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I have killed a large number if coyotes with both 22 LRs and 22 WMRs. The LR is fine inside it's range, but the 22 WMR with 40 grain hollow points was quite a lot better. I used to earn a noteworthy percentage of my living killing coyotes, foxes and cats for the hides when I lived in Nevada.
Here in Wyoming I know a lot of hide hunters and so far from what I have seen I am not overly impressed with the 17 rim-fires. Not bad, but not as good the the older 22 WMR. Kills are not as consistently fast with the 17 Rim Fires as they are with the 22 WMR.

Once I got a 222 Remington and built myself a 221 Remington Fireball, I never went back to the rim-fires.

Now days I usually use a 223 from a 16" barreled AR15 which fires a 50 or a 55 grain bullet at the same speed as my 22" barreled SAKO 222.So the kills are exactly the same too. The AR is louder but the advantage of the semi-auto when you call in a pack became obvious to me soon after I started using the AR15.
My short light barreled AR is not as accurate as my SAKO 222, but not enough less to cause me to miss any coyotes yet. However not needing to move my hands at all to fire on the next coyote starting getting me more kills, especially on the farm and ranches I was asked to come shoot on.

So to address the article:
I personally would not be too ready to use any other rim-fire then the old 22 WMR, and the 22 WMR only if I can't use a 221, 222 or 223.

As a side note, The best tool I ever used for money shooting of foxes was a standard 22 LR. Deadly and no hide damage to speak of.

When making money, consistency of the kills with little to no hide damage is important. A small exit and excellent killing is better then 85% instant kills and 15% runs--- even if you have no hide damage at all. Loose a few and you see the "advantage" of no exits is not enough to override the 100% loss of some animals, or even the time lost in using up part of the day looking for one that runs off leaving no blood trail at all.

Others may disagree, but I like small exit wounds instead of none, paired with all kills being bang-flops or with runs of less then 10 years. The 221, 222 and the 223 give me that with the bullets I like.

Edited by szihn (11/12/22 07:06 AM)

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