I Could Barely Kill Pack Rats With .22LR-Remington Thunderbolt. Why?

No offense, but it is about shot placement. Iguanas are really tough animals, especially the big ones. I anchored a 5 footer with a single shot to the head. It did not even twitch. I shoot .25 caliber H&N Barracuda Extreme pellets at around 900 FPS out of a Benjamin Marauder. I normally aim for the base of the neck and destroy the spine or try to put it through the eyes.

I imagine head shots that destroy the brains of a rat will kill it pretty dead as well. I’ve watch rodent pest control videos on YouTube where they used air rifles with night vision scopes. If you can’t kill a rat with .22 LR, it isn’t because the rat has super powers. I nailed an iguana at the range with a 9mm. That darn thing still went a few feet. Another guy nailed one with a .45 ACP. It still walked away.

https://youtu.be/PpH7YbxHOVw
 
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The nervous system of cold blooded animals {reptiles} is very different than warm blooded animals {mammals}, cut a snakes head of and they can still strike you with the stump, likewise the head can still deliver a bite. No mammal can do that, shooting expectation's should be adjusted accordingly.

Here's the explanation from the web, Reptiles,
Because their bodies aren't generating their own heat, their energy and oxygen requirements are lower. This is how some cold-blooded, or ectothermic, animals are able to survive conditions without oxygen for periods of time. And it's why snakes (and other reptiles) continue to move after being bisected.
 
"...why 22LR is not great for SD..." You get attacked by rats assorted that much do you? As mentioned, shot placement matters with small game and varmints.
"...dispatch large rodents..." Average weight of an adult male pack rat is 14 ounces. Big ones go to 21 ounces. That's about the same as a tree rat.
A Thunderbolt is a 40 grain, HV, LRN. It'll kill a charging, 21 ounce pack rat with no fuss. HP's or frangible's(all lead .22's are that) are necessary.
 
^^^If you think 22LR will do it for you then by all means carry it. Like I'd said in many posts before and probably many more in the future - Carry what you are comfortable with. For me, 22LR is my backup.
 
Thanks everyone here for their feedback! I would like to think we had decent shot placement and some people here were suggesting THUNDERBOLT sucks for killing even rats (it's strictly for plinking). That could easily be the case. There was even one instance one was down and alive and we were shooting it multiple times at point blank range (like 5 to 6 times) before it actually died.

At one point and I wish I was exaggerating, there was blood splattering on the walls as we would hit rats multiple times and they would still keep running. I'm thinking I need to get some hollow point rounds next time.

I really appreciate all your feedback guys!
 
I respectfully suggest that it might just be that you did in fact shoot them properly, but because of the low velocity/small caliber of the .22lr, they just didn't know they were dead yet. And any that flop and twitch are dead; you hit them in the CNS somewhere and all that twitching is just autonomic response.

When I go prairie dog hunting, I take a couple .22s with me, just for close range shots.

I usually aim for the upper chest/belly area, and hit them the first time the majority of the time. But because the .22 is so slow and small it usually takes some time before they die. Minutes even. But they all die.

If I feel like they're taking too long about it and making me feel bad, I'll either hit them with my AR-15 or put another .22 in them if I can see their heads.

As someone pointed out earlier, to a rat a .22lr is like shooting a person with a slow-moving .50 cal/20 mm round. They're going to die, but it might take some time for them to bleed out. If you need them to die faster, shoot them with a faster bullet. Maybe high velocity .22lr would do it.
 
Rangerrish99 said:
As someone pointed out earlier, to a rat a .22lr is like shooting a person with a slow-moving .50 cal/20 mm round. They're going to die, but it might take some time for them to bleed out. If you need them to die faster, shoot them with a faster bullet. Maybe high velocity .22lr would do it.
Click to expand...
Thunderbolt is high velocity -- 1255 fps. The problem is that it's round-nose, not hollow point. There won't be any expansion.
 
consider a change of weapons, instead of a .22 use a good .357 or .38special loaded with wadcutters. I'd suggest loading them down to about 600fps or so. The mass of the bullet hitting the rat is about equal to you or me getting hit with a bowling ball (or cannon ball). It is quite effective, and improves your pistol shooting at the same time! :D

(and that's only partially sarcastic. I've dispatched a lot of rodents with light pistol loads, though you do still have to hit them right.)
 
as stated

As others folks have noted, the round nosed lead .22 lr bullet is notorious for lacking "killing power" for bodyshots on critters. For hunting near anything appropriate in the .22 lr range of power, hollow point ammo is a better choice.
 
How close were you shooting them from? Where were you hitting them at?

Head shot? Tail shot? It all matters and generally thinking, things want to live till they can't.
 
OK where I used to live we had a creek behind the wood fence and the only pecan tree I could see in any direction. And Burleson Tx is known for having a rat population. That pecan tree was a rat and squirrel magnet.

The squirrels came of duty around 10am to about dusk. The rats came on watch around 10pm and were on the job almost all night. I had two different Chow dogs and those were the huntingest dogs I have ever seen. When they had a squirrel or rat treed they had a high pitched bark. And if they sounded the alarm you could count on there being a rodent to hunt.

I kept a pair of slip on shoes, slip on shorts, a bolt action 22 loaded with CB22s and a flashlight by the bed. My Chow (Chopper) would start his high pitched bark in the middle of the night. I would wake up from a dead sleep and say "Chopper's got a rat". And quick as a fireman I was dressed to kill and on my way.

I never lost a rat when using those bullets. I sometimes used a Benjimen/Crosman pump 22 with 5 pumps in it. Same for the squirrels. It just killed them dead. Except for a few times they would fall out of the tree and the dog was on them instantly and he would shake them so hard you could hear the bones breaking.

I shot over 200 rats before I stopped keeping count. I never had one in the house or the garage. It was some of the funnest hunting I have ever done. I really miss it here in my new house.

If you aren't killing the rats you are shooting all I can say is its just plain bad hits. I did what I did with a low powered round with a RN bullet. I did try to make head shots. That was easy because the rats would hide behind a limb and every time they would move to a fork to have a look to see what you were. Just aim at the closest fork and when he sticks his little rat head out blast him. Dead rat.

And I tried one of the Colibi Quiet no powder rounds on a squirrel. It just bounced off and the squirrel ran away giving me a good cussin'.:D
 
Been Thar !!!

Once hunted up around Bolder Junction, Wisconsin and they are notorious for their population of Sabre-tooth Chipmunks. had to use some of my Remington Yellow-Jackets and the vermits still didn't die, right off ..... :eek:

Sorry bout dat and;
Be Safe !!!
 
I had an avocado that was going bad and decided to test out the Air Venturi Avenger on it using Predator Polymags. I need to figure out how to get the video on here. I captured it using slow-motion record so it was pretty cool. I can’t imagine a rat surviving long from a hit like that.
 
A ranch where I've gone to shoot had a large ,round woodpile with a bunch of cottontails living in it.
I was harveting a few.
I set myself in a loading chute "hide" with my Rem 513 "S" topped with a Weaver K-4.
Making a head shot was my choice. Better for the pan.
I'd hit them,they;d flip about 6 feet up in the air,hit the ground,then somehow crawl back into the woodpile.
Ordinarily,I'd say a solid headshot fulfilled "shot placement"

But,actually, a headshot can be misleading. The head is not all central nervous system. There is quite a bit of "less lethal" real estate than brain pan. Facial structure,etc.

It was hard to believe, but the "boing" straight up back flip bounce comes from a head shot, and they disappeared..
Switching to hollowpoints fixd it,along with aiming smaller. COM on a head isn't so good.

Shoulder shots anchored them.

An old trick to increase lethality on 22 solids is to cut a flat meplat on the tip.

A pocketknife will do.

Do some research on packrats. They have a way of being "dangerous game" that can kill you.

A distant relative spent a couple of weeks in intensive care and took 40 some units of blood.

No,it was not like the cave rabbit in Monte Python's Holy Grail.

It was Hanta Virus. She was cleaning a cabin that had pack rats. The urine and fecal matter holds the virus. Pack rats carry it. Gloves,mashs,etc are required. Do some research.

Good luck!
 
About flatting the nose on a RN .22 bullet, I recall Ed Harris talking about doing just that on the old FidoNet forum. He said he made a fixture to do it evenly by drilling though a piece of steel. Of course what's easy for a guy with a life time in the gun business is more trouble for us ordinary folk...

Tony
 
Drilling a hole would work. If your local gunsmith has a nasty,ringed,pitted junk 22 barrel ,the chamber end could be cut off and faced to length.
But IMO an eyeball and sharp knife will get it done plenty good for pack rat ranges.
Easy enough to try. Or,buy Stingers.
 
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