Thread: As someone who is getting into hunting, what rifle should I invest more money into?

On the 22's, I would go with the wood stocked Norinco and ignore 10/22 semis and expensive bolt actions. The average distance to shoot rabbits is 35 - 50 mtrs. Hares 50 - 70 mtrs. A JW 15 will put all shots into the head at those distances and shooting skill and ability will make more difference than a rifle that shoots a 10mm tighter group. Practice stalking in close and the lessons learnt will really help for deer. Scratching a JW stock going under a fence is no big deal but scratching an Annie will ruin the week. Professional rabbit shooters use JW's
Centrefire shots tend to be further than rimfire so a better rifle is needed. I dont like the closed action types like Tikkas because it is hard to load and unload them quietly in a hunting situation and an unfired round cannot be top loaded back into the mag or the mag 'topped up' from the top after a couple of shots are fired. No big deal in open country but not good in the bush. There is no action better than an M98 for a first centrefire imo