactical in 25-06 w/ bipod, 6-24 Burris Scope, find a shade tree, take some beef jerky, a bottle of water, some tic repellent, binoculars, and my .357 for the ones that come out of the fencerow within 50 yds..

Damn, which would I rather do!!!?????

Savage99

You've had some interesting rifles. Do you still have that R2Lovel? I liked the Swift for awhile, too. The 243's just always seemed like too much noise for my area. I do like that cartridge and own 4 of them but they are all deer rifles. You were right about groundhogs along I80. I live 5 minutes off that interstate and still have halfway decent shooting in a couple of places not far from home. I feel I'm lucky in that regard.

I put together a M700 in 25/06 for this particular genre of varminting. It is as follows:

27" Lilja, NBRSA HV taper
Action trued, lapped, etc.
McMillan HTG, bedded, w cheek pad
Jewell @ 12oz
Williams guard & action screws
Farrel rail, bedded, w 20MOA taper
Volquartsen tactical rings
anti-cant device
Harris S-BRM w podlok & speed nut
Weaver 4.5x14x44 Tactical/AO/1st plane mildot

This rifle goes a bit over 14# and is wonderful for extended field sessions. Likes 100 grain MKs over IMR4350.

Poodles and hogs hate the thing!

knobmtn,

My post was not clear on the R2. The High Wall was already rechambered to .219 RCBS Improved when I bought it. It was common to twist R2's like the Hornets back then. The barrel is a Buhmiller and has been a no miss rifle as it stay's sighted in. I have a number of books by Charles Landis and he goes over these neat old cartridges in detail. I always thought the Lindal Chucker was the best looking of them all.

Landis mentions noise quite a bit and his books are fifty years old and more. Today we seem to forget it.

The woodchuck was the greatest rifle game ever in my experiance. I really miss them. I was talking to a farmer yesterday and we can't figure out where they went. We blame the coyote. Perhaps it's overhunting here as well. There was one chuck out in the far fields of this farm last April. I left it for seed. When I pulled into the barnyard later that spring the farmer told me someone had shot it.

There are a few chucks under the barn on this farm. They are not extinct just so scarce that there is no shooting. They are the best rifle shooting for Easterners. No doubt about it.

I was out yesterday for varmints and it was warm and there was no wind. All there is to hunt is coyotes and crows now. I took a long shot at a crow. Missed it. Talk about long range hunting! Well 440 yds on a crow is really long! Thats the only shot I got.

Knobmtn: If Holmes in Wyoming can play, then I want to also!

I have never shot a Ground Hog but I have shot many, many Rock Chucks! Your Ground Hogs western cousin's! Over 40+ years of Chuck Hunting I am certain I have shot in excess of 10,000 Rock Chucks. They are my all time favorite Varmint to Hunt! I shot my first Chuck before I was 10 years old in Oregon with a 22 LR. I will never forget that big double chubby Chuck! I am sure he was a 12 pounder!

Out west we sometimes get into large colonies of Chucks and can sometimes warm up a barrel real quickly. The ranges are also often out to 500 yards, in areas I Hunt anyway. Chucks are pretty tenacious creatures and take a good solid hit and plenty of velocity to anchor in their tracks. Our western Chucks (especially the more mature ones) have a habit of just peeking out at the world from their dens or rock crevices. Extreme accuracy is often very important in western Chuck Hunting. As is speed or the ability to "buck" the wind! Another important factor in Chuck Hunting is the ability to spot ones own shot! Light recoil (heavy Rifles with moderate calibers) is always one of my concerns when Chuck Hunting.

For these reasons and many others I tend to favor the 22 Remington BR for Chuck Hunting! I have two Varminters in this caliber and have been extremely pleased with them and the cartridge over the years! Extreme accuracy, economical, fast and quite easy on barrels and brass are just some of this cartridges attributes.

During the "hayday" decades of western Chuck Hunting I would often kill 200 Chucks in a day. I remember several dawn to dark spring Hunts where I killed 250+ Chucks in a day! On days like these I would often switch Varminters when they shot dirty and would use 5 to 8 different Rifles in a day. I was always impressed when it came up the 22 BR's turn! It could really be depended on to make that head shot out at 275 yards when the old wise Chucks were just peeking around a rock at me!

Long live the 22 BR!

My favorite Chuck Rifles over the decades have been the various Models of Remington factory 40X Rifles! I have several of them now including the following calibers 222 Remington, 22-250, the two 22 BR's, 220 Swift, 6X47, 243 Winchester and 6mm Remington. They fit me and their accuracy is impressive and long lived. Their heavy weight and stock design are VERY conducive to successful field shooting of Chucks in my opinion. The amazing 40X trigger is second to NONE on factory Rifles! A good Chuckin choice in my opinion.

And one of these years when I get out on Safari where the Ground Hogs (Wood Chucks) live I will certainly have one of my 40X 22 BR's along!

Hold into the wind

VarmintGuy

Savage99

Do you think that picture of the Buhmiller barrel on pg 359 of 22 Caliber Varmint Rifles might have been the one on your High Wall? Just kiddin' but I bought tht book back in about 1960. It was out of print then and I was just a kid. I about wore out my credibiity with the local bookstore bugging them to find it for me. I always thought the Chucker was the most logical cartridge of its day, too. Judging from the loads I've lumped the Chucker into the 222 or 223 category. Interestingly enough I just loaned that book to a 25 year old rifle fanatic. After studying it out for a few days he called me one evening and said "you know that 22 Chucker would be a great cartridge today",,,,By the way, 400 yds plus on a crow IS Swift terriotory. Nice shot. Maybe the wind doesn't blow much in New England?

VarmintGuy
Just the kind of post I had hoped to read! I've never shot a rock chuck but your obervations and opnions parallel mine from 40 years of eastern woodchuck shooting. I agree that the 22BR may be the ultimate varmint round. I know when I had my first one my interest in 22-250s was gone. Virtually the same speed and better accuracy in a smaller case. Right now my 22 BR barrel is on the bench and that rifle has a 6BR barrel on it. That's not a bad cartridge either. But I've been sidetracked for awhile with a 17 and the jury is still out on the 6mm. I like the 40X's, too. I still have a 40XBR in 222. Its still the quarter minute rifle Warren page said they were when this one was made in the 70's. Your cartridge preferences would all work here in Pa. just fine for groudhogs. I would have expected bigger case 6mm's but your rationale about spotting shots makes sense.

knobmtn,

I don't have my Landis books with me but there are some very good photo's of rifles like my Floyd Butler High Wall in Paul Esteys "The Woodchuck Hunter" That's a small book but quite nice to have.

.22long rifle(both long gun and tricked out MarkII), .22Mag, .17 HMR, .22Hornet, .22 K-Hornet, .223, .17 MachIV, .22-250's, 6BR, 13lb .25-06, next spring two new aquisitions-- .22 Hornet Anschutz pistol -- Tactical.20. The Tact.20's burning a hole in my gun safe so to speak, by the time I got it put together the chucks had gone beddie-bye. They ain't gonna like what greets em in the spring!

Where I hunt chucks there are also gophers and a goodly number of badgers, a guy might shoot 5 or 6 hundred gophers 12 to 30 chucks and a couple badgers, shots from 25 to 600 yards. Like Hillary says, " It Takes A Battery". As we all know Hillary really didn't say that, I "might" like her better if she had. But I ain't holding my breath .