17 caliber Berger 25 grain Target vs. Hornady 20 grain vmax?

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Anyone have experience shooting both on predators? I have shot a lot of fox with the Berger's and they are extremly accurate but sometimes leave a hole. Friend uses 20 Vmax for fox and coyote and swears by them. I bought some to load but need some convincing they will handle Eastern Coyotes. I shoot a .17 Rem. Fireball with Remington 7 1/2 primers and H322.
 
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i have shot around 800 coyotes with 25.gr.bergers with great results.very little fur damage with drt kills.mine is a 17.rem.if you try some bergers and shoot one in the chest cavity you need to open it up and look at the damage they do,i have used both and the hornady dont even come close.just my experience.i shoot them in my 22-250,300win.mag,280A.I.,300 ultra mag.,and 223.
 
Thanks lyotehunter! Are you using the 25 Grain .17 caliber Berger Target or Varmint?

Where I hunt in PA I am mostly in red fox spots about 90% of the time. In fact, I have killed tons of reds and only shot at one coyote that I missed. I use a .17 Fireball which I love as a crossover gun. When I shot fox with the varmint berger the pelt damage was awful. When I switched over to the Target berger it was much better but not fantastic. My buddy tells me he has very little damage on fox using the 20 grain vmax and they work well on coyotes too. I bought a couple hundred to load up with H322 in the theory they would be perhaps a tad bit better on fox pelt damage. However, I just picked up some coyote spots this year and now I am not sure if I feel they will be comprable to the Bergers on killing a coyote.

Thus my dilemna. Any thoughts are welcome.

I guess if the 25 grain bergers and the 20 grain vmax shoot in the same spot I can just switch out the bullets depending where I am hunting that night? Would that work?
 
I bought a .17 Rem for fox and then most of the fox in ND died from mange, so I started using the .17 on coyotes. I have shot both the 20 grain vmax and the 25 grain berger HPs. For fox, I cannot say but for coyotes, the difference is like night and day. After hundreds of coyotes with this load, Berger 25 HPs (match target) is my choice.

You are shooting these loads at super fast speeds and anything can and will open up the vmax loads. You will end up with lots of splashes, even on good hits of coyotes. I had too many coyotes get away with the 20 grain vmax. Switched to 25 grain Berger Target (not Varmint) and the rest is history. The majority of shots are DRT.

I would say the same thing for any light-weight super fast coyote load. I saw the same issue with 2 different .204 guns shooting 32 grain vmax loads. They both switched to Berger shooting 35 grain and DRT once again.

The .17 Rem shooting Berger 25 grain hp's is something to see. It leaves virtually no damage and they just drop and don't twitch. The Fireball is a bit slower but I know if you pump up the speed above 3900 fps on a .17 Rem, they work great. I was shooting around 4100 fps with my load. I have also heard of guys have great luck with the 30 grain target bullets but it doesn't appear they make them any longer only varmint. I haven't used the varmint Bergers but have been told to stay away for coyotes.

If shooting the occasional coyote and mainly fox, then it might be OK to go with the vmax loads, but if coyotes are your main target, I would go for the 25 grain Berger Match.
 
Hey Kirsh...I really appreciate your feedback. After reading your post I kinda am feeling like maybe I should not have bought 200 Vmax bullets. This is the first year where I have a couple spots where I think I will get a shot at a coyote. It would kill me to have one walk away after hitting it so I guess I am going to just load and shoot off the vmax bullets to get rid of em or shoot them with my scope sighted in for the 25 grain varmint target bergers I have been using and if they shoot close just use them in fox only areas.

There are tons more fox in eastern pa than coyote. Actually, this is a fantastic place to be a red fox hunter.

Your comments gave me an somewhat unrelated thought too. Berger does not recommend the Target bullets for hunting from what I think. However, you and tons have terrific success with them for hunting. My son shoots an AR in service rifle competitions and I load him 75 grain Hornady Match bullets. I was thinking of getting a bolt action .223 for myself and using the same bullets since I have loaded thousands. I did some internet research and guys give them thumbs up on deer and other game. Figure they might make nice anti personnel rounds as well. I emailed Hornady and they told me to not use these for hunting but to use their GMX. Just interesting how bullet companies target bullets seem to turn out to be good hunting bullets based on hunters experiences using them...
 
I have never heard that said by Berger but if it shoots well enough to be used in a tournament or match, why not use it for an animal especially a coyote where you don't care about eating a bullet fragment, etc. I also shoot the Berger 50 grain target match out of my .22-250 and have hundreds of coyotes harvested with that bullet as well. It is very devastating as well. Not bad on fur either, but not as good as the .17.

The hard thing to explain to people who haven't used this load on a coyote is the combination of speed, expansion, and weight seems to almost always keep the bullet inside the coyote, but penetrate far enough and expand enough to turn the inside of a coyote to mush. I have shot many other calibers at coyotes including .204, 22-250, 6WOA, .243, and 25-06. I have yet to use a caliber that is more fur friendly but still devastating to the coyote. You can almost always get the same result. You can't hardly see where you shot them and they lay sleeping on the ground. It is cool to see.

Honestly, I don't shoot the .17 as much as I used to. It isn't because it isn't a good gun/round, as it is. I love the minimal recoil resulting in seeing your sight picture through the shot. When fur prices plummeted many years ago, I became less concerned about pelt damage and beefed up to a bit heavier caliber. Many of the lighter caliber bullets are prone to more wind drift. It isn't as bad as many would lead you to believe, but it is something to consider. Prices came back last year a lot and if they keep going up, the .17 may have to drop some additional coyotes this year.

On your .223 comment, I own several 22-250's but not a .223, so not sure, but you may need a special barrel twist to handle 75 grain bullets out of it which you may already be aware of.
 
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