Originally posted by clickclick shutter speed should be at least the inverse of the focal length, so for a 300mm, 1/300.
This rule of thumb comes from film days and applies to full frame. For apsc apply the "crop factor" ie 1.5x = 1/450 th or in practice 1/500th, Then it's common that you end up cropping your bird pics. So if you crop to half size to get your bird pic, you must x2 again = 1/1000th !! Get the picture ?
Cut a long story short, if you want to see what the dal 55-300mm can do, then get the camera out of your hands and stabilise as best you can. Even better than a tripod is a bean bag or similar on a solid surface or post. Absolutely use a remote shutter release, IR or wired doesn't matter (note that canon wired ones fit most pentaxes (eg my K5) and are more readily obtainable, few cents off ebay), and consensus is that SR should be off.
To see what can be achieved with a variety of lenses and methods check out the 300mm lens club thread. And bear in mind that we all make lots of use of the delete button to jettison poor results.
Having said that, there are good u-tube videos on telephoto hand holding technique: grip, breathing, posture, 3 shot bursts etc I recommend you browse those.
Addendum - shake reduction.
I remembered I had attempted some test pics with my DAL 55-300mm to judge the effect of SR. These are both handheld at 1/60th sec, f9, reduced in size from the cropped 2500px wide to 1000px wide. One is with SR on. I am more impressed than I expected to be actually. However trying to get the most out of SR is a bit pernickety, the camera is juggling with focus first so the SR light only comes on when the camera thinks it has nailed that, then moving subjects complicates things.... all a bit hit and miss in practice.