REM 600 in 222 REM for Deer?

[Cast10]

No.
Margin of error is too high.

[Jhon]

Lot of armchair experts venturing opinions not backed by experience I'm thinking. Here in New Zealand, deer culling was a big deal funded by Govt in the 60s and 70s when they handed out military surplus 303B rifles and gobs of FMJ surplus ammo to cullers who were paid to go bush for weeks on end and got paid per animal shot, tails collected as evidence and the backsteaks for dinner. Those rifles were not particularly accurate nor was the fmj a clean reliable killer. Most took to dumduming them by cutting the tip off. Long range shooting clearly not a consideration in the bush.and not really a.thing at the time.unlike today.

Then the Govt kinda gave up on culling but lo the market for venison in Asia took off and the cullers became far better paid (if they were good) as meat hunters. Mid 70s into the 80s.

Guess what the calibre of choice was? Yup 222 Remington and the most favored rifle a Sako Vixen. 1:12 twist. Maybe some brands at 1:14.. The bullet of choice was the simple 55gn SP, flat base probably for the most part, but also BT.

What deer are we talking about here? Well almost exclusively back in the day the mighty Red. Most armchair pundits today would consider nothing less than a 300 WinMag, or maybe a 30-06 as sufficient. But an awful lot of venison was shipped out of the country shot with the mighty 222Rem..

Compared to the 303B the 222 is laser accurate. Meat hunters who transitioned successfully learned to head and neck shoot which of course favored meat recovery. Those who insisted on body shots or who were poor shots moved on to other calibres.

Today we have large populations of Fallow, Sika, Rusa and others alongside the mighty Red. Probably the most common calibre used, and often, yes, badly, is the ubiquitous 223 Rem which has largely supplanted the 222. Old timers will still take all they can eat with a 55gn or 62gn Hornady BT SP bought bulk in bags of 100 to 500 with either 222 if their barrel is still up to it or maybe a successor 223.

Those who have got into fast twist with 1:8 and 1:9 bores are using fancy ammo up to 77gn. And 1.7 twist even larger. But the latter are pretty much custom rifles. For myself I use a.Ruger Ranch Gen 2 1:8 Twist with 16.5in barrel. It will head or neck shoot anything here downunder out to 150m or more with 62.gn Hdy BTSP and a lot further with 73gn ELDM or 69gn HPMatch. For myself I have a preference for 80 to 120m shots when off the shoulder, out to 220-250m off sticks. Younger eyes and greater skills do for better than that. Most of my shooting is on feral goats for meat. Head and neck shots are highly desirable but a precise body shot on a goat, as for a deer, crease of shoulder, heart, lungs will certainly do the job. Like the professional meat hunters of the heyday of 222 Rem in this country, I favour getting close enough not to miss. I doubt many of their kills were past 100 to 120m.

Those who decry the suitability of 222Rem for deer will not find much more favour for the 223. Do this search and you will turn up a long running thread on our local forum where the debate also rages. You will.find plenty of evidence for the effective killing capabilities of .224 Cal bullets in competent hands.

site:nzhuntingandshooting.co.nz .223 deer
(Copy and paste into your browser)

What can be done with 55 and 62 gn SP or current polymer tipped bullets, monolithics, partitions etc in a 223 can be done equally well in a 222 1:12 twist.

Finally I'm reminded of an old govt deer culler now in his latter years, speaking against the 222Rem he bought following the days trend only to find when he took half a doz body shots at a bunch of running fallow moving past him a mere 40m or so away, that he failed to drop any. He was adamant every shot hit and from his trusty old 303B, would have put every deer on the ground. I believe him. Point is, if you try and use a .224 cal as if it were a 6mm, 270, 7mm, 30cal etc your success is likely to be marginal. Better bullets today may have made a difference but they are not shots anyone I know would take with a .224 cal.

Deployed to its strengths in capable hands the little triple 2 is deadly enough.

[schutzen-jager]

here in Jersey many towns + parks have severe over population - one town had 3 cars totaled with deer collisions in two days - the professionals hired to cull them all used .223's + guarantied no wounded animals - iirc this is one that used silenced .223 at night -

https://www.whitebuffaloinc.org/deer...%20communities.

[FergusonTO35]

On the other side of things, the hunter who is well practiced and confident with his .222 is always going to do better than the one who has a big game rifle but never practices and really doesn't know if the rifle is actually sighted in or not. And his rifle probably has a yard sale scope mounted in flimsy tall see through rings, loaded with whatever ammo was available or on sale when he stopped into Cheap Mart to buy ammo plus license the night before opening day.

Or, maybe worse, the one who closes his eyes and flinches with every shot because his macho magnum is really too much gun for him to handle. My first deer rifle was a bolt action .30'06 with a cruel hard plastic buttplate. Even though I was a big 13 year old at 6 feet and 190 pounds, that thing was decidedly painful and I seldom bothered to take it out until I was in college and put a recoil pad on it. I switched to .30-30 in my 20's and that was a game changer. No more kills at both ends nonsense and one per customer is still all it takes! I also rebarrelled the .30-06 to .257 Roberts, a very good decision.

What has always amazed me is, there are in fact many good hunters who fit into these categories. One of my relatives is a very good hunter and has taken hundreds of deer and turkey. His idea of "sighting in" is to set up an empty pizza box about 20 yards away and fire one shot. Hits somewhere on the box, good to go! His rifle is a Remington .270 autoloader, probably loaded with both 130 and 150 grain rounds in the mag, with a 30 year old cheap scope in tall and spindly see through rings.

[white eagle]

The first sentence drove the nail home
know your limitations

[Jhon]

here in Jersey many towns + parks have severe over population - one town had 3 cars totaled with deer collisions in two days - the professionals hired to cull them all used .223's + guarantied no wounded animals - iirc this is one that used silenced .223 at night -

https://www.whitebuffaloinc.org/deer...%20communities.

On the other side of things, the hunter who is well practiced and confident with his .222 is always going to do better than the one who has a big game rifle but never practices and really doesn't know if the rifle is actually sighted in or not. And his rifle probably has a yard sale scope mounted in flimsy tall see through rings, loaded with whatever ammo was available or on sale when he stopped into Cheap Mart to buy ammo plus license the night before opening day.

Or, maybe worse, the one who closes his eyes and flinches with every shot because his macho magnum is really too much gun for him to handle. My first deer rifle was a bolt action .30'06 with a cruel hard plastic buttplate. Even though I was a big 13 year old at 6 feet and 190 pounds, that thing was decidedly painful and I seldom bothered to take it out until I was in college and put a recoil pad on it. I switched to .30-30 in my 20's and that was a game changer. No more kills at both ends nonsense and one per customer is still all it takes! I also rebarrelled the .30-06 to .257 Roberts, a very good decision.

What has always amazed me is, there are in fact many good hunters who fit into these categories. One of my relatives is a very good hunter and has taken hundreds of deer and turkey. His idea of "sighting in" is to set up an empty pizza box about 20 yards away and fire one shot. Hits somewhere on the box, good to go! His rifle is a Remington .270 autoloader, probably loaded with both 130 and 150 grain rounds in the mag, with a 30 year old cheap scope in tall and spindly see through rings.

Sad about the 30-96 experience but if I had experienced one at that tender age likely would've had the same result. It was a calibre way down on my have to have list in later times, practically slipping off the edge. Until someone offerd a "bitser" he had had as his goto rifle for 30 years, and it was not new to him. He had re barreled it with a new Douglas barrel, shot a few times and moved up in the world so it languished in back of his safe. He offered it for $350NZD, about $US200. I watched it as it sat for a week and then couldn't help myself. The barrel is in a M98 receiver/action, likely an OEM Zastava, and came with a Timney trigger installed, in a bedded Bell and Carlson stock, The floor plate and bolt shroud are off a Parker Hale sporter. Because the trigger and bolt shroud have been replaced there is no safety catch. A very clear old Burris Fullfield is mounted in good steel rings.

On receipt I took it to DPT Machinists with one of their 308 cal modular suppressors I already had, got them to thread the 24in barrel, so it lost .75 inch. I put an extra baffle in the suppressor and one of their excellent recently released muzzle brakes on the end. I first shot it with 3 of his reloads he spoke highly of and off a support put 3 holes in paper at 100m my thumbnail would cover. And what a delight to shoot. Better behaved, just, than my suppressed non-braked 270 or 308. A bit long for bushbashing but I still take it out. First deer was a large fallow hind on a group shoot. I was sighted in at 200m as was told to expect 300m shots. The hind lost half its head at 25m to a 150gn Corlokt over a max charge of RL19! Recently I took 2 meat goats with it at 220m off sticks using Hdy ELD-Ms. One neckshot, one heart shot as it was on the move. Apart from anything else about the rifle, that muzzle brake is the bees knees.

[curdog007]

I grew up in New Zealand in the 60's and 70's, and what jhon said is right.
The 222 was the choice of meat hunters. My father killed his last deer at 81 with a 222, and my son killed
32 before he graduated high school with a 223 and 222.

You have to make a good shot, whatever the caliber.

[Noah Zark]

I have a HS classmate whose father used a Rem 788 in 222 for deer, and the classmate bought a 222-chambered 600 Mohawk from me in 1976 for deer b/c I needed the $$$ for my sr. year at university. He has used that 600 for deer every year since with good success. Personally I would not; I used the 600 for woodchuck culling for farmers.

Noah

[FergusonTO35]

Sad about the 30-96 experience but if I had experienced one at that tender age likely would've had the same result. It was a calibre way down on my have to have list in later times, practically slipping off the edge. Until someone offerd a "bitser" he had had as his goto rifle for 30 years, and it was not new to him. He had re barreled it with a new Douglas barrel, shot a few times and moved up in the world so it languished in back of his safe. He offered it for $350NZD, about $US200. I watched it as it sat for a week and then couldn't help myself. The barrel is in a M98 receiver/action, likely an OEM Zastava, and came with a Timney trigger installed, in a bedded Bell and Carlson stock, The floor plate and bolt shroud are off a Parker Hale sporter. Because the trigger and bolt shroud have been replaced there is no safety catch. A very clear old Burris Fullfield is mounted in good steel rings.

On receipt I took it to DPT Machinists with one of their 308 cal modular suppressors I already had, got them to thread the 24in barrel, so it lost .75 inch. I put an extra baffle in the suppressor and one of their excellent recently released muzzle brakes on the end. I first shot it with 3 of his reloads he spoke highly of and off a support put 3 holes in paper at 100m my thumbnail would cover. And what a delight to shoot. Better behaved, just, than my suppressed non-braked 270 or 308. A bit long for bushbashing but I still take it out. First deer was a large fallow hind on a group shoot. I was sighted in at 200m as was told to expect 300m shots. The hind lost half its head at 25m to a 150gn Corlokt over a max charge of RL19! Recently I took 2 meat goats with it at 220m off sticks using Hdy ELD-Ms. One neckshot, one heart shot as it was on the move. Apart from anything else about the rifle, that muzzle brake is the bees knees.

If that is in fact a Zastava action, then you have a very good rifle indeed. I love my Zastava 85 bolt action .223, and wouldn't mind to get one in .308 or 6.5. Burris Fullfields are excellent scopes, I have several of them and they never let me down.

Nothing wrong with the .30'06 cartridge, certainly one of the most versatile rounds out there and will cleanly kill probably 98% of all game animals on the planet with proper bullets and good marksmanship. But for a kid who had never fired anything stronger than a 20 gauge game load it was just too much, especially with that pointy buttplate. And it's still too much for me today unless loaded down to something like hot .30-30 power level. I've discovered that the .308 with .300 Savage load data is the perfect "big game" rifle for me, 180 grain bullet at around 2200 fps. I cleanly took a bona fide trophy buck with it last year at around 150 yards. The middle school kid I used to be who was afraid of a smashed shoulder from his full power .30'06 would have completely missed or wounded him. The second largest buck I took was with my Marlin .30-30 and a 170 grain Sierra at around 1950 fps, a bit more mild than factory and deadly accurate. One round in the crankcase, he goes 20 yards and lights out!

[Jhon]

"If that is in fact a Zastava action, then you have a very good rifle indeed. I love my Zastava 85 bolt action .223, and wouldn't mind to get one in .308 or 6.5. Burris Fullfields are excellent scopes, I have several of them and they never let me down"

I also have an Interarms (Birmingham, UK made) Mk X in 308 and one in 7x57mm Mauser both using Zastava M98 OEM actions "finished" by Birmingham gunsmiths. The 308 is still in its well used English walnut stock. The 7x57mm in an excellent Ramline synthetic (no longer made). They are both excellent to use. Then I have a "no-name" 270Win probably Spanish with the same action and a 24in barrel also in a Ramline stock. Some of my favourite rifles. All used scoped and suppressed which makes them a little long and heavy to carry by current standards, but I do ok walking slow lol

[FergusonTO35]

You have some very nice rifles there indeed!

[Bigslug]

Its pretty clear here. In Texas a .222 (and smaller) is perfectly fine for deer. In the rest of the country it starts as a .30 cal.

That said a 7mm works just fine and while I never tried a 270 it sounds like it should work too.

But ya gotta love these what is the minimum I need threads.......

Well. . .the .222 IS the parent cartridge for the .223/5.56NATO, and that's been regarded for over 60 years as perfectly adequate for hunting dangerous game that shoots back with AK-47's. Unless someone's developed an "up-armored" deer that I haven't heard of. . .

[Three44s]

If I had to use a .222 with slow twist for deer, I would use the Sierra Game King 55 grain. Many reports of them working just fine on deer with good shot placement. That said, when the trophy of a lifetime crosses your path do you really want to be holding a .222 or other marginal gun?

I have not shot deer or larger with a 22 centerline but I have used the Sierra 55 gr Game King on coyotes out of a 22-250 and it would be my choice as well if I wanted to go for deer.

Three44s

[waylonrocks]

I have an Interarms Mark X Continental rifle in 30-06, the one with a full length mannlicher stock, double triggers, and butter knife bolt handle....and no recoil pad! Cool as all get out, but recoil is brutal! A slip on recoil pad helps greatly. I also have a Remington 600 in 308, that has stout recoil, too. Also, a very cool rifle. I can certainly see why the OP would want to take his 600 afield. I have found over the years that each firearm has it's own personality and using it on a hunt has more to do with the gun itself than the chambering. As with anything, if you accept the limitations of what you are using and adapt to it, success will follow. If you go to the other end of the spectrum and use a firearm that is overly powerful, then the limitation may come in the form of having to consider mitigating the amount of meat damage.

[Rapier]

We have a ton of hunters here that shoot deer with the 223 and the 222. Our distances average 50-100 yards and the deer here are smaller in body size, mostly. A deer up close and small in size is easy to kill. Like shooting something thin skinned that is the size of a German Shepard dog with long legs. We see larger deer once in a while, but they are rare.
Most hunters around here with a rifle, use a .224 center fire or 6mm, like a 243 Win or 223 Rem. A head or neck shot is most common. We have enough deer that you need not take a bad shot, another deer will come along or the same deer will present a better shot in a minute. We do have a very long season also.

[Uncle Grinch]

I think the 222 REM is not my best choice so it seems. Since I have two rifles in 222 REM, one a 700 with a custom Douglas barrel and a REM 600 and I have a nice .223 barrel (1-12 twist) off a REM model 7, I think I may swap the barrel on my 600 with the .223 barrel. I don’t currently own a .223 rifle, so this gives me a little more flexibility in my choices.

[FergusonTO35]

I suspect the slow twist is more of a handicap than the cartridge itself. There are plenty of hunters who kill deer with .223/5.56 no problem, but they are using heavier than average bullets made for that purpose. For the record, I think using a varmint type bullet on deer is a bad idea regardless of caliber. There are many accounts of bullets such as the .30 caliber Nosler Ballistic Tip fragmenting on deer shoulders. Even the bonded ones are not guaranteed. John Barsness reported that happening to him with a 7mm Swift Scirocco, which is more than a little disappointing from a bullet that goes for about $1.25 apiece.

[Bigslug]

I think the 222 REM is not my best choice so it seems. Since I have two rifles in 222 REM, one a 700 with a custom Douglas barrel and a REM 600 and I have a nice .223 barrel (1-12 twist) off a REM model 7, I think I may swap the barrel on my 600 with the .223 barrel. I don’t currently own a .223 rifle, so this gives me a little more flexibility in my choices.

I'm not sure a 1-12" is going to be a great deal more helpful than a 1-14". It would at least expand your options more into 55 grain territory.

Bullet construction is going to matter more than bullet weight or caliber, which I why I brought up the Barnes bullets in my first post. If your projectile is sturdy enough to make it to the Tootsie Roll center of the Tootsiepop, you'll be fine. . .

But it's worth remembering that the 1-14" twist left the bullet so unstable in the earliest M16's that the shift to cold, sea-level air in artic warfare training was enough to destabilize the flight of the 50 or 55 grain bullet in use at the time, which was why the M16A1 got the 1-12" to stabilize the 55 grain M193 round. . .and just stabilize it enough so it would still tumble and frag on impact.

What you DO have is something that would be pretty good at throwing the lighter (45 to 50 grains. 55 as an outside maybe.) Barnes TSX and TTSX options, or a sturdy cast, gas-checked flat point to a downloaded speed in the middle-2000's FPS. Some of the bonded lead core options will probably do the trick, but I can't speak to 'em personally. Those were concocted to give the 5.56 law enforcement carbines a bullet that would penetrate similarly to handgun duty rounds. Not sure which - if any - of those would be available as reloading components.

Mainly what you need to do is the homework to set up your varmint rifle so it doesn't behave like a varmint rifle. . .or just buy yourself something in .30 cal and save yourself the work and anxiety.

[Hickok]

Just my experience/opinion of hunting many years. Use of any of the .224" centerfires on deer depends on the type of hunting being done, and the skill and patience/mind set of the hunter.

For the old way of "driving/pushing" deer through the woods to "standers", I want a dependable, deep penetrating bullet that can usually exit and leave a good blood trail. When deer are "jumped up" and running, the shooting is fast and at times hits are made at various angles, the old stand-bys calibers excell,...30-30, 35 rem, 270, 300 savage, 308, 30-06 etc.

Still hunting, blind hunting, watching bait from a hide, etc, when deer are calm and oblivious to danger, I think the .224 centerfires are deadly. A cool calculating hunter, who is calm and can put the bullet where it needs to be is successful.

The thing I fear most with smaller calibers is the lack of a blood trail. If the deer runs far with a bad shot, it can be a problem.

Used properly and wisely, the .224 center fires are fine for deer.

[Good Cheer]

If you have one of the slower twists then try the old Speer 70 grain round nose.
It was made with the slow twist barrels in mind and provides extra weight where you need it.
Or get a good cast boolit gun and stop poisoning your barrel with copper!