good question!
first i have to admit, I dont hunt with a .223, Illinois law prohibits rifle hunting, so check caliber restrictions in your state.
That being said, When I was in the Marine Corps, we used a 62 grain bullet traveling aproximatly 3000fps. Considering a deer is a human sized animal, I suppose this would be sufficiant with good placement of the round. Being that the 62 grain bullet still has some power restrictions, I would bump that up to a 75 grain bullet traveling at least 2800fps. I'm sure there are plenty of factory loads in this range. What makes that better is that I'm sure many of these come in a hollow point configurations.
All of that taken into account, shot placemet is far more important. Heck, there are records of people taking Elephants with high speed .22 type bullets by placing the shot in the brain.
Hope that helps!
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