meat on the table 17hmr vs 22lr.

[HskrVern]

I have been thinking about the 17hmr vs 22lr for putting small game in the cook pot. I've never shot or been around the 17hmr but did a lot of 22lr hunting from cotton tails to 'yotes (took my first 'yote with a single shot) with a 22lr and found it to be quite satisfactory without destroying meat. I am seeing all these videos of the 17hmr completely demolishing small game and it kind of turned me off. I say that because if I kill something I fully intend to eat it, and having a half rabbit doesn't really appeal to me. Is it just the bullet selection of the 17hmr or is it just a really destructive round for small game?

[trautert]

We've shot hundreds of ground squirrels with the .17 HMR and the Mach 2 in the past couple of months. The V-Max bullets with the polymer tip really blow up the little rats. The hollow points (I think they are CCI's, but I'm not sure) put them down really hard, but don't blow up. For meat, I would probably use my .22.

[atavuss]

The .17HMR is accurate enough to just use head shots if you want the meat. I easily take only head shots out to and past 100 yards on the small Belding ground squirrels. If the wind picks up all bets are off though.

[ErikTheRed]

.22 magnum? Good compromise?

[Bug Splat]

buddy has a 17 Mach4 and watching him make hits on rabbits and it was just shocking. Looked like someone was setting off M80's inside them. Just exploded to nothing and left a cloud of red mist.

I'd go with the 22lr.

[Kiba]

buddy has a 17 Mach4 and watching him make hits on rabbits and it was just shocking. Looked like someone was setting off M80's inside them. Just exploded to nothing and left a cloud of red mist.

I'd go with the 22lr.

.17 Mach IV is a centerfire round... way beyond what a .17 HMR or .17 Mach 2 is capable of.

.17 Mach IV: Around 800 ft/lbs energy
.17 HMR: around 250 ft/lbs
.17 Mach 2: around 165 ft/lbs

.17 HMR V-max loads do decent damage can jelly and remove large chunks from small furry fleshy targets especially under 100 yards; it's a small fragmentary round moving pretty quickly so it's a very "reactive" round. However, it's typically extremely accurate and that allows easy headshots. If you zero a .17 HMR to be 1" high at 100 yards your rifle will have a trajectory within +/- 1 inch from 20 yards all the way out to 150 yards.

For varmint eradication in areas too small to safely use my .223 I use my .17 HMR and aim for the boiler room... it often puts the insides on the outsides of smaller things like ground squirrels. Compare that to a .22LR with 36 or 40 grain solid ammo at similar ranges where boiler room shots often allow ground squirrels to crawl back to their holes before dying.

If you're confident in your abilities I'd take the superior ballistics and trajectory of the .17 HMR over a .22LR and go for headshots every time.... but if you pull a shot occasionally a .22LR with solid projectiles will be MUCH more forgiving and ruin a lot less meat-- but you'll have to get better at ranging and compensating for the drop of a .22LR round.

[DirtyDave]

22LR shoot em anywhere
17HMR head shots only