I've shot quite a lot of porcipines with the .223, 22-250, and the 204. On these targets I don't see any major differences in LR performance other than the .223 is 100 yards in the hole.
My longest shot with the 22-250 was @ 500 yards. the porkey hung in the tree for a few seconds and then fell. This spring I shot one @ 565 yards with the 204 40gr v-max at 3850fps. Same result as with the 22-250.
Last year in one hour I shot 6 with the 204 from 50-370 yards all one shot kills the one at 370 was a raking shot from back to front. The bullet opened him up from his hip to neck with a 1.5 inch wide gap where his ribs should have been.
The 204 is easilly deflected by small branches much more than any other varmit round I have shot. I think the small high vel. bullets come apart when they contact anything.
I have had similar bullet problems on a couple of close range coyotes, and stopped using it for dogs. although there are some dedicated 204 shooters who have overcome this problem.
For a strictly varmit round it is a great cartrige. The audible "smack" sound when hitting small varmits is more pronounced than the other cartriges I've listed. Explosion factor on critters under one pound is awsome.
