Rat-shot is very small lead shot

Lead shot

Lead shot is a collective term for small balls of lead. These were the original projectiles for muskets and early rifles, but today lead shot is fired primarily from shotguns. It is also used for a variety of other purposes...

 (typically #12 - 1.3 mm (0.05")) which is loaded into a cartridge

Cartridge (firearms)

A cartridge, also called a round, packages the bullet, gunpowder and primer into a single metallic case precisely made to fit the firing chamber of a firearm. The primer is a small charge of impact-sensitive chemical that may be located at the center of the case head or at its rim . Electrically...

 not generally considered a shotgun shell

Shotgun shell

A shotgun shell is a self-contained cartridge loaded with lead shot or shotgun slug designed to be fired from a shotgun....

. Such a cartridge with a shot load is often called a "shot shell". The most common cartridges loaded with rat-shot are the .22 Long Rifle

.22 Long Rifle

The .22 Long Rifle rimfire cartridge is a long established variety of ammunition, and in terms of units sold is still by far the most common in the world today. The cartridge is often referred to simply as .22 LR and various rifles, pistols, revolvers, and even some smoothbore shotguns have...

 or pistol

Pistol

When distinguished as a subset of handguns, a pistol is a handgun with a chamber that is integral with the barrel, as opposed to a revolver, wherein the chamber is separate from the barrel as a revolving cylinder. Typically, pistols have an effective range of about 100 feet.-History:The pistol...

 or revolver

Revolver

A revolver is a repeating firearm that has a cylinder containing multiple chambers and at least one barrel for firing. The first revolver ever made was built by Elisha Collier in 1818. The percussion cap revolver was invented by Samuel Colt in 1836. This weapon became known as the Colt Paterson...

 cartridges. Using rat-shot cartridges allows one to convert a handgun

Handgun

A handgun is a firearm designed to be held and operated by one hand. This characteristic differentiates handguns as a general class of firearms from long guns such as rifles and shotguns ....

 or rifle

Rifle

A rifle is a firearm designed to be fired from the shoulder, with a barrel that has a helical groove or pattern of grooves cut into the barrel walls. The raised areas of the rifling are called "lands," which make contact with the projectile , imparting spin around an axis corresponding to the...

 into a small shotgun

Shotgun

A shotgun is a firearm that is usually designed to be fired from the shoulder, which uses the energy of a fixed shell to fire a number of small spherical pellets called shot, or a solid projectile called a slug...

 suitable for short-range use.

Uses

Rat-shot is generally used for shooting at snakes, rodents, and other small animals at very close range. It is used by farmers in rifles for the control of birds flying inside of barns and sheds, as well as for killing rats, for the simple reason that rat-shot will not damage the metal roof of a barn or the metal sides of a shed, while still being effective against small pests at close distances. Rat-shot is often used in 22 caliber rifles to train new shooters the use of a shotgun and as a first step in bird dog

Bird dog

A bird dog is a type of gun dog or hunting dog used to hunt or retrieve birds or other small game animals. by tracking their scent in the air. This dog breed has special hunting abilities and they are also trained to retrieve the birds after hunting them down. Bird dogs tend to enjoy the process of...

 training for the dog to get used to loud noises.

Rat-shot cartridges are best used in dedicated smoothbore

Smoothbore

A smoothbore weapon is one which has a barrel without rifling. Smoothbores range from handheld firearms to powerful tank guns and large artillery mortars.-History of firearms and rifling:...

 firearms such as Marlin Firearms

Marlin Firearms

Marlin Firearms Co., formerly of North Haven, Connecticut, is a manufacturer of high power, center fire, lever action, and .22 caliber rimfire rifles. In the past, the company made shotguns, derringers and revolvers...

' Model 25MG

Marlin Model 25MG

The Marlin Model 25MG is a smooth bore, bolt-action, .22 WMR shotgun manufactured by Marlin firearms Company. It was designed and marketed as a "garden gun" for use in dispatching small garden and farm pests. It features a hardwood Monte Carlo stock....

 "Garden Gun", but can still provide suitable patterns of shot from rifled

Rifling

Rifling is the process of making helical grooves in the barrel of a gun or firearm, which imparts a spin to a projectile around its long axis...

 barrels at short ranges. Since smoothbore firearms with barrels under a certain length may be classified as sawed off shotguns, rifled barrels are legally required in some cases. The Thompson Center Arms

Thompson Center Arms

Thompson/Center Arms Company is an American firearms company based in Rochester, New Hampshire. The company is best known for its line of interchangeable barrel single-shot pistols and rifles. Thompson Center manufactures muzzleloading rifles and is credited with creating the resurgence of their...

 Contender pistols offered barrels in some calibers, such as .357 Magnum

.357 Magnum

The .357 S&W Magnum , or simply .357 Magnum, is a revolver cartridge created by Elmer Keith, Phillip B. Sharpe, Colonel D. B. Wesson of firearms manufacturer Smith & Wesson, and Winchester. It is based upon Smith & Wesson's earlier .38 Special cartridge. The .357 Magnum cartridge was introduced in...

 and .44 Magnum

.44 Magnum

The .44 Remington Magnum, or simply .44 Magnum, is a large-bore cartridge originally designed for revolvers. After introduction, it was quickly adopted for carbines and rifles...

, in configurations that contained special straight rifled choke tubes to improve the patterns produced by the rifled barrels when shooting rat-shot cartridges.

Rat-shot is used in some types of frangible

Frangible

A material is said to be frangible if through deformation it tends to break up into fragments, rather than deforming plastically and retaining its cohesion as a single object...

 ammunition, such as the Glaser Safety Slug

Glaser Safety Slug

Glaser Safety Slug is a frangible bullet made by Glaser Safety Slug, Inc., a small American ammunition company based in Sturgis, South Dakota . The company was founded in 1975 by Armin Glaser the same year as the Glaser Safety Slug was developed by Jack Canon.-History:The original round was a...

. In these bullets, the shot is glued or sintered together inside a thin shell to form a projectile that fragments readily upon impact, reducing penetration and risk of ricochet.

The maximum effective killing range of rat-shot cartridges is limited, typically being less than 10 to 16½ feet (3 to 5 meters). At this distance, it only has a small chance of tearing through a sheet paper target.

Configuration

While some makes of rimfire ratshot cartridges somewhat resemble traditional shotgun shells, with a brass case crimped closed, many other types of rimfire and nearly all centerfire rat-shot cartridges use a hollow plastic capsule, often shaped like a bullet to aid in feeding, which holds the shot. This plastic case shatters during firing, and allows the shot to disperse after it exits the muzzle. There are reports of the plastic casing shattering when being fed from a magazine; unlike a revolver. Crimped cases do not exhibit this problem but can fail to extract in some semi-automatic guns.

External links

• Handgun Shot Loads Work For Pests But Not Defense, Gun Week, 2005