What .177 pellet for squirrel?

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premiers shoot well most of the time out of most any gun. They aren't the gold standard for quality, but they are generally the best pffft for the buck.

the 1377 as stock is a bit underpowered for longer range hunting, but I've taken squirrel in the backyard with it with no problem. With CP hollowpoints.

for the sake of accuracy, I'd strongly recommend spending the $20 on a 1399 stock. And after you practice a bit, get the valve port relieved and a lighter valve spring and you'll hit >600fps much more easily.

And as always, remember that squirrel are possibly the hardest small game to actually get :)


And, while even I (and I'm pretty adamant about keeping ammo costs low) get sucked into the fancy ammo thing sometimes, truth is that at the ranges and power levels you are talking about, anything accurate enough for a hear shot at 15 yards is going to do. at closer ranges like 10 yard, on very small game (dove and ptarmigan (pigeon) are great for this power level) wadcutters do a GREAT job.

With the single exception of crow magnums, I've stopped buying anything that costs more than my crosman .22 hollowpoints. when you get to nickel or dime a shot pellets, it's suddenly way too expensive to go shoot four hundred pellets a week.
 
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I've killed crows and squirrels out to 70 yards, with chest hits, using the Crossman round nose pellets. They were the only .177 pellet that worked well at all ranges.
 
RatDrall said:
I've killed crows and squirrels out to 70 yards, with chest hits, using the Crossman round nose pellets. They were the only .177 pellet that worked well at all ranges.
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I've hunted around the net and found several sets of expansion tests- with a few exceptions (one of the reason I swear by Beeman Crow Magnums in medium powered guns) the profiles end up very similar- the round nose pellets are what most everything ends up looking like anyhow.

The 10.5 grain round nose crosmans (available as ultra-magnum labelled in 500 round tins or 1250 round boxes as 'premier heavy') do really need a powerful gun at range- but the heavy pellets don't necessarily *not* work in lower powered guns at very close ranges.

You can expect a decently performing 1377 to give 6.25 foot pounds with a 7.9 grain pellet, but with a 10.5 grain pellet it actually goes *up* slightly to 6.31 foot pounds on a particular stock 1377 pistol I have. Not enough to matter, really. But not a fail.

if your gun shoots them well, round ball beat anything (including the silver arrows) at penetration, and at lower speeds overpenetration isn't as much of a worry. at 900fps a .177 solid nose or round ball can drill right through game and leave it wounded but moving.

Except, the same thing applies to the beeman crow magnums, which are the only projectile I've ever encountered that has a reliable and non-seperating expansion at low velocities. if you can get 600fps with one, it will pop and get you a good expansion. (you'd need to tweak a 1377 a bit to do that) - 700fps is where they really shine, and if you can get 700fps you can have quail, dove, ptarmigan, squirrel anytime with any decent shot. I mostly use them in my .22 caliber 101, which loves them. It shoots those at ~540fps on 8 pumps. That's right up at 12 foot pounds and I get reliable expansion. they are hideously expensive to my mind, but try a tin and see if they do it for you.
 
PrimitiveMan said:
Where are you guys getting Silver Jets?

They stopped making them, at least the nice lathe turned ones a few years ago.

Closest you can get are silver arrows, and they are anything but precise like the old Silver Jets were.

BUT, I would agree they are a great .177 for head OR chest shots on a squirrel.
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Let's just say, when I first discovered them, I "squirreled" away a bunch of them, and use them VERY VERY sparingly... Beeman did go back to making them again for a short time but not sure of when they stopped..
 
koyote said:
On a larger note- one thing that hasn't been mentioned yet is that not all airguns will shoot all pellets well. I have found some guns that purely love round balls. I have found some that hate them. I've had the same thing with the crow magnums, all the gamo stuff, and the other beemans I've tried. I have to say that overall, no gun I've ever had hated crosman premiers, but i have had some guns shoot a bit more accurately with other pellets or ball.
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Well said Koyote :thumbup:!! I've ran into the same thing with a number of my airguns.. Crosman heavies seem to be quite good thru all my airgun but one, which likes the lights scarily much better..

Good Point, and another great post !:thumbup::thumbup:
 
koyote said:
I've hunted around the net and found several sets of expansion tests- with a few exceptions (one of the reason I swear by Beeman Crow Magnums in medium powered guns) the profiles end up very similar- the round nose pellets are what most everything ends up looking like anyhow.
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I wasn't talking about expansion, I was talking about the only thing that matters with tiny pellets: penetration.

Pointed pellets work great at short range, but are usually inaccurate at long range (in my experience, yours may vary).

Flat pellets work great for punching paper, but usually run lighter and didn't kill well at longer ranges because they didn't consistently penetrate enough.

Round nosed pellets were the only ones that were accurate enough for consistent kill zone hits on small critters small vital areas, but had the power to penetrate deep enough to kill consistently at long ranges.
 
With all due respect RatDrall, its not just the penetration that counts, its the damage it does after penetration.. With pointeds, depending on the velocity, the pellet may just zip thru and the hole just close up on itself.. Yes, the pellet may have done a complete pass thru, but there was no trauma or hydrostatic shock damage, such as when you use rounds, or wadcutters.. In most cases, when you hear that "thwop" of a round nose or wadcutter, or one of the semi's and it's a hit in the "boiler room", that's a guaranteed meat in the pot..

Now please don't take this all as gospel, its just from what I've experienced with my airguns, past and present..

As for wadcutters(flats as you call them) being "great for punching paper, but usually run lighter and don't kill well at longer ranges because they didn't consistently penetrate enough", I've got a few 11 and 12 grain pellets that are truly wicked out to 30 yds or so..

I'm guessing(and appologize if I'm wrong), that possibly your accessibility to wide array of pellets may be a little limited, or you haven't gotten around to try out more pellets for your airguns..

In my experience my best performing pellets were round nosed(crosman premiers as one example), or semi round nosed(beeman kodiaks, Ramjets, and trophy's..the last 2 I'm not sure they make anymore).. Not to exclude hollow points, they do have a spot in my arsenal as well, but I'm pretty selective when it comes to them because a few manufacturers make these too light which in some cases can damage some guns... I like the crow-magnums.. They are nice and heavy, and do PLENTY of damage in impact.. I only use these for birds, as well a few of my hunting buds down in Tenn.,.

I'm not sure as to what brand, model, or type of airgun, you own, I a basing this on my airguns and my experiences...

FWIW

Good hunting to you

Tux
 
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Wadcutters are strongly recommended by a lot of pest control shooters for backyard ranges because they DO hit so hard and cause quick clean kills- and because they don't over penetrate. The crow magnums are in that same boat (at 3 to 4x the price, admittedly)

Penetration certainly does count- Penetration often needs to be controlled in .177 caliber airguns, because you can acupuncture easily with pointed pellet- to some extent round ball will do that, too, but it seems to hhave a larger shock channel thant the super pointy guys.
 
I have shot many squirrels with a crosman 1377 and 1322. They really do not have the power to make a clean kill in the chest. Head shots are much more effective.

With that being said, the best pellet choice is whatever pellet is the most accurate for your gun. Every gun is different so I suggest trying a few different brands and see which ones group the best.
 
koyote said:
Wadcutters are strongly recommended by a lot of pest control shooters for backyard ranges because they DO hit so hard and cause quick clean kills- and because they don't over penetrate. The crow magnums are in that same boat (at 3 to 4x the price, admittedly)

Penetration certainly does count- Penetration often needs to be controlled in .177 caliber airguns, because you can acupuncture easily with pointed pellet- to some extent round ball will do that, too, but it seems to hhave a larger shock channel thant the super pointy guys.
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It does and it doesn't, if there's no wound channel then you've got a cruelly wounded critter, that's getting away.... It's like you said Koyote, you dont want to acupuncture your prey ... You want it dead, quickly and humanely..

Sorry if what I said earlier came out wrong..

True you want the best pellet for the job, but there are or were tools that helped in accurising your gun with just about any pellet.. It was called a pellet sizer.. What it did was open or close the back end of the pellet(the pell), so that it'd help get better control of the airflow behind the pellet and mmaking it more accurate.. Beman made a version of it, with about 4 dies for adjusting the pell size.. I'm not sure if there are any more manufacturers of these, but if so get one .. It will make things a great deal easier, with whatever pellet you try, provided they aren't too hard of an alloy..
 
I once shot a squirrel dead center in the chest with a .22 Long Rifle bullet at over 1,000 feet per second. It ran from tree to tree to tree and it took me two more rounds to knock it down over a period of a few long minutes. When it finally fell to the ground it took another round in the head to finish it.

I once shot a squirrel up on a branch in the left side of the chest with a .45 auto bullet. It completely took out the lung and left a huge hole. But he hung onto the branch until I hit him again with another .45.

I realize young guys love their guns, and I own and shoot pelletguns myself. But hunting is for Sportsmen, not killers. All history tells us to respect our game, and avoid suffering. A clean kill is honorable. To track a slowly dying animal and savage it unto death, as I described what I did above, is not good for animal or man. I regret the above to this day, but was but a callous youth at the time.

Squirrels are hardy beings. Everything I have read, and my experience, says shoot them in the head with a .22LR. I have killed with my sheridan .20 and the meat tasted great. But I no longer hunt anything other than birds with it. It's just too small.

Yes, you can stab them to death with pointed sticks or beat them to death with clubs or poke them full of holes with pellets until they die. But then you are being just a killer, not a sportsman, a mature man of the outdoors. Give them a quick, instantaneous end.
The meat will be better and so will the hunter.

Keithcarter
NRA Life
 
take a look at pyramidair.com try and send them an email and see what they reccomend for you. or browse thier pellet selections for your caliber. they are great people and really helpful with huge selections. also they have a continuous deal like buy 4 tins of any sort 5th is free. i think they also have samplers to see what your gun shoots best.

I personally use a RWS panther 34 synthetic stock .177 i use RWS meisters in mine, but it also likes the RWS hollow points. those worked OK on chest shots. but i would really recommend headshots.
 
Tuxdad said:
I'm not sure as to what brand, model, or type of airgun, you own, I a basing this on my airguns and my experiences...
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And that's all anyone can do, when it comes to airguns. They're all extremely different, as is everyone's ability to use them properly.

To be more specific:

I was using an RWS Model 36 (1000fps) with a 3x9x40 RWS airgun scope mounted with an adjustable one piece mount (if you don't have the adjustable mount your scope won't line up with the barrel). When I got my rifle I bought a ton of different pellets and tested accuracy and penetration in game (we had thousands of ground squirrels that needed population control so that was never an issue). The only pellet that was both accurate, and consistently deadly, at longer ranges (50 yards +) was the Crossman round nose. I'm not saying that there aren't other good loads out there, but among the dozen or so that I was able to get my hands on that was the best. I didn't have too many problems with wounding, if I put that round nose pellet into the lung area or head the critter would drop right there, even past 50 yards. The problem is hitting an area the size of a dime at that range, especially with a gun that you can't rest (if you rest a sping piston airgun on a hard surface, like a tree branch or bipod, the vibrations will cause your rifle to shoot a pattern instead of a group).

Everyone has to learn their own way with airguns, and do whatever works for them.

Edited to Add:

Here's the best article I've ever read on airgun pest control, it's an entertaining read as well as informative:

http://www.geocities.com/n3umw/Backyard-Safari.txt

Whether you're toting a .600 Nitro Express or a slingshot, hunting is a state of mind, and the only difference
between a rhino and rat is strictly between your ears. Today, whereas so much acreage used to be available to
the shooter, urban swell and population growth have greatly cut back the freedom of the congenital rifleman.
But be of good heart! Relief is here! Just open the back door...

Read the rest!
 
HAHA !! I have the article of "Gun and ammo":thumbup:.. It was one of my favorites to read !!

I always carried a small beanbag or sock full of rice when I was "shooting in a hurricane", and could't steady myself.. If I had a shot from the sitting position, I'd put the bag on my knee, but if I was using a tree, I'd rest my hand on the tree, and place the bag over my wrist and rest the gun there.. I'd never put a deah grip on it, just rest it on the bag and let the jump when I squeezed the trigger... It worked like a dream...

Like with any gun its all about putting in the pracice time.. I've only done 3 shots over 50 yds(65yds) and those were in field target shoots, and was only able to hit twice ad that was by SHEER luck because my scope was crapping out on me(that's a story for another time).. In a hunting situation y longest was about 48 yds, on a couple of male skunks during mating season(yea they were having a "pissin contest " you might say:D) and let me tell you that's not something you want going on under your house or shed, and my neighbor had just that.. I was able to get one with a clean H&L shot, but the other got away before I was ale to reload..

I guess it's all about knowing your limits and putting in time behind the scope...

Pyramid air does have a nice selection but you should STILL look other places for pellets.. You'd be suprised at what all you find out there.. 've gotten pellets from europe, south america, as well as somewhere in the ussr(all by way of an american distributor).. You just have to keep an eye out on the web as well as in magazines..

If I can 'll have to pull out my tins and get some pics put up of some of them..

Keith
I've also shot squirrels with 22's and had them run off(both head and H&L's) also, and believe me I hated it.. That is one of the reasons I went with airguns, because of that very thing.. I have NEVER lost a squirrel yet with any of my airguns.. In all honesty, I think airgun hunting makes you a better hunter and sharpens your skills of stalking and proper shot placement because you have to make that shot count, for you as well and the prey..

There was an article on the web a few years back discussing the pros and cons of airgunning and how it made a lot of folks better shoters with their other guns because of that time they put in with their airguns... I will have to see if I can dig it up and post a link to it..
 
Most of my shots are head shots for a quick kill, but I would have no problem squaring one in the chest with a gun going over 650 fps or so and I have done so many times. Have I had squirrels that didn't die immediately? Sure, not many, but it has happened. Same thing has happened shotgun hunting rabbits, Duck hunting, deer hunting, etc.

A deer doesn't just fall over and die in 5 seconds when you whack it with an arrow ya know....it bleeds to death and sometimnes takes a looong time to do it, but we still consider archers ethical hunters.

As long as you are hunting and attempting the quickest kill you can under the circumstances, shoot away.

While I prefer .22 airguns, a .177 airgun is a great squirrel getter.

Carl-
 
PrimitiveMan said:
Where are you guys getting Silver Jets?

They stopped making them, at least the nice lathe turned ones a few years ago.

Closest you can get are silver arrows, and they are anything but precise like the old Silver Jets were.

BUT, I would agree they are a great .177 for head OR chest shots on a squirrel.
Click to expand...

Try Pyramyd Air.
 
Uhh. When I was a kid I used a 760 pumpmaster loaded with steel BB's to bad all manner of varmint and small bird, including squirrel. I cleaned them with a little Old Timer I found in the front yard and cleaned up.
 
Try the Predator Polymag and you will never use any other pellet. It gives superb penetration. I have shot crows at 50 yards using an RWS 34 and these pellets make them drop dead right there.
 
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