Pellet air rifle suggestions?

[gsganzer]

I have a RWS 48. It's great for turtles and starlings.

 

[tawilson]

Ok, I checked and it was a Beeman I bought at Wmart for $130. .177 and .22 barrel. Break action spring piston and it is noisy and kicks some but it did what I needed, mainly red squirrels and driving off a flock of geese that used to come around and mess up my beach. I do want to upgrade to a better model, the Marauder looks like a good one. There is even big game models out there.

 

[Skyco]

Well...speaking of airguns and squirrels....the war is ON.
Recently had to replace a bunch of the aluminum tie wires on the top rail of my chain link fence, the squirrels like to chew on them, all the way through on some.
But the last straw was today- the little rodents had chewed up the plastic gunwales on my Old Town canoe and even part of the hull where there is a transition line at about water level, not all the way through but through the outer color layer exposing part of the foam core


My Benjamin pump .22 is down right now with a leaking air seal, but spent an hour installing and sighting in an airgun scope on my Gamo .177....did manage to nail one right before dark:drool: One down many to go...

 

[scoutcub]

Well...speaking of airguns and squirrels....the war is ON.
Recently had to replace a bunch of the aluminum tie wires on the top rail of my chain link fence, the squirrels like to chew on them, all the way through on some.
But the last straw was today- the little rodents had chewed up the plastic gunnels on my Old Town canoe and even part of the hull where there is a transition line at about water level, not all the way through but through the outer color layer exposing part of the foam core


My Benjamin pump .22 is down right now with a leaking air seal, but spent an hour installing and sighting in an airgun scope on my Gamo .177....did manage to nail one right before dark:drool: One down many to go...

:laughing::laughing:

FFE!

 

[retiredmgn]

I have dispatched some ground hogs humanely with BBguns just got to get em in the ear.

No way. A bb does not have sufficient mass to kill an 8 lb animal. A quick google produced this which is quite fitting

"Some airgun projectiles may make a great impression by the number of telephone book pages they can penetrate, but the wound channel such pellets produce in the field may be so tiny as to have almost no knock-down effect. Unfortunately, the "acupuncture" effects of such projectiles and others, such as steel core pellets or darts, may mean more than just the loss of game to the shooter; they may mean a long, cruelly lingering death to an injured animal perhaps without the shooter even knowing that he scored a hit.

As a kid I had the 'task' (hunter/gatherer instinct runs deep in kids) of reducing the number of nuisance animals on the farm using a Daisy bb gun. Chipmunks, Red Squirrels, Grey squirrels - done. Rabbits and woodchucks suffered because I thought - in my youth full ignorance - they would fall like the the little critters when I shot them. Never was able to bag that elusive game until I had a Sheridan pellet rifle.

 

[retiredmgn]

Well to start off, where I live, you can't shoot a .22 So the air rifle comes in very handy. As far as killing power, I have killed many woodchuck with this gun, with a single headshot. The comment you made about these high end air rifles, just tells me that you have obviously never used one. As the saying goes, "you get what you pay for".

Correct, I have never used one. Don't have the need or inclination to spend that much money on an air rifle. You must live in a neighbohood. My closest neighbor is 1/4 mile away and couldn't care less what I'm shooting.

 

[JRobyn]

+1 on RWS/Diana. German made. Deadly. Extremely accurate. Built to last several lifetimes. Mine is a model 48.

 

[IXLR8]

Thanks to all who have made suggestions, I have been doing lots of research thanks to you. This is world I didn't know existed. I can't shoot my 22 due to neighbors proximity, that is why I am looking at an air rifle. My old Daisy .177 625fps did what I needed it to do, so I don't think I need a 1500fps gun to take out a gray tree rat at 50-75ft. So I have narrowed my search down to guns in the 800-1000fps range, to save on cost, noise, vibration. Still undecided on the caliber, .177 or .22, leaning towards the .22 to make it a clean, no questions, asked kill. I do have one neighbor who is a... shall we say "a piece of work" so I am leaning towards a rifle that has some sort of silencer/muffler on it. I am liking the thought of the gas spring guns, but most of them are the faster, more powerful, more expensive guns that I just don't think I need. Still searching, I wish there was place near me that I could actually see and handle some of these before a purchase. I think I have narrowed my choices down to Benjamin, Gamo or RWS brands.

 

[schmism]

My dad has waged war on long tailed limb rats for years.

Over the years he has had a number of different pellet guns and has always circled back to the one that has produced the most number of kills.

crossman 2200 .22 cal he prefers pointed pellets.

his eyes arnt the best so he never used a scope (just iron sites) ... later i put a scope on it and increased the accuracy by about 100% (in terms of hits)

 

[ManAtArms]

What's your budget? Gamo is the lower end of airguns. They market to the "feet per second" crowd and typically have crappy triggers. I think anything over 1000 fps in a pellet is sort of a waste. Pellets are a diablo type projectile (hour glass shape). This design is the most accurate and stable at the 850 to 900 fps range...tops. 1500 is a marketing gimmic. I'd rather have a .22 at 850 than a .177 at 1500. Besides, once you pass much over 1150 you break the sound barrier and get a "crack" like a rifle.

If you want quiet power, the benjamin marauder in .22 has the bill. Call Benjamin corporate and ask them if there is a stocking dealer in Maine.

-mark

Thanks to all who have made suggestions, I have been doing lots of research thanks to you. This is world I didn't know existed. I can't shoot my 22 due to neighbors proximity, that is why I am looking at an air rifle. My old Daisy .177 625fps did what I needed it to do, so I don't think I need a 1500fps gun to take out a gray tree rat at 50-75ft. So I have narrowed my search down to guns in the 800-1000fps range, to save on cost, noise, vibration. Still undecided on the caliber, .177 or .22, leaning towards the .22 to make it a clean, no questions, asked kill. I do have one neighbor who is a... shall we say "a piece of work" so I am leaning towards a rifle that has some sort of silencer/muffler on it. I am liking the thought of the gas spring guns, but most of them are the faster, more powerful, more expensive guns that I just don't think I need. Still searching, I wish there was place near me that I could actually see and handle some of these before a purchase. I think I have narrowed my choices down to Benjamin, Gamo or RWS brands.