California and hunting with 22lr?

[rbuck351]

This thought just crossed my mind. Is there any ammo for the 22lr that is legal for hunting in California and if so what is the cost? Or, what does one use instead of a 22lr for dispatching pests and other small game?

[Kylongrifle32]

CCI offers a copper polymer compressed 21 great HP and Winchester has a lead free tin / copper jacket bullet that I know of. I'm sure other manufacturer offer a lead free bullet.

[rbuck351]

Well, it's a good day. I learned something. I had never heard of either of those. Thanks.

[Bigslug]

The other option which my Pop has started experimenting with is to cast in something other than lead.

https://www.wildlife.ca.gov/Hunting/...tion/Certified

We've currently been tinkering with the Rotometals 98% tin / 1.5% bismuth / 0.5% copper pewter alloy. It knocks your weight down by 30% and does not expand when used in LFN/WFN format bullets, but it can be driven hard and seems to want to group very nicely without any real effort. It casts cooler and we frequently have to wrestle with getting it to drop out of the mold, so there's quite a bit more we need to learn about its temperature dynamics before we even consider adding to the challenge with a hollowpoint bullet design.

We've been primarily looking at this alloy in terms of vintage deer rifles of odd bore diameters for which we can't buy Barnes coppers, and so haven't gotten as far as thinking about it as a low-speed .22LR surrogate, but I'd think any of your .32 revolvers or .38 wadcutters would serve. This certainly makes a case for a return to the "rook rifle" concept - single shot rifles shooting small rimmed cartridges at black powder pressures.

[RED BEAR]

Good luck trying to tell game warden its not lead.

[Bigslug]

Good luck trying to tell game warden its not lead.

On the flip side, what are his qualifications to tell me what my own ammo is made of?

I'm not terribly worried about it, as much of the enforcement arm of any branch in CA seems to realize our idiot legislators are regulating from "their own little world". Even so, the game plan for this season is to either carry the top off a box of my Barnes TTSX's or a printout of the DFW approved list and/or the Rotometals MSDS, and probably even a pair of lead & non-lead bullets or mini-ingots, just to say "SEE! This is lead. This is not". The stuff is darn near pure tin, and is pretty obviously NOT lead just to look at it. When you hold what SHOULD be a 405 grain .45-70 slug that only weighs 283 grains, it sets off all kinds of "that ain't right" signals.

But yeah, it's a concern, so we plan to be polite, have our license & tags in order, and prepared to have a friendly chat to get the boys in blue educated with what will in their experience likely be the weirdest thing being done to stay legal. In our favor is the likelihood that a real poacher wouldn't go to all this trouble.

[ShooterAZ]

I have a box of CCI "TNT GREEN" 22 WMR ammo. It's a 30 grain lead-free hollowpoint, says it right on the box. I'd imagine that would satisfy a game warden? I also found this, it looks like they make a green version in 22LR as well. I can shoot lead where I live, and I bought the 22WMR ammo on a whim just to test it. It's accurate ammo.

https://www.americanrifleman.org/art...-s-green-ammo/

[rbuck351]

I don't live in CA. but it is nice to see there are some options available for those with 22lr guns that still allow them to use them on small game. It's also good to see folks are working on being able to hunt with the older guns (25/20 being one of my favorites) as there are a bunch of us that use substitutes for 22lr especially in handgun calibers. I like the Rotometals idea but I don't have to go that route YET. CA. laws seem to have a way of moving to many other states.