My stand is 63 yards from my feeder. With my 22, I can put 10/10 shots the size of a quarter. If I take my time
and shoot for the ear hole, does my 22 have enough power to knock down a hog?

My money says yes, look forward to your update!

Within stated parameters - yes.

Why?
Why not just shoot them with something you know will kill them?

Honestly, I like the challenge of making myself wait and wait and wait to take the perfectly placed shot.
And the 22's I got at BassPro were .06 apiece but the 270 are $2.50 each. That's really not the reason,
I could also shoot coons, etc while waiting on the hogs. Of course, I could just take 2 rifles.
But, I just wanted opinions on if a 22lr was enough gun at that range with proper bullet placement

Do it.

A .22 rifle can absolutely kill a hog at that range but you better hit it just right. A .22 long rifle shell that has high velocity will drop a hog because I have done it at that range. BUT....you have to hit them where it counts.

I’ve killed a bunch of hogs with a 22 over the years, not so much an ear shot as rapid fire spraying them running off but it works. If you want to aim small and miss small mix up a pound of Tannerite and set it on the ground surrounded by piggies at about 150 yards. It’s also very rewarding I’m told.

Not that I care at all for hogs but is it ethical?

Yes and no and no.

The ear hole is at the rear of the skull with little or no brain case directly behind it. Just 1/4" off in the wrong direction and you are hitting heavy bone with no brain under it. While your slightly errant .22 may go in, it likely won't have the energy to break up enough bone to do the necessary brain damage that you would get from a proper centerfire round. You may just ring the hog's bell. A 1/2" inch off to the rear and you may miss the head itself, and the bullet pass through muscle and not have the energy for hydraulic or hydrostatic shock to drop the hog. In short, the ear hole is NOT your sweet spot.

Your sweet spot is between the ear and the eye, but closer to the ear, starting about 3/8" below the top of the head. That is where your pingpong ball/lime-sized brain will be. There is not a lot of bone there and the brain should be directly in your bullet's path. Between the brain and top of the head, however, are sinus cavities and if you are too high, the bullet may pass above the brain, through the sinus cavities, not doing the damage you want due to the puny amount of energy and small diameter of the .22 lr bullet. If you hit too low, you may encounter the zygomatic arch and ascending ramus of the mandible (all bone) which would not be shoot. In short, you will need to choose your shot very wisely to be confident of success.

If you do the CNS damage needed, you will not knock down the hog. It will simply fall down. A .50 BMG won't knock down a hog, either, for that matter.

Remember that as you reduced caliber size, bullet weight, and energy, your need for precision increases. You are at the low end of those, so you need to be on the high end for precision in your shooting...to have the highest chance for a quick, clean kill.

My 17hmr is 5 for 5 on hogs. I'd bet it will work.

Thanks a bunch for all of that information.

Are you taking the head shot that was talked about above between the ear and the eye?

I shoot hogs and predators with my .22 mag since I carry it 100% of the time in UTV...larger than a .22 but still not like a centerfire rifle. I shoot all larger hogs in the liver area with my .22 mag. and it kills 100% of them. Most will run a little distance but not that far....some drop dead in their tracks or within a few feet. If I had a .22 I would still carry it to use to shoot all hogs and predators.

This right here. When you live with 'em year 'round, you shoot 'em with whatever you have in your hands at the time. My last hog was shot with a Sig P365...

Mark

Do it, have the patience and make a great shot. It will be rewarding. Pics are appreciated

Killed a 200# boar at 115 yards a couple of years ago with 22lr. Lucky shot placement? I'm sure, but it can be done.

^^^^

This is exactly right and I think many folks are not aware of the actual anatomy of a hogs skull. The brain pan is rather small and is NOT at the 'ear hole'. Shots from high powered rifles will certainly kill them when shot at (or near the ear hole) BUT it is NOT the correct shot to take for the reasons cited above.

See this skull I bisected that shows where (and what) you should really be shooting at.

And the general admonition NOT to take head shots unless you have no other choice. There is little room for error when taking head shots. Not to mention the only thing moving more than the head on a hog is its tail. Use enough gun and take responsible shots (neck or high shoulder IMO).

A 22 in the earhole is not ethical or responsible in my book. If you screw up you leave an animal to die an long, agonizing death.
Nothing deserves that, not even a hog.

I’ve taken several w the 17 hmr out to about 75 yards

Between the eyes or in the ear, depending on how they were facing

I’m sure a .22 at 63 yards would work but if it doesn’t shoot another anyways lol

Thanks for sharing. I hunt pigs with a air rifle and have found between the Eye and Ear is DRT. Right behind the ear will drop then in their track but may not be as immediate. That shot will break the neck and damage the spinal cord. So if you are shooting quarters you will be fine. I would use a hollow point if I had the choice.

in the hog trap

I've killed several this year with a 22. I shoot just behind and under the ear about an inch and they all have dropped DRT. CCI Standard Velocity solids. All were 50-65 yards.

^^^^
For a broadside shot that is about the correct shot placement. If you were to draw a line straight down from the ear and straight back from the eye. the intersection is roughly correct for a brain pan shot.

As we teach our hunter education students to make sure we make clean and ethical kills making sure we cause no excessive pain and suffering to any animal. Why would you use such a marginal round testing your skill set at the expense of any animal. Even a hog deserves to be dispatched in a quick and painless manner!!!!

How do think wild animals die? In hospice hooked up to an IV full of morphine, with their animal friends and family all sitting bedside telling wonderful stories about them? Most animals are eaten alive by other animals after they are weakened from age or injury. A 22 to the dome is absolutely humane compared to how 99.999% of wild animals die. Maybe you should try it before condemning it and learn how effective it is. Soundness of heart doesn't make up for softness of head.

I think it more accurate to state that SOME (not most) animals are eaten alive in the wild. Yes, it happens. But just because animals (depending on what they are) die an inhospitable death in the wild, doesn't mean we should be another source for that.

A well placed CNS shot is indeed as good a death (quick and painless) as could be hoped for. But I believe the argument being made is one of probability.

A skilled marksman with an accurate firearm at reasonable distances, could expect to make quick, killing shots most of the time. But it should be incumbent upon each person to honestly evaluate their abilities (for sake of the animal) rather than 'test' the limits IMO. Field conditions are often very different than on the shooting bench....I'm sure you would agree. So...it is well to account for that too.

Surely each animal deserves to die as quickly as circumstance allows. And 'circumstance' should be dictated with respect to us being good stewards of the resources and proper respect for the lives of the animals we take.

I would not argue that a .22 LR or .22WMR placed in the brain pan of hog at distances to 100 yds would not readily dispatch that animal, I am certain it will do so the majority of the time. I am equally certain that if you MISS the brain pan, you will lose that animal and it might suffer a slow, miserable death. I would take no solace in knowing that the death of that animal was no worse than you propose nature has in store for it. I am not responsible for what 'nature' does or how that plays out. I AM responsible for my own actions and the consequences of such.

We can argue to death (pun intended) the ethics of all kinds of hunting and never reach complete agreement, I am aware of that. I simply ask each person to give some thought to the taking of life (beyond what is just legal). Know your limits, stay within them.....try to be a good example of the hunting community.

Sounds like if you don't know the skill set of the person who is doing the wet work, then maybe you shouldn't be throwing shade on them.

Not even a hog, true, but "nothing deserves that" I disagree with. I worked for a manager about 10 years back that an old co-worker told me was convicted of child molestation. He messed with a 3 year old girl and only got 8 years. Those guys deserve a lot worse than a 22 in the earhole. Way off topic though, sorry, I shut up now.

Your preconceived bias should exclude you from teaching “a class”. You don’t know what you don’t know and you should not pretend to. Go and do the research, present the findings and leave your bias at the door. A bigger caliber and more powder does not guarantee a quick death.

Dead is dead however they reach Valhalla,, may the pearly gates of Asgard give them all all free snacks. I would have said chasing them down and running them over is more fun but I thought some of you may be offended by that one 🎉

No one worries how a poisoned rat dies.

I completely disagree with your holier than though attitude but if your interested in reimbursing me for all my crop damage caused by them then by all means do and at that point you can kill them however you see fit. Until then STFU and watch them die by whatever means I have available at that moment. You might actually cry if you knew of all the ways pigs have died at the hands of this evidently evil guy.

I could write a book, “ 1001 Ways A Pig Can Die At The Hands Of A Pissed Off Man”. You want the first signed copy?

I've killed more hogs with a .22lr than any other caliber. Probably killed over 200 of them with a 22 over the many years.

If you put one in their earhole at 63 yards they will drop like a sack of rocks.

Go shoot a 55 gallon drum with a .22 and then shoot it will a 9mm and tell me what the results are for both

Damn skippy

ALL hogs get a one way ticket to hell from me.
I will not put up with them no more than I will a coyote

Yes. Every hog thought they were hit with a 300 win mag.

I am sure nxtrapper knows this, but worded it cavalierly. The bold faced part of the quote is problematic because many people literally do think the "dome" or "head" is all lethally equal to shoot when it is not It is the brain or stem inside the dome or head that must experience significant damage to attain the desired result. A hog's head and even the dome have large areas where impact would be non lethal given a .22 caliber bullet with a nearly 2 moa level of accuracy.

As to Flashprism's quote and query, I do think hogs should be dispatched as quickly and painlessly as is realistically possible. I do a goodly amount of ammo testing in my preferred caliber, 6,5 Grendel (can't test all ammo in all calibers because I am not rich with unlimited time). I test ammo marketed for hunting as well as for other applications. Some of the non-hunting bullets are pretty sketchy. Sometimes the hunting bullets turn out sketchy. Sometimes the work well.

So why would I do this? Isn't it unethical to shoot an animal with a bullet that may not cause death as quickly as desired? Yes and no. I document the results. People are always going to hunt with marginal bullets (and/or calibers) For example, some folks try to brute force their way through hogs to compensate for a lack of skill by using larger calibers. Some folks are too cheap to buy decent hunting ammo. So my goal for Grendel bullet testing is to find out what works and what does not work and hopefully help folks make better buying decisions to be able to kill hogs more successfully within the price they are willing to pay and that performs in the manner they want. Hopefully, the few bad kills resulting from bad bullets that I make will keep others from having to go through the process themselves with the same bad bullets. There can be good that comes from bad.

FYI, There have been 2 times I stopped mt testing because the bullets were such abject hunting failures that I cut the tests short, once for a non-hunting bullet and once for a hunting bullet. I have had expensive hunting bullets that did well, but also those that performed worse than target ammo. I have had cheap and moderate priced hunting ammo outperform expensive ammo. My favorite Grendel bullet for hogs is marketed as a varmint bullet (Speer TNT) but it performs comparably to a Hornady SST which is marketed for hog-sized game. I haven't found any non-hunting ammo that would be my first choice for hunting hogs, but some does work fairly well.

Is this unethical? How do you know what will work until it has been tried?

I have killed hundreds of pigs in traps with one shot from a 22 pistol - all I use, but I've actually never shot one with a 22 rifle. .17 HMR/WSM yes and works great under 100 yrds, but I've never killed a pig with a 22 RIFLE. I need new life goals....

I don't have any problems with killing hogs even if you use a rock. Just make sure they are dead so they don't breed.

BIG FAVOR: after you shoot some hogs with a 22 rimfire, come back to this thread and tell us how it worked.

Dunno how but the homeowner at the end of the street from me down the steep hill has stopped the hog population's repetitive damage to his professionally manicured yard. His 2 acre lot backs up to some heavily forested unimproved acreage on both sides of the live creek bottom that comes out of Davey Dogwood Park's 20K of dogwoods and 240 acres. It is pretty common to see dead critters of several specie on the nearby 4 lane divided Loop especially at or near the corner of Hwy 79 North and the Loop that runs around Palestine and some of those porkers gotta run better than 200++ lbs.

Hwy 19 North from the Loop runs thru the woods & several creek bottoms up to Montalba, Bradford and 32 miles into Athens and in the spring time it's common to see up to a dozen or more critters going to waste on the shoulder....and an occasional disabled vehicle too. Ought to be a bounty on 'em in Anderson County and mebbe our car insurance rates would go down when the locals got paid Bounty $'s by the # of Pig tails they turned in each week or month.
Ron

A single shot bolt action shooting .22 longs was used to kill a world record grizzly in 1953. There is a pic in this article shows the skull the bullet holes. The spot where to shoot a hog is no different.

https://www.ammoland.com/2017/06/be...d-record-grizzly-and-more/#axzz740a8Iu5Y

That’s a great analogy really

This ethical feel sorry for pigs doesn’t jive w me

Where I hunt I am their only predator within several thousand acres

I can count 10,15,20 sometimes 30 different pigs on a hunt

I’d run out of bullets before I run out of pigs

Kill them anyway possible

If I cared enough to prove my point I could show pics 5-7 acres of coastal grass rooted up or that much more wheat seed gone because of them last year. It’s fair to say 10 acres where rooted up where I’m at

They aren’t protected for a reason

I don't much like to not recover the things i shoot so I wouldn't. I've done the same and similar with a 22 and I don't anymore. I think if many would do more than rattle off a shot with a 22 at them driving through the pasture and expect similar performance and recoverability to deer hunting it wouldn't even be a question.

That said I don't care how you want to hunt them.

I've carried a suppressed .22 to my bow stand many times. I wanted to kill the pigs without running my hunt. I ended up with ruined hunts anyhow as the pigs dropped right where they were standing under the feeder. Yes, a properly placed .22 will flip the off switch as well as anything if put in the brain pan. I haven’t counted, but I'd guess I've killed over 50 with a .22.

I get your point from a hunters perspective and you have that luxury, as a land owner with crops I’m guessing you would change your opinion pretty quickly after you spend tens of thousands fixing crap they tore up and loosing tens of thousands on crop damage year in and year out. I wish thr was a way to rip them in half and watch them run themselves into the creek bottom or river without lifting a finger but they won’t and I can’t so I kill them with everything from a 22 to my front bumper and everything in between. If someone told me they had a special rock that fell from the heavens and killed every one within a 50 mile radius I’d be investing heavily in specialized rocks.

We've tried helicopters, paid thermal hunters and the likes but Tannerite seems to be the most effective in making them leave for a while, from what I’ve been told anyway

I thought this was being discussed about in a hunters perspective no?

I'm with you, I'm tired of them. I do enjoy shooting and eating some of them, but If I could push the big read easy button and banish them I would.

Hah you can sure get an argument here on the THF. Yes head shots work just like DNS says. In between the eye and the ear hole works for me. I have had a bullet or two hit at a poor angle and sort of bounce off.

This is why more and more folks are taking hunter's education online.

People take it on line because it is convenient and for the majority of people into hunting they already know more than the class offers before they take it.

Suggesting a 22 LR is as good as center fires is laughable and I would respect the teacher more for representing reality.

Not one post in this thread said a 22 LR is as good as a centerfire......25 and 32 acp are centerfire...

What they are saying is that a .22 LR is plenty capable of bringing down a pig (and much larger animals) given the correct circumstances. Limiting yourself to 60 yds with a .22 LR is ZERO different than limiting yourself to 300 yds with a 30-30 or 800 yds with a 300 winmag....will they kill farther than those ranges...you bet! Are you taking much higher risks trying to do so...Yup!

I've killed plenty of animals with a .22LR.....at farther ranges.....

A 22 LR is too light unless you are shooting baby pigs. Pigs over 30 pounds at 50 yards are difficult to kill.
Adios,
Gary

Not based on my experience, but maybe you have different pigs.....

I have killed lots of hogs with my .22 mag. It is normally all I shoot them with. A .22 will not frighten deer like a big gun. I have has deer come right back to the feeder after shooting hogs with a .22. I don't normally shoot big boars but I have. I had my .22 auto with me one day and dropped a big boar. He ran right at the blind after the first shot and I pumped 6 more into him. Sometimes I just gut shoot them so I don't have to haul them to the pig dump. I killed one at 100+ yards with the mag. I heard the distinct thump but I never went to confirm the kill. Some hunting buddies found it right a month later right where I shot it.

If that is what I have with me I will shoot hogs with it. Would it be my first choice no, but can it kill a hog yes. Brain shot is the way to go on a hog but others can work as well. You can kill one with a heart shot but do not expect any blood trail or it to die right there, it will run a ways but they will do that when shot with other guns as well.

A 22 short HP will penetrate one side of a hogs skull and bounce around in the brain and was our preferred gun to kill hogs with when growing them out and killing an processing them our selves.

Based on what I have seen yes a 22LR will kill a hog with a well placed ear hole shot at the distance Mr. T gave and a couple other shot placements to the brain will work but if just a little off I would not count on it to kill the hog.

Okay- I'm going to get everybody mad at me. I really don't think a .22 rimfire is that good a choice BUT there may be some confusion. Killing hogs at point blank range on a farm- that is holding the rifle up to their head. etc. No question it is a standard method but if the shot isn't placed right- it isn't going to work, in my humble opinion.
On bear's -if you've handled many skulls, the thickness of the bone on the top isn't that much. At point blank range I can see a .22 killing a bear.