I have a K-22 shooter with a 6 inch barrel that shipped in 1949.
I've seen old ads for the K-22 that mentions you can shoot
.22 Long & Short. Has anyone done this? I want to try this,
but wanted some real world advice before doing so.

Yes. shoot "em" all you want. Impact will be in a different place from a HV LR. Just run a .22 cal. brush through the charge holes before going back to LR.

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S&W Accumulator

You can even mix them up in the cylinder. 2,2 and 2 or 1,2 ,3 and 1,2 and 3 again. Larry

Yep, mix and match, and as previously suggested, clean out the charge holes after use (a good practice no matter what you are shooting out of it) .

You do not have to stop at .22 shorts. You can also shoot .22 CB caps in long or short cases and RWS BB caps. I've bulled both the hollow spire point bullet and round ball out of the RWS BB caps and they have no loose powder, just what ever is stuck to the back of the case under what looks lite a kid's toy pistol paper cap. The trouble is all these cartridges cost more than hi-vel .22 LR, their POIs are different and accuracy can be problematic. They really are for rifles in which the noise reduction is more significant. Pistols, especially revolvers, release noise making powder into the air before the small amount in even BB caps burns up. Fired through a single shot or manually repeating rifle CB caps and BB caps are quieter than a lot of air rifles.

It's defenitely possible to shoot long and short 22's. The problem with 22 longs is that they are almost impossible to find. I'm not sure if they were that hard to find prior to all the shortages but I haven't seen any for sale in the last couple of years.

The problem with shorts is the free bore before the bullet hits the throat and that might effect accuracy. But it's defenitely worth it to buy a box or a couple and try them out. Shooting shorts is a like a glorified BB gun.

Aguila Super Colibri works very well on chipmunks. About 500 FPS. They come with a warning not to use in a rifle because they may get stuck in the bore.

Last time I saw any shorts or longs on the shelf they cost more than Long Rifle. I can't see any reason to buy them unless they are all you can find.

Mostly because of the .22 shortage I shot an old box of CCI .22 longs through my 617 practicing for bullseye last winter. Accuracy was so poor that other than having a good visit with friends at the range it was a waste of time.