I keep two varmint guns readily available, well, actually three.
At the house I have a single shot 12 guage. It is mostly for noise, but it is also good for varmints in the garden. It is hard to miss with even small varmints like tomato eating chipmonks.
I also keep a 22 readily available at the house and one in the barn. Both are extremely similar tube-fed semiautomatics. One is my original 1958-59 J.C. Higgins Model 31 with a scope. The other is a Marlin Model 60 with the same model scope as on the Model 30. Both are dead-on accurate when sighted-in with 3-4 shells from a new batch of shells. I mostly use CCI Long Rifle shells.
IMO, 22 shorts are almost useless beyond about 25-30 yards. They are slow and they drop real fast. I've got a decent .177 air rifle that out performs a 22 short. It actually makes a pretty decent squirrel gun.
I've used a friend's 177HMR. If I were younger and I had more varmints to deal with, that is what I would pick today.
