Part II. SMALL GAME HUNTING RIFLES

Chapter 06. Small Game and Varmint Rifles. The .22 Rimfires

No matter if a hunter is primarily con­cerned with elk hunting in the Alpine meadows of the Rocky Mountains, still-hunting whitetail deer in Maine, long range varmint sniping or just tree squirrel in a farm woodlot, his most important field rifle is a .22 rimfire. It is not only a beau­tiful caliber in its own right for small game hunting, it also has a definite place as an understudy and stand-in for all the differ­ent calibers carried afield.

The high degree of skill required for clean, humane kills in all phases of hunting is usually the product of .22 rifle shooting.

There is no line of demarcation where a hunter can say this is big game shooting skill. This is squirrel shooting skill. All field shooting skills are related, just as all stalking, sign reading, and woodcraft are related—just as all food and cover preferences have about the same requirements.

Why more hunters do not consider their field shooting rifles as a related battery is one of the mysteries. Why arm manu­facturers feel they have fulfilled their obligation to the cause of hunting when they make a big or small game rifle without duplicating it exactly with another rifle, so hunters have similar rifles for all their shooting, is equally mysterious. Someday, somewhere, a custom gunsmith will begin building rifles in series—a .30/06 bolt action, perhaps, a beautiful .222 Remington, and a .22 rimfire, not as individual rifles, but as a field battery. They will be stocked alike, have the same length bolt throw, sights, weight, trigger pull. He will also make a battery of suitable calibers for both the lever actions and slide actions. When this occurs, hunters will beat a path to his door, as wide and as well worn as the path leading to the house of the man making the better mouse trap.

It would be nice to know that you could plunk your iron men down for a small rifle and when you decided to take a big game hunting trip you could get a rifle of suitable caliber that would take advantage of all the skill and confidence developed small game hunting. And it would be an excellent conservation measure, too.

I have a Marlin 39A lever action tucked under my arm when I hunt the river bottoms, where the briar grown brush patches catch the first sheen of autumn frost and there are cottontails on my mind. This hunting is not a backhanded effort, without relationship to all field shooting. Cottontail rabbit shooting puts the same premium on fast rifle handling and accuracy as big game hunting. The rifle has much in common with big game rifles designed for the touch and go of shooting deer in heavy cover.

A morning's rabbit hunt will turn up targets at twenty-five to seventy-five yards, very typical ranges for all hunting from small game to deer or elk.

Most of the shooting is off-hand. Again, that is typical. When I get a near miss as the game is feeding along the marge of those briar patches, a second shot is at a fleeting target where all the speed and accuracy of a snapshot is never more than enough for a clean kill. (Remember that buck you surprised on a hardwood ridge last autumn? That line could have been written about your shooting.) Small game shooting, such as I have along those autumn river bottoms is exciting shooting in its own right, and from the standpoint of big game shooting skill, very rewarding.

In an over-all consideration of small game hunting with .22 rifles, big game shooting must be taken into consideration. Small game rifles are not subordinated to big game rifles, nor is small game hunting less important. But in order to spread shooting skills wide enough to include big game hunting, small game rifles must be selected with this over-all consideration in mind.

Select a big game rifle action, complement it all the way down the line, and you will come to your small game hunting with an excellent choice of rifles, for all hunting is basically the same.

In making the selection, plenty of horse trading will have to be done or else it is no true hunting rifle, but a specialized firearm for just one type of shooting. Sometimes a bit of target range accuracy should be swapped for other qualities—ranging ability traded for ease of handling, and speed in getting off a second shot. After the trading is done, a hunter usually finds that, from the standpoint of practical field shooting, those trades which widened groups on targets have narrowed them in the touch and go of field shooting.

When a big whitetail buck crashes out of his snug bed in the top of a windfall, some certain rifle caliber and action in your hands will have just the proper amount of compromise in its makeup to be highly woods accurate, and you will roll your trophy with plenty to spare.

The essentials of this rifle are no different than those of a .22 rimfire which you have found right for rolling a cottontail or a squirrel. Field shooting accuracy has a lot to do with a short range shot when you are stepping under a snow ladden hemlock and a buck crashes out. It has a lot to do with one shot kills when you are sitting with your back to an autumn touched oak, watching for grey squirrel.

Other factors being equal, which they seldom are, a brush hunter has advantages in a lever or pump action rifle as a basis for his field shooting battery. Under the compelling necessity of field shooting, when a buck crashes out of that windfall cedar, stained antlers gleaming in the pale sunlight, accuracy has an element of expediency more important than target group size.

In mountain shooting, long range mule deer shooting, elk or rock chuck shooting, accuracy is measured in sensible inches, not expediency. A hunter could well trade some of the ad­vantages of a lever or pump action for the added accuracy and ranging qualities of a bolt action rifle. All rifle actions have some advantages, but you cannot have them all in just one type action, nor can you expect to come to your hunting with the highest degree of field shooting skill of which you are capable if you constantly switch from one action to another.

See what a whale of a compromise there is in selecting field rifles? See how utterly impossible it is to say that a .220 Swift, driving a 48 grain bullet at 4000 feet a second, is a better woodchuck rifle than a .25/35 using a 117 grain soft point at 2350 feet a second?

I hunt elk, deer, squirrel, occasionally woodchuck. During the winter, when other seasons are closed or my quarry is snuggled down for the cold spell, I love the high brushy ridges where snowshoe rabbits range. This hunting, from the smallest to the largest game is equally satisfying. It requires equal rifle skills, and matched rifles.

A bull elk bugling in a canyon some cold foggy November morning has its moments. So does a session in the hardwoods with a .22 rifle, hunting squirrel. Flushing blue grouse from the huckleberry brush and snipping their heads off when they perch in the second growth is thrilling hunting.

Here is my basic rifle outfit from squirrel to elk. First, and most important, is the before mentioned Marlin 39A lever action with its Micro-grove rifling. I use this rifle constantly the year around. It is the sweetest shooting, easiest handled .22 rifle I have ever used. There is a beautiful compromise of barrel length, weight and stocking for field shooting. It has a nice hand-filling forearm, a stock with very comfortable dimensions for snapshooting, kneeling or sitting positions.

Here are the essentials of that stocking: overall length of stock from trigger to center of buttplate 131/4 inches. Buttplate 5 inches long. Pitch (angle at which buttplate is set on stock) 3 inches. From line of sight to comb of stock 15/8 inches. From line of sight to heel of buttplate 21/2 inches.

Next in line is a .25/35 lever action Winchester model 64, same stocking. The .25/35 is my all purpose rifle for small game and varmint shooting. It is often carried afield during the autumn grouse season. In summer, when the first tender shoots of clover attract ground squirrels from their dens, and there is an urgency for a hunter to be afield, I often have this rifle with me.

Next is a Model 71 lever action, .348 caliber. This is the big game kingpin of my battery. All skill acquired off-season is directed toward using it during autumn big game seasons. I have fired only nine shots at deer with it during the last eight big game seasons. Eight bucks were bagged. Obviously, this amount of shooting contributes very little except confidence to the skill required to make those kills. There must be a pickup in the small game fields to compensate for the lack of shooting one gets in big game hunting. Big game seasons are too short, bag limits too restricted to actually acquire field shooting proficiency there.

What action? That question has plagued every hunter going afield, regardless of the game he has in mind. Is there some one action with which you would be better armed for all hunting? The answer is an unqualified yes. Just as sure as sure, there is one type rifle with which you will do your best shoot­ing, just as there is very apt to be one certain big game caliber which will deliver best for you.

Proper action must not only be measured against field shooting situations, but against the temperament of the hunter himself.

Some hunters require the steadying influence of a good smooth working bolt action for their best shooting. The very mechanics of manually operating a rifle tends to more accurate shooting, though accuracy is usually associated with sights. Remember, speed of fire has no inherent virtue, unless there is complementing accuracy. Sometimes hunters need an action which will slow them down to acquire this accuracy. Some­times certain temperaments require actions which will speed up their rate of fire. It all depends.

The sleight of hand, subconscious operation of a slide action may be the one thing which will contribute the necessary ac­curacy to your field shooting. It depends on the hunter. It is faster than a bolt action. But that isn't its chief virtue, smooth­ness is, and the fact that sights are not off the target during reloading. With some hunters it has just the proper division of work and concentration for accurate field shooting.

Somewhat the same thing can be said for the lever action. Again, it is faster than a bolt. But, again, that is not its chief virtue. The smoothness of operation and the steadying influence of its easily learned manipulation are its chief merits.

Both the slide action and the lever action can be more easily mastered than a bolt action. But once a bolt action is mastered, it has plenty of merit for any type of field shoot­ing from snapshooting to long range varmint sniping.

The automatic is definitely the most tricky action of the lot to handle properly in game shooting. A hunter of nervous temperament, under the stress of taking running shots, has no business with an automatic rifle in his hands. The tendency to spray the landscape with a magazine full of ammunition is almost irresistible. His best bet would be a smooth working bolt action or a lever action for their steadying influence. It is even questionable whether he is temperamentally fitted to use a slide action rifle.

By the same token a hunter of phlegmatic temperament is often greatly handicapped with a bolt action, lever or slide action. His best choice would naturally be an automatic rifle, both for small game and big game shooting. He would be much more accurate, and speedy enough to master just about any gunning situation his hunting turns up.

There are other factors in selecting the proper action, as you shall presently see—field conditions in which some actions fit like a hunting glove. But hunter-rifle relationship comes first.

Lever actions are wonderful woods rifles. For a still hunter with his mind on deer and elk in heavy cover, there is no better action. It is surprising how well this action fits into most small game hunting too. .300 Savage, .35 Rem. Marlin, .250/3000 Savage, .348 Winchester. These calibers at one end of the hunt­ing trail, and matched with a .22 Marlin 39A at the other end, and you are not far wrong for any type of shooting from squirrel to elk.

There are other conditions and other actions. A hunter who has used a bolt action extensively on the target range gains nothing by trying to go to a pump action or lever because they are better for woods shooting of deer. He will be much better served by procuring a bolt action understudy and using it in the small game field to iron out his shooting, developing sub­conscious habits which take over under the stress and excite­ment of game shooting.

Bolt action .22 calibers give the small game hunter a very wide selection from which to choose. Best, of course, is a customed stocked rifle based on either the Remington Model 37, or Winchester Model 52, with the stocking and weight exactly that of your bolt action long range sniping rifle, and your big game bolt action.

Hunters who cannot acquire custom stocked jobs still have several alternatives. The Marlin Model 80DL bolt action, Remington model 513S, Winchester model 75 Sporter, Moss-berg model 144LS, and their 146B. All these are in addition to Winchester Model 52 sporter, the best designed field gun of the lot.

One other bolt action must be mentioned, however, a specialized rifle which my hunting gang swear by. This is the "coon gun," Mossberg bolt action Carbine, Model 142: 18 inch barrel, weight 5 pounds trailside. "Coon gun" is not its official title, but a name bestowed by this gang of night roving raccoon hunters who are out almost every night when a full autumn moon silvers the cover and frost rims on the fields. When they start out, it is an all night affair. So a rifle must have excep­tional portability, as well as good practical accuracy to receive their endorsement. Mossberg's light bolt action carbine fits these requirements like a glove.

A hunter using a Remington Model 760 slide action for deer, a pump action shotgun for upland bird shooting and in the duck blinds should never consider anything for squirrel shooting except a slide action .22. A Remington Model 121 is about tops. It has enough weight for steady holding, a semi-beavertail forearm. It is nicely stocked, and usually comes from the factory with a crisp trigger pull. Winchester Model 61 is also a good choice for tree squirrel, rabbit hunting and targets of opportunity during the summer months. It also has good stocking, but is a half pound lighter than the Remington Model 121. And light weight is the curse of most .22 rifles, unless they are for some specialized purpose, such as the "coon gun."

Both the Remington Model 121 and the Winchester Model 61 are superior woods rifles in the .22 Special caliber. The .22 Special has more killing power than a standard .22. It drives a 45 grain bullet at a muzzle velocity of 1450 feet a second, with a muzzle energy of 210 pounds. The .22 long rifle, in comparison, has a velocity of 1335 feet a second with a 40 grain bullet, giving a muzzle energy of 158 pounds.

It is unfortunate that the .22 Special caliber, in both the Remington and Winchester, is now obsolete. But quite often very good rifles in this caliber can be picked up secondhand.

The .22 Special is splendid on tree squirrel. That extra bit of energy puts you on your target with more clean killing hits, especially when body shots must be taken. It is also more deadly on running jacks, cottontails and ground squirrel. It is not quite as accurate as the regular .22, all factors considered, but it would take a very skilled shot to find any difference in accuracy, even on a target range. In the field, limitations of range will cancel out clean killing before any inherent inaccu­racy become apparent. What better can be said of any rifle?

Winchester, Model 62 slide action is the only small game rifle, other than the Marlin Model 39A, with an outside hammer. This feature makes it a favorite with many experienced woods­men because it is such a simple, easy to operate safety. With the hammer set at half cock, it is perfectly safe to carry with a load in the chamber. At the same time it is exceptionally fast to get into action when a rabbit hound flushes a bunny from the secur­ity of a briar patch, or a squirrel rattles through the fallen autumn leaves, heading for a dentree.

A hunter devoted to an automatic shotgun or big game rifle has several .22 automatic from which to select his small game hunting rifle. The Marlin Models 88C or 89C are excellent choices. Both have Marlin's accurate Micro-Groove rifling. The Model 88C has a tubular magazine, loading through the butt-plate, the 89C is a clip loader. Using this rifle one autumn while hunting tree squirrel, I found it very accurate and practical for running shots when a big grey squirrel was crossing through the tops of the oaks, a very exciting target. On another occasion, when Grant Hartwell and I were giving our autumn deer shoot­ing a final polishing on ground squirrel before the big game season opened, I used Marlin's Model 88C for the day. Our hunting rule this time was to take nothing but running shots. For within weeks we would be in the autumn deer woods, cat-footing along the brushy ridges where bucks had horned the low growing red cedar, mountain willow and ash.

We flushed our squirrels and tried for a kill as they scurried for their dens. That meant short range snapshooting, with plenty of careful stalking to get within reasonable range before our quarry got under way. What a beautiful, exciting day of shoot­ing we had! What wonderful preseason shooting in preparation for deer hunting in heavy cover!

That Marlin automatic certainly complimented the day in every respect, giving me good accuracy—and not a mal-function all day, even though I used both regular and high-speed ammu­nition.

Both the Marlin Model 88C and 89C have sufficient weight for good steady holding, weighing in at 6¾pounds. The stocking is full and mansized, very closely duplicating the excellent stocking on the Marlin Model 39A lever action.

Mossberg, Model 151K .22 caliber automatic is also an excel­lent choice for a small game rifle. It is well stocked and heavy enough for close, steady holding, weighing 7 pounds. Savage's version of the .22 automatic is another good plinking rifle. In addition, there are several others available which will give entire satisfaction at reasonable ranges. But Marlin and Mossberg, it seems to me, are more mansized in their stocking, come closer to approximating the dimension of hunting rifles.