Which calibre for fox

I would compare down-range terminal performance to shooting a grain. Again, dropping to 32 grains almost halves the yard performance in this department. It would make a superb round for long-range varmints, but as a foxing calibre I still rate my old. I had gathered the information and views on the Swift in preparation for this test, but I will have to cut the analysis as there is very little between the grain Swift and grain.

Ammo is expensive and rifles are less readily available than the. So although it is an excellent killer, shooter and grouper, by comparison the Swift has to be counted out. It is probably fair to say that the. Like the. There is no doubt that the. As you would expect, there is a vast selection of rifles chambered in. Off the shelf ammunition selection is good, and, of course, you can obtain very cheap military surplus ammo as well.

Having said that, of the mil spec ammo I have fired, I have never found any to group particularly well in a hunting rifle. This is most likely due to the clash between rifle twist rate and the loaded bullet weight. Shooting the. When moderated, there really is very little fuss, and I have never had any trouble getting factory ammo to shoot well. Shooting with a very modest muzzle velocity, barrel life is generous.

The same cannot be said for some of the other calibres. Possibly one of the most convenient points of this smaller calibre is that you can get away with having a much shorter barrel than, say, a. Cut a. You can get away with it when it comes to the. I would say finally that, although the calibre kills the vast majority of foxes outright, every now and then you will get them running on a way.

Obviously this could happen with any calibre, but it is more noticeable with the. Although most people think of the. A grain bullet may be the default choice for many, but most rifles will shoot better with some lighter fodder. Indeed, most hunters never really get to see the true capabilities of a. It is here that you will see what a tremendous calibre it is for foxing. Without a decent moderator, the.

Although it may be the heaviest recoiling of the shortlist, moderation makes it only marginally more noticeably than a. Loaded with or grain bullets, even if bullet placement is a bit off, it will knock a fox off its feet where it stands. The same cannot be said for some of the smaller calibres. The weather on Skye can be unpredictable, with winds whipping up in seconds. The broken, rough terrain makes locating a dropped fox hard enough even when you know where it is.

With relatively cheap ammo on offer, the. It's an accurate round, and a good choice where you don't need the extra range of a. This calibre has been around for a long time - it was developed by wildcatters from the old. Winchester introduced the. Rifles in this calibre can be picky over ammo, so experiment to find the one that gives the best results.

Fox shooter? Published: PM February 4, Updated: PM November 12, Top foxing calibres. Most Read. Don't Miss. Jeremy Clarkson stands up for game shooting in The Times. Emily Damment. Wild Justice: a timeline of attacks on shooting. Few of the fields in the part of Devon I live and shoot in are much wider than yards, and with the network of roads and other situations that present hazards to safe shooting, I have always reckoned that yards is top whack range-wise.

I suppose too that having shot many thousands of foxes with a shotgun for their skins when I did it for a living, I have always endeavoured to get as close as I can before taking a shot.

I have said before that any rifle from an airgun up to a. On the other end of the scale, I know an extremely good shot who is more than capable of dropping foxes out to yards using a. In my early years all my foxes were shot at very close ranges, most at around the yard mark. I took considerable satisfaction in being able to get foxes at that range. Let me clarify what I mean when I say air rifles can be used on foxes. I have an FAC-rated Daystate in. One recent one concerned a gent lives in one of a pair of cottages, and recently the next-door neighbour died and new people moved in.

These folk had come down from London to retire and immediately started feeding the local foxes and badgers! Not wishing to have a major fall out, he rang me up to ask if I could help. Hatching a plan, I suggested that for a few nights he put out a small quantity of dog biscuits mixed with some cat food.

I also put down a small quantity of fox-attracting scent from Best Fox Call on the pole of rotary washing line. After about half an hour, a decent-sized fox appeared next door where as usual some scraps had been left out. It was an ideal night, cold with some light rain, more than enough to deter people from a town being out and about.