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AR 10 Prarie Dog Hunting

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Replied by faawrenchbndr on topic AR 10 Prarie Dog Hunting

At that higher mag level, the "fuzzimness" May have been the heat mirage.

Great shooting.......PD slaying is taxing on shooting skills.
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9 years 9 months ago #40182

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Replied by Siscowet on topic AR 10 Prarie Dog Hunting

Great shooting! Have you thought of getting a ballistic calculator? At that distance, wind, temperature, humidity all become variables that act on the bullets. Also keep a notebook next time, recording the placement of each shot. I am guessing within 200 shots you could double or triple your hit rate once you discover the impact of these variables and get data to compensate. There is obviously nothing wrong with your shooting touch.
:thumbs:
As far as expansion, a Prairie dog just doesn't offer enough resistance mass to allow a bullet like that to expand. Too light and too shallow.
Last edit: 9 years 9 months ago by Siscowet.
9 years 9 months ago #40196

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Replied by silverman1 on topic AR 10 Prarie Dog Hunting

I did take along a small spiral note book, and a big black paper clip, to keep the wind from blowing it shut.
Every hit was logged, but was sometimes, the shooting was too hectic, to log in all the hits. I would use the 4 vertical lines with a slash , for every 5 hits , but when I would get a mound, with 2 adults, and a bunch of younger ones, I would shoot the 2 adults , and then pick off the young.
I got a couple of these a day, where I would get up to 16 hits on one mound, and one of these was early morning, calm winds, no mirage, and at 401 yards.
I was using 10 rd. magpul mags, as 20 rd mags get in the way bench shooting, as far as I am concerned.
I could not get the 2nd. mag in fast enough, and a couple would always escape.
We used 12X12 pop up tents, for shade, and the guy under the tent I was shooting from, was accusing me of spray, and pray, till I told him to look at the 400 yd. mound, and all he could say was, ''look at the carnage.''
He was using a Savage 22-250, single shot, and could not get off the kills I did.
I do not have a chronograph, so downloading a app. like shooter, requires velocity in the equasion.
I used a program, put out by a powder mfg. which only asks for bullet weight , gr. of powder, and barrel length.
With the .223 it was real close (within one inch.) , but the 308 was WAY off , ( up to 3 mil dots at 700 yards)
Most of the shooting we did, we had a (guessed ) 10 to 20 mph cross wind, and I was holding one full mil dot for windage.
Before next trip , I would also like to buy one of the hand held wind velocity gauges, and log that also, but the day I was trying the 400 to 100 yd shooting, I used 3 ft long steel rods, with 2 foot of surveyors tape on them for wind flags, and it could be absolutely calm at the bench, but the flag could be horizontal at 700, and straight at 1000.
So if I can watch the flags next to me sometime, and determine app. how many degrees the flag is flying at, and them measure velocity, I will have a better guess as how much to hold to allow for it.
This trip, it amounted to firing a shot, and see how far I was off, and compensate.
The great part of shooting out there was we could position ourselves in a''bowl'' ,and have 360 deg. shooting with safe backstops from the hills all around.
The only thing in the way, was the truck, and the poles on the tents.
The following user(s) said Thank You: Siscowet
9 years 9 months ago #40245

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Replied by Libertarian623 on topic AR 10 Prarie Dog Hunting

Silverman - Great stuff man. Sounds like a absolute riot. If you go online and sign up for the free ballistics calculator here
www.gseven.com/ballistic-program
you will be able to use there ballistics program free and it has a trajectory Validation function that helps you calculate you MV. Also if you haven't watched any of there videos, you may pick up a lot of information about long range shooting that is hard to find. Look forward to more write ups.
9 years 9 months ago #40249

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Replied by Siscowet on topic AR 10 Prarie Dog Hunting

Silverman, sounds like a gas! I would like to spend a month doing something like that with a small mountain of ammo.
9 years 9 months ago #40251

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Replied by silverman1 on topic AR 10 Prarie Dog Hunting

I just finally had time to go through some of the pics from the ''hunt'' .
Boy do I have some great pics, of prairie dogs feeling the ill effects of Nosler varmageddon bullets.
I would put them on here, but would most likely get hate mail from animal lovers.
9 years 9 months ago #40386

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