The .17 HMR really does a number on water-filled plastic jugs. It is tiny in size but big in performance.

If you want to get good at wind doping with a cartridge that doesn't kick much and doesn't make a lot of noise and you don't have a long firing range, the .17 HMR is a good training vehicle.

The people at Hornady tell me they are getting good 200-yard groups in their tunnel. The rifles and ammo are no doubt capable of it. Due partly to the deadline for this article and partly to the limited ammunition available, I was not able to fire 200-yard groups under ideal conditions. Again, the group I did fire is a weather report and not representative of the accuracy capability of the rifle and ammo. Speaking of recoil, the .17 HMR turns up about 0.2 ft-lbs from the 7.5-pound scoped Ruger. That's not two, it's zero point two. You don't feel any kick at all.

I thought it would be interesting to see how--or if--the tiny little .17-caliber bullet would expand. Using an animal glue expansion medium, I first fired into it from a distance of 25 feet. The velocity on this shot was 2589 fps, and the bullet penetrated two inches into the medium and fragmented as a good varmint bullet would. I recovered a couple of the largest fragments and their combined weight was 5.8 grains. The other fragments were little more than dust particles.

Moving a new block of glue out to 100 yards, the muzzle velocity on this individual shot was 2538 fps. With the acoustic target it is readily possible to get an accurate figure on impact velocity because it picks up time of flight over the shooting distance. I simply placed the acoustic frame in the same plane as the face of the glue expansion medium. The 100-yard impact velocity was 1929 fps, and the bullet penetrated three inches. It mushroomed instead of fragmenting this time and retained 12.2 grains of weight. A good portion of the lead core remained with the jacket.

Moving the target and glue to 200 yards, the muzzle velocity was 2616 fps for the shot, and the system indicated an impact velocity of 1423 fps. The bullet did not expand at this distance though the red tip separated from the rest of the bullet. The tip penetrated 2.50 inches into the medium, and the rest of the bullet penetrated four inches. The retained weight for the bullet and tip was a full 17 grains.

Again, due to limited time and ammo, I fired only one shot into the expansion medium. One shot may not be representative of what is typical. The people at Hornady say they normally get some expansion at 200 yards.

Something you might notice from the accompanying chart was the velocity uniformity. Rimfire cartridges, particularly the .22 Magnum rimfire, are not noted for velocity uniformity. The .17 HMR, however, turned in standard deviation figures that were similar to centerfire cartridge rounds. The .17 HMR ammo is uniform, and this is no small feat. The new Hornady round is loaded with only 5.6 grains of a spherical propellant so a small deviation in charge weight is really a large percentage of variation. In other words, if you're off 0.1 grain in charge weight with a 60-grain charge of powder, it does not mean much. If you're off 0.1 grain in a 5.6-grain charge, it is more than 10 times as significant. Not only is the charge weight small so that the proportion of error is greater, the burning chamber is so much smaller so that errors are emphasized even more. These factors, combined with having to deal with rimfire cartridge priming, are not conducive to a low standard deviation. All this is a roundabout way of saying that the Hornady ammo is good.

So what does the .17 HMR do on game? Unfortunately, I received the rifle too late in the season to go after our ground squirrels. They are sunny-day critters and go in when it's cool and rainy. But starlings were out. A shot to the breast inside 50 yards makes for an exit hole about 1.50 inches in diameter. Needless to say, it makes for a very dead bird. The Germans call it "Maus tot" or "mouse dead," meaning it is killed instantly and drops like a wet rag.

The .17 HMR is not so violent that you couldn't use it on tree squirrels for the frying pan as long as you limited yourself to head shots. The .17 HMR certainly has the accuracy. And at common squirrel shooting distances you will likely get bullet fragments on impact. Tiny fragments don't carry much energy to any distance, and that spells a margin of safety in this regard. This, combined with the low noise, contributes to making it a practical, useful cartridge. Let's face it, some of the wide-open spaces aren't so wide any more. Another thing about the .17 HMR is that the velocity is not so high as to make it a problem bore fouler. While the .17 HMR is hot for a rimfire, it is not hot in the sense of the centerfire .17 Remington that turns in 4000 fps.

The .17 HMR is a great little cartridge with an entirely different purpose. In my book, that purpose is practical. It is a cartridge you can shoot because it won't frighten the neighbors. It is a cartridge with which you can learn to shoot because it is so pleasant and accurate. The ammo is far less expensive than centerfire ammo, and that encourages more shooting--which is the biggest factor to shooting well.

Get yourself one of these little .17s. You'll become addicted.