.25 caliber at 32 FPE not enough?

What projectile are you using?

MushroomPsyche said:

I'm using JSB King 25.39gr at 755 FPS.

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These aren't ordinary squirrels. They're Hydrated with the healing waters of lake lanier.
SHOULD be enough. where in the head were they hit? Low head hits will knock them out, cause posturing, but eventually they may recover. I've had that happen with .25, hit under the eye, blew him off a tree violently. I get up to him and nearly gave my pants their very own stool sampling.
the trajectory in such a small target still makes a difference.

Tough to kill they are. If they were 100 lbs ,I’d never go into the woods because you couldn’t kill them.

MushroomPsyche said:

I'm quite certain that I hit one just under the ear probably level with the eye and the other one just behind the head. I'm attaching videos of both shots. Both times, when I turned off the video, I thought for sure that they were done for.

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First one appears to impact high and deflect off the top and to the left. sometimes they'll ride the skull. Game of angles, and sometimes the prey kinda wins (not really). even if you hadn't touched him off he would've died from intracranial pressure due to swelling and likely Subdural hematoma. I have a video on here.. actually... I'll get on my phone and post, I was in your neck of the woods not long ago and dropped a grey from just over 75y with a .177 10.03 @21fpe MUZZLE. probably impacted him at 13fpe/760fps and he had crossed the river styx before he hit the ground. I had this happen with the dreamline at 46fpe with a king, Hit just below the eye, deflected just a touch and removed his sinuses, and jaw. He wasn't gone. Also hit one dead on between the eyes, the angle was just right for a deflection and it ripped a strip of hair and flesh giving him a reverse mohawk. was walking in cirlces obviously not long for the world, had to give him the Coup de grace

MushroomPsyche said:

I'm quite certain that I hit one just under the ear probably level with the eye and the other one just behind the head. I'm attaching videos of both shots. Both times, when I turned off the video, I thought for sure that they were done for.

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Point being. yes 32-25-12 is ample.



Edit: For clarification, the scope cam Is my hunting partner, not shooting, just filming.I was the shooter. I'm about to mount my Zulus to my katran, I'd like to have footage from both guns

Playing the old headshot game has a very small margin of error. A headshot that’s not a brain shot is ugly.

I agree with the other commenters, a 32 fpe 25 caliber is enough for squirrels. I would say more than enough. I used my P35-25 with 20 grain H&N FTTs at 880 fps for about 32 fpe for one season. Took 18. Mixture of head and body shots. I hit one on the hinge of the jaw and it was DRT. It crushed the skull. Only two ran, both were hit in the front of the chest and the pellet stopped under the hide behind a rear leg. They did not run far and I recovered both. One other one did not exit, it was hit through both shoulders and was DRT. My P35-22 is tuned to about 32 fpe and has taken another 10. All DRT, all pass throughs. It shoots 21 grain Baracuda Match a little over 800 fps.

Head shots are not necessarily brain shots and I think your results illustrate that (as do some of mine). But fortunately the head also has lots of blood vessels and a solid hit to the head normally anchors the squirrel but it may still need a finisher. I hit one in the throat with my P35-177 and it bled a LOT but still got up after dropping and climbed up about 10 feet in a tree before dropping the second and last time.

I've take 24 squirrels so far with my P35-177 using simple domed pellets. It's tuned to under 20 fpe and the only squirrel I've lost with it I shot in the rear end. That one dropped but crawled off. The gun was not the problem, my taking the shot was the problem. I've also taken 18 with my Prod. It came tuned to less than 15 fpe and I did not like the results on the 4 I shot before retuning it. The next 14 with it tuned to about 18 fpe were all clean kills although one shot in the brain flipped itself into a rotted out area at the base of the tree I shot it out of and I couldn't reach it.

I thus think fpe below 15 fpe starts to get a little iffy. Once you get to about 20 fpe you should get clean kills consistently. At 30 fpe I expect pass throughs and no running and that is almost always what I get. But you got it too. I worry more about the ones that run after being hit than the ones that I have to shoot again (or my doggie finishes for me). In my experience that is not unexpected at about 20 fpe. But at 30+ you should get very few runners.

Results are much more dependent on placement than on caliber or fpe. A shot in the brain will consistently drop them as long as there is enough penetration (which is far from an issue with a 25 at 32 fpe). Double lung shots also drop them consistently but with my 177 they often run a short distance with this placement. I've never had a runner with a double lung shot with a 22 or 25. Hitting a shoulder seems to help significantly with the 177. But a squirrel will not live long with any shot to the vitals and even a solid head shot that doesn't hit the brain will kill the squirrel pretty quickly but you might want to give it a finisher to minimize the time it takes.

If you hunt long enough you'll have shots like that happen regardless of what you're shooting. Even with .22 LR hollowpoints at over a hundred foot pounds of energy. Chalk it up to bad luck.

MushroomPsyche said:

As I continue to explore lower power tune .25 caliber I constantly learn different aspects of it. I currently have my Taipan Veteran Short .25 tuned to 32 FPE. I've taken a number of squirrels with it; both headshots and a heart and lung shot. The last 2 though didn't go so well. The shots were a day apart. One was 17 meters and the other was 30 meters away. Both were headshots and both seemed to do the death dance typical of a headshot. I left both for a few minutes before I picked them up. To my surprise, what I thought were dead squirrels started crawling back up. I went out there and the shots looked like the typical very bloody headshots... just that the squirrels didn't die. Both had to have follow up shots.

I've used a 30 FPE .22 caliber and a 45 FPE and 53 FPE .25 caliber and I've never had anything like that happened before with headshots. I don't know if the .25 at 32 FPE were bouncing or just not penetrating enough but those squirrels were hit with around 27 FPE on impact which I would think is more than enough. What are your experiences with larger calibers at lower power tunes in regards to hunting and pest control?

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I've used 25.39 going 780fps out the barrel and taken down iguanas out to 70-80yds with headshots. I doubt squirrel heads are harder than an iguanas.

I've also taken down smaller iguanas with .177 going 9fpe out the barrel out to 30yds

Confidence is part of it. I got my P35-25 as my third pcp. It was a LOT handier than my Avenger and a lot more powerful than my Prod. When it started knocking squirrels down with authority I was smitten. I ordered a 22 and 177 as soon as Krale had them in stock. The 25 is now my "big gun" and gets used the least. It is less accurate than the other P35s and a bit much for small game. But it is still a great gun I am proud to have. I hope you get on a roll with your 32 fpe airgun soon.