Best target medium to simulate effect on prairie dogs (video update)

[Tommie]

Carp

 

[JSH]

Hydraulics, key word for the subject. Mid day when they are laying flat on a mound looking at you, hold on the chest or bottom jaw for best “lift”

 

[wupterchook]

Potatoes. They are cheap and you don't have to pick up any trash when you are done.

 

[moorepower]

Red jello in a 20 oz water bottle is cool. More fpe= more splat as long as your in the velocity range for the bullet.

 

[hfinkle]

I use a 6br with 87gn vmax, they jump about 4 feet

 

[Dgd6mm]

I'm running 53 vmax and 105 Amax, they blow them up. I'm going to shoot me some potatoes this week. Thanks for the tip.

 

[sw282]

Walt Berger (RIP) makes a 30gr .224 Varmint H P. Most of the Berger load data show them being pushed above 4500FPS from my 22-250. Wonder what a full body prairie dog HIT looks on tape @4500fps?

 

[JASmith]

Probably just a bottle of drinking water.

The 16 oz water bottle and the prairie dog have about the same volume. The plastic is not very far from the strength of the skin. So, yes, exploding a water bottle should give ani idea of what will happen to the prairie dog.

If one thinks the pint bottle is too small, go for quart or liter bottles. The 2 liter bottles are a bit large though. Nonetheless these will also give spectacular results for 20 caliber and larger. I haven’t tried the. with 17 caliber rifles yet.

Remember to collect the fracutred and torn plastic. It will fill less volume than when the bottles are intact.

I call this whole process ”pre-cycling”

 

[searcher]

Having shot tens of thousands of the V-Max in 50 and 55 grain versions - my money is on the 50 Varmint Grenade. Not as aerodynamic but unmatched in same-weight bullet effects on the small critters. I think anyone who has shot 500+ squirrels/prairie dogs with each bullet would agree. Dead is dead - but for gore - the VG is the way to go.

 

[ben lurkin]

^^^. Varmint Grenadines for the win. That and a 22 BR. You just have to experience them for yourself. Just thinking about them makes me smile.

 

[boltfluter]

The Speer TNT and 52 HP are quite good as well, and reasonably priced. Hard to beat a plastic tipped varmint bullet though. Happy shooting!

Paul

 

[epc308]

Kittens even better. I'm certainly not taping that.

BTW in all seriousness if you haven't seen 'Don't Fu@K with cats' on Netflix, I highly recommend it. Its a 2019 documentary where some sadistic bastard tortures and kills kittens, and people make it their life mission to catch the guy via the Internet. Fascinating show!

If cats and kittens are ok, does the same hold true for small dogs and puppies?
Asking for a friend…

 

[Brians356]

Make sure you try the Speer 50-gr TNT.
-

 

[Mike402]

If cats and kittens are ok, does the same hold true for small dogs and puppies?
Asking for a friend…

Well as shown in that documentary, cats/kittens are NOT ok to mess with, as people will dedicate their lives to catching you.

 

[epc308]

Well as shown in that documentary, cats/kittens are NOT ok to mess with, as people will dedicate their lives to catching you.

I posted that while holding a large sarcasm sign. I do not agree with folks shooting cats and dogs for any reason.

 

[AckleymanII]

Cheap Ham, anything liquid in a container is just a wasted bullet.

Put the ham 150 yards from the muzzle at a minimum, shoot again at a further distance if you can.

You can down load shells to simulate a loss of velocity at distance.

 

[DirtySteve]

I use prairie dogs... lol.. Has this been said?

 

[Tommie]

I use prairie dogs... lol.. Has this been said?

Good one!

 

[Mike402]

I use prairie dogs... lol.. Has this been said?

As do I, and I'll repeat what I said before. PD hunting is a once a year deal for me, involving taking 10 days off from work and driving from CA to NM & WY. Its a lot of time and expense to figure out what loads work best in real time on the PD fields. Would like to have it all worked out ahead of time.

For instance, I put together a 204 Ruger setup for my trip last year. Slinging 32 VMAXs at 4000 fps. I was completely underwhelmed with the terminal performance on PDs. My 6BR 75 VMAX load at 3300 was much more impressive. Sure the 204 kills em nicely, but that 75 VMAX just obliterates and launches them 4-6 feet in some cases. If you listen to some folks posting on here, they claim all it takes is velocity. Not true, saw it real time after shooting hundreds of dogs.

I've learned its a combination of velocity, RPM, FPE and of course bullet construction. I've ordered new barrels w/ twist rates to get my loads as close as possible to the 290,000 RPM limit on VMAXs. Trying to get right before the limit they can sustain before blowing up. All I'm looking for is a way to gauge the effectiveness of each load, hence the reason for this thread.

 

[DirtySteve]

I was making a joke. Apparently not a good one.

I would try plastic bottles with jello inside.