I've inquired and searched for all brass shotshell components and loading info for well over a year now. Got plenty of 12, 20 & 410 brass shells and oversize CircleFly wads, loading tools & info, and a little load data.

I've been busy trying to sell our old house and finish the new one out back and haven't had time to play with loads yet but I need to assemble some low-intensity 410 loads for the family of red squirrels who taken up residence in the old house! The little furry tailed rats have apparrently built a nest or two in the walls, I've located the entrances and watched them scurrying back and forth, but any shots I'd take with a 22 would line up on my neighbr's house too! Poison is out - don't want potential buyers wondering "what's that awful smell?"

Should've bid higher on that Sheriden air rifle last year - would've safely done the job, or maybe 22 CB caps? I'm hoping instead that someone can advise me on a starting load w/#9 shot and Unique or 4227?

Handloader's April '05 shows:

- 45 Colt 9 grs Unique (45 shell w/ #12 load - g c over & under)

Speer with their plastic shot capsules:

- 45 Colt 7.5grs Unique or 5.5grs Bullseye

Lyman 1st ed. Shotshell handbook:

- 2-1/2" 410 (various wads) 1/2oz shot 15-19.5gr IMR 4227 @ 8,800 - 10,500 L.U.P.

My goal is to come up with a "snake load" that will immobilize a raw potato (or red squirrel) @ 15-25'!!! I have an NEF 45/410 single shot for a test bed, but plan to occaisionally use these loads in either my 45 Colt Ruger (if in 45 cases) or generally my 45/410 American Derringer (in 410 brass or 444 cases). For 45 Colt cases I'll follow the Speer/Handloader guidelines - for 410 brass/444 - LP primer, 15grs IMR 4227 (to start), 1/2 oz #9s, CircleFly wad column to fill balance of case, topwad glued/crimped to create sufficent resistance and seal load? I'm hoping to come up with a low recoil mild load which I can play with and pattern, maybe trying to increase velocity slighty for pattern and consistent kills.

Help - darn squirrels are driving me and my Springer crazy!

Thanks, Joe

I've tried to load short range quiet loads in various shotguns...including the .410...but really, by the time you get the shot load up to killing speed (about 800-900fps) it tends to get a bit loud. Not going to get great results in reducing that slow (slow in terms of pistols opr shotguns)...Unique might work, but still belive you're going to get pretty darned loud.

IF you'ave the urge to try, my best results were with loads designed for the .45colt case...if using 410 length brass cases, can still use the data, just that your over shot wad ends up 1/2 down the case...basically, loading .45colt in a too long case.

Now I've killed very short range critters (birds and filed mice) with a very odd load in 410...but I'd not use it in an expensive gun. Primed (this case a plastic shotshell) case and an upside down fired 9mm case. Primer alone will send it through both sides of a soda can (it also deprimes it so there is a primer sized hole as well as the big rip from the 9mm case). Flies like a bad mitten bird, and slows down nearly as fast.
BTW: If you've got a new shotgunner to train, that 9mm case load is useful...can see it in flight, so you can tell about where the shooter is holding when he fires at a thrown target.

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The air rifle would do the trick better...and proably not cause enough noise to be noticed (and if it were, police are not as hard core about air rifles as they are fire arms).

Can try CB caps..from a long barrel, they are very quiet and will do the job you describe just fine. Will also poke some holes in the walls.

But you certainly want to drop them on the spot...having them run off to die in the walls isn't really an option in the heat of summer....and even if you do drop mom and pop, you still may have a problem with the nestlings.

Air rifle or trap, and head shots only. Squirrels are surprisingly tough. You don't want to eplain to the next homeowner, why there are lots of bullet holes on the inside of the house! :eek:

I’ve posted this in 3 or 4 places, hoping to get some starting loads for 45 Colt and 410 (brass cases – 444 Marlin & Magtech 410 shells) low velocity shot loads. My initial need was to eliminate some pesty red squirrels who’ve been raising a litter of little ones – probably born in the walls of our 150+ year old post and beam farmhouse.

I guess I didn’t clarify some info about where I live! Though our old 80 acre farm is in southern Maine and not as “country” as it was 30 years ago, my 2 closest neighbor’s houses are 300yds away, others are 1/2 to a mile away. It’s an active hunting area, thickly wooded, nobody calls “police” when shots are fired (even when it's rapid fire semi auto high cap. clip), rarely even a game warden. I normally testfire new rifles and handguns from my back porch, last deer I shot was 250’ behind the house at a range of 32’! I own and regularly fire 2 doz.+ rifles and handguns – from 22 Hornet to 50-110 Winchester, and am building a new personal shooting range out back, so I can work up loads for both accuracy and chronograph same – once I finish the new backstop and bench! I no longer wander around my fields and woods with a 22 LR – often with a Ruger 22Mag though, but none of the random shots I used to take up north, or in the northern Adirondacks 40 years ago.

Though I really wanted to come up with some low velocity shot loads to use in both my 45 Colt Ruger and 45/410 derringer, even in my 45 Colt Rossi lever and NEF 45/410 – I realize that even with lots of time reloading and patterning – I’ll be lucky to come up with fairly reliable 20’ killer! That’s all I want, something which will dissipate energy real fast, none of the 22 worries when firing into my pines!

Regarding poison or traps – done both, with woodchucks over the years – also shot them along with raccoons and skunks out of my barn and henhouse, foxes with my chickens or turkeys in their mouths – with pistols and rifles and shotguns! Thanks for the hint on mothballs, planning to load up the back wall! My earliest hunting experience was for Connecticut Gray squirrels as a kid nearly 50 years ago – with a scoped Sheriden Blue Streak – generally dropped them in their tracks! My local red squirrels are half the size of a Gray, about like a small Chipmunk, probably taste like a pinecone, and have moved into my yard since we’re now housecatless. I hate it but will tolerate them badmouthing me when I’m sitting on a deerstand, but the woods are theirs, my yard is mine, and they’ve crossed the line!

In my circumstance for back porch/yard squirrel control a 22BB cap would surely be safe, as would 22 skirted pellets with a Magnum primer and/or light charge of Bullseye out of my Browning 1885 Hornet – it’s just that I carry a handgun 24/7, generally a 45 Colt, and would like to use that and my NEF single shot. I’m pretty sure I’d have problems with shotloads out of my Taurus 2” ported snubby and will hopefully be replacing it soon, my Blackhawk should be okay, same with that derringer – heck, I can get within 10-15’ of them generally!

Call me a sadistic squirrel killer – just want the challenge of shooting them with a shotload! Any hints on loads will be appreciated – thanks to those who’ve suggested some light loads already!

Thanks, Joe

Have no trouble killing squirrels with a single ball a moving at as low as 550fps. Aren't dealing with one ball...have to consider each shot pellet as an individual, and it just takes more vel. for one of those little #8 or #7 1/2 shot to do the job once they land....better figure on upping the MV to the 850-900fps range and getting close.

Go ahead and use the full length brass .410 case if you desire (or the plastic ones)...will just build the load deeper into the case leaving some enpty space at the mouth.

Brass case should load about like the .444 cases I often use to make cylinder length .45Colt shot loads. Good place to start is with 4.5gr.of Unique, card wad right on top of the powder, fiber wad, 210gr. of shot (that's a tad less than 1/2 oz), and a thin over shot wad glued in place.

Work up from taht starting load...are looking for the best patterns at whatever velocity will put shot thouh both sides of a soup can...kind of a rough estimate of power, but that is the minimum required.

For use in the .45colt revolver, will size the 444 cses fully in a .45colt die. Then strip out the bullet seating stem and size them full lenght in the .45colt seating die. the crimping shoulder will slightly bottle neck the brass...and the forward part will now fit in the chamber mouth. Mark what hangs out at the cylinder's end, and cut it back a little SHORTER than that.

Do the same with empoty plastic .410 cases, but they usually do not require any sizing. They also extract easier as the slick plastic won't grab on from expansion. Some revovlers just won't fire 209 shot shell primers...and there is a risk of the increased primer thrust peening the breech fase of a revovler (I haven't seen any evidence of that, but people keep telling me it could happen).

You could get away from the 209 primers by using these...
http://prbullet.com/vf.htm
It looks like it would be a bit more work, but if you aren't shooting many of them it wouldn't be too bad. It would at least let you shoot them in the guns that won't set off a 209.
Joe

Digging up an old thread, but I've been working on this to see if I could get better results than the last time I tired.

Unfortunatly, the answer is "no".

Tried an old single barrel .410...ntohing wrong with that gun, I just wanted a simple crack barrel to keep things simple.

Exit gas pressure is basically the "boom" of a gun shot (the charp crack is partly the projectile goiing transonic). The less exit gas pressure, the less the "boom", so used small cahrges of fast powders, to decrease that exit pressure to the least possible.

Tried normal componetns (pastic wads/ ww cases /older Federal 410 primers) but by the time it got quiet enough, was lacking in power. Built up wads (card then fiber) help a bit. Loaded down to 4gr. of Bullseye, card wad, fiber wad, and 3/8oz #9...almost quiet enough, but wihtout any critters to shoot, believe power might be lacking even at 10yards....heavier shot would be a help.

Testing was informal...a V-8 can is small enough to represent body shots, and 15yards seemed far enough. Patterns were only shot with the better loads, and not enough to be s-shure of the results. Are confroming to the choke, it's just that with 3/8ox. of shot, there is much more space between hits....stay inside 10yards.

This old gun will chamber and extract sized 45colt cases, so tied some of these (elimating the excess case volume when using 410 cases and the hot shotgun primers tend to "get ahead" of the micro powder charges). Result of the smaller case is that the 4gr. load is still a bit too loud...a 3gr. load way too weak.

SO>..I break out a 12ga. SXS and a set of Gauge Mates 12ga. adaptors and try the .45colt loads. Quieter.

Thinking about it, those short adaptors dump the shot and gas into the bore pretty quickly...so by the time it all gets to the end of a 12ga. barrel, the gas is lower pressure than when exiting a .410 barrel, and the noise reduced.

Might be that the noise is also being redirected...is enough room in that 12ga. bore taht some of the noise is being directed forward...rahte rthan one escape at the muzzle with a .410, it's an escape way back in a hollow tube. DIdn't feel like getting shot to find out.

All in all, don't think these lite loads would do the squirrel trick...getting between 15 and 24 hits on a v-8 can, but only five or six are actually penetrating one side of the can (the rest just dent it).

But I will keep loading those .45colt cases for both that crack-barrel 410 and the 12ga. adaptors...have been fun on tossed targets and I have a nephew just about ready to go hunting....worrred about pellet's bouncing back, so I'll have to toss al. foil balls for him, but it should get him the basics before heading to a real range (don't want him to get discouraged).
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Oversight: How did I decide how "loud" loud was. Very unscientific...i brought along a 10/22 and would fire it occasionaly with stardard velcity ammo. Figure is it isn't quieter than a .22LR, then there isns't much use in using them.
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May as well mention it, but also loaded some brass cased 12ga. BP loads. The old built up wads, naketed shot, and stinky powder can hold ther own (at least until you have to scrub out the barrels).

Considering everything, do belive those BP laods were LOUDER than the smokless loadings. Differnt tone (deeper) but can feel the concusion on your face when one of those goes off...kind of "slaps" witha pressure wave. Now I don't know exactly why this is...exit pressure should be lower, but there is a whole lot of gas (and particulate solids) exiting and that seems to create a differnt type of noise.