I’m curious how many hunt with subsonic ammo. I have a 300 Blackout AR which was set up for both supersonic and subsonic ammo. We’ve only hunted hogs with subsonic ammo. We shoot all our hogs with below ear shots so they drop and die quick. I’ve tried a few different subsonic ammo, even the ones with rapid expansion bullets. Never once did we ever have a quick clean kill. They’d drop and squeal bloody murder until we could put another road into them.

After a dozen or so hogs shot with subsonic ammo, I no longer allow hunting with subsonic ammo at the ranch. We’ve just never had successful quick clean kills with it. Maybe a 45-70 with a 410 gr subsonic bullet.

I’m sure some of y’all have success, we never have.

You must be missing your mark. I'll sometimes take a suppressed .22 bow hunting to shoot the pigs with. Subsonic .22 right in the earhole turns the switch off. 300BLK should do the same. They never make a sound. That said, if I'm strictly rifle hunting, I prefer supers. Much better margin for error.

I don't think it is many and if many, not often.

It works, but mostly for limited application stuff. If you want to take a hog or two, subsonic probably is fine. For sounder work, subsonic is not the way to go.

I haven't had the opportunity to try it but a gun store owner and big hunter told me the only subsonic .300 ammo he trusts for hunting is Fiocchi subsonic loaded with Sierra Matchking

I have killed a ton of pigs with 300 Blackout subs. Maker Rex bullets expand at subsonic velocity. Everyone tries the Sub-X stuff and they don't perform very well so you see threads like this.

We've taken entire sounders out at night with sub 223 and 300bo. Never use anything but subs.

Subs will work if you get close enough that the drop doesn't make a bad shot. I don't use them. I did get my 110 vmax, 135 FTX & 150 G.D.s with same POI today - nite hunting, hard to change the IR boresight.

I have used Hornaday .300 BLK subs on deer. Worked just fine.

I shot a deer this morning ( we have an early anterless season) using a .44 magnum, 400 gr hardcase sub sonic. As you would expect from a hard cast, it zipped right through.. But a .429 hole through both lungs and the heart doesn't need expansion.

I let my son shoot a Fallow buck with subs out of a .300 BO. I dont recall the bullet but they were the "expandable" ones similar to what ntxtrapper posted above and in 3 of the 5 shots it took to kill the deer, the bullet fragmented upon impact. Nothing wrong with shot placement 4 out of the 5 shots. We've had more luck with the sub FMJ's but we wont shoot deer with them anymore, just pigs and coyotes.

Shot placement is everything when hunting with a subsonic. I have a customer who shoots my 243 Win subs with an 85 grain SP and kills tons of deer with it. His shot placement is in the high shoulder where it breaks down the deer and they drop in their tracks. His feeder is right at 75 yards away. With another subsonic round with over twice the weight of the 243 85 grain bullet, there is enough weight to work well. Shot placement is key.

But, why would you want to hunt with subsonic when supers give better all around performance? When I first got my suppressor, I had envisioned myself picking off pigs around the feeder while the others were just standing there trying to figure out what happened. Yes, the gun is super quiet (almost hollywood quiet). But a big hunk of lead slapping flesh is MUCH louder than I anticipated it being, and they scatter the same as if you were shooting a supersonic bullet. The only time that I see it as effective is shooting pigs while you are deer hunting, and not wanting to spook the deer that may be out of sight, but not out of hearing distance.

You are 100% correct. But... there are MANY people who hunt off their back porch and they live in a rural area, but have neighbors close by. They don't want to disturb the neighbors and they want to be as quiet as possible.

The second reason, some hunters think that once they get a suppressor for their gun, that they HAVE to shoot subsonic ammo. I hear that reasoning all the time. I inform them that they don't "have" to use subsonic ammo, but they buy some anyway to play with.

What is hearing safe for you (some supers) isn't likely hearing safe for me. I lost a lot of the hearing in my right ear from a work incident and don't want to make it worse. Also, why stress the nearby animals that don't hear the subs hitting animals.

Subs within about 75 yards are pretty effective. I don't like shooting them much further than that.

I am with you on suppressors and supersonic ammo in rifles (not much handgun experience). I haven't shot a centerfired supressed round that didn't ring my ears without hearing protection.

I recall when my neighbor got his first suppressors (I didn't have any) and brought them to my range and told me hearing protection wasn't necessary. First shot rang my ears. He told me it doesn't bother him. Well, yeah, he was an F4 Fantom pilot until he retired from the military. His hearing was already so damaged that the supersonic crack being only somewhat damaging went completely unnoticed by him. And this has been a fun and funny epiphany. I have noticed that suppressors and supersonic ammo work best when the shooter already has some significant hearing loss. Supersonic suppressed ammo from a rifle is still really loud for folks with no or minimal hearing loss.

I shot my first hog with hardcast 165gr in 40sw. 2 shots to figure I needed to aim at a running hog. 3rd got him, all the way through - broke front leg. 4th tried to compensate for range, too high. So yes subs will kill. If you can hit them in the right place. Got tinnus from 5/38 and 8" going off. Silencer would be nice but the regs and cost don't make sense. Forgot to put the muffs on when shooting at a rabbit with BO, reminds you real quick but no damage. I hate muzzle breaks at the range.

Subs can kill about like overly heavy pistol rounds given that they travel at subsonic pistol velocities. What is given up in energy comes with the benefit of little noise.

Your ranging story is what we go through with any caliber but the issue with subs is that they have such a much more pronouned parabolic trajectory. You need to employ longer range considerations into making what would be nominal range centerfire shots. Your near-far point blank ranges reduce dramatically. I was comparing .300 200 gr. subsonic from a chart online. With a 100 yard zero, 32" of drop at 200 yards. For the supersonic Grendel load I am not shooting, that would be a 400 yard shot.

Being subsonic means flight times are longer and so your lead on running shots has to be increased. The greater the amount of lead necessary, the greater the chance the animal will deviate course before the bullet arrives on target. However, as you said, it will kill if used properly.

This dude is pretty amazing, or his ability to use his technology is pretty amazing. No running shots here. He is using his ballistic calculator and knows his dope to use subsonic .458 to make longer range kills and it is impressive. I would also argue that while this can be done, I doubt too many of us (I am not one) have this skill on this forum and the ones that do are applying it to taking their elk at 1000 yards. The slow mo in the vid makes the shots look like artillery rounds coming in from the next valley, LOL.

There is an aussie guy on utube that is a crack shot on hogs with 308 supers. Given a BO with subs, he missed almost all. Guy on another forum shot 220gr cast at large sow, 100 yds. 4 hits and sow still ran off. He is a decent shot. Your 2 cents.

The 3 components to successfully with hunting with subs are:

1. Use a heavy projectile that will expand but not disintegrate at subsonic velocities.
2. Use a laser rangefinder.
3. Use a silencer. It makes no sense to use subs rather than supers if you don't have a silencer.

I pig hunt every week. run .22lr and 300blk or 9mm 147gr XTP every now and again, but it only makes sense when I really need to be quiet. I spot and stalk in crop fields, and its hard to make shots with the precision necessary to hit a central nervous system component with certainty. any other shot often results in losing that pig. Most consistent success has been with the bigger 300blk Makers Rex subs, they are like shooting large broadheads and do a lot of damage but nothing close to what any full power center fire rifle bullet would do.

Any caliber or any velocity bullet put square thru a pigs earhole will drop them immediately but sounds like dropping a watermelon on a tile floor. the sound of a bullet striking flesh and bone makes a significant noise if you think you are going to silently drop all the pigs in a sounder. .22lr pistol in earhole will go thru both sides of skull. .22lr pistol in mid-neck will penetrate flesh and may go thru spine, but not reliably.

The only way I would is if I was using maker or Leigh bullets, they both expand well at extremely low velocity’s. Personally I still shoot supers out of my 300 blackout and I’ve taken more animals with my blackout than any other gun.
Big pigs, deer, axis, blackbuck, aoudad, rams.

I load a 540 grain hard-cast bullet for my 458 SOCOM. Use it on hogs, mostly at feeders. The intent being to have several 'line up' and shoot through all of them. It will shoot through as many as you can get to stand next to one another. I have NEVER recovered one of these bullets.

I don't know where they stop. I load them trans and subsonic.

Now you got me wanting to get Subs for my 30-30. No scope and original iron sights and with my eyes would be 50 yards max. Might get a box to try it out now

Agree with Flintknapper, big heavy bullets.
Shot only hogs subsonic using 45/70. 400 grain Montana hard cast and 540 paper patch. In theory the pure lead PP should expand but they exit. All shots under 15 yards.
Rifles I use are a Marlin for hard cast and Ruger No. 1 for PP.
My landowner/friend usually wants a small hog "about this long to fit in smoker." For this I have in blind a Remington 700 300 BO with Nosler 220 Ballistic Tip subs.

If I was using factory Subs in a 30/30 I would buy Hornady with SubX bullet.

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