Back in business ?

[Zazu45]

Hi guys.

About 15-20 years ago, I kind of been forced to drop shotgun hunting. You know: raising kids, factory closure, house payements...
Anyway, even ended up having to sell my 12ga. Browning BPS and reloading equipment.
But finally my life is getting back on track(touch wood) and the hunting bug been after me this fall.

So here goes, seems it is a whole different ball game these days?
I been looking at buyng a shot gun lately and have bee hearing all kind of stuff about what works and what does not.
Some say nothing short of a 10ga. for ducks and geese,
others say a .410 is better than a 12ga.3.5 and others claim hardly any difference betweem steel and lead.
So see I been looking at getting A Remington 870 3inch .
So what's the truth about steel shooting?
What works and what does'nt?
Wich brand of ammo and what shot sizes work best?
Is Winchester :Xpert, SuperX or Supreme any good, that's what the easiest to find in my area.(Quebec)
I hunt mainly along rivers, irrigation ditches and small swamps,
mostly pretty open spaces and range tends to vary alot, also there is always the odd goose that fly by.

Thaks for any help.

Denis.

[skeet]

An 870 3' will be fine for almost all hunting you may do. I know many who have that gun and that is all they ever use. As far as waterfowl and steel shot..that is another case. Shooting steel is completely different. Yes Steel will kill the birds. Steel is a barely acceptable alternative to lead..in my opinion. If you are going to shoot steel go with the best of the stuff you can find...the premium lines etc. The cheap steel really isn't too much good for anything other than shooting cripples. The best of the substitutes seems to be hevi-shot or one of it's derivatives that most of the major manufacturers has available. It really seems to be better than lead..but it is very expensive. I find though that I use less shells for birds brought to bag and I certainly feel much better than if I shot steel exclusively.....and the hevi-shot and things like bismuth tend to shoot much more like lead ballistically. I know this will probably touch a raw nerve with some but kind of wish they would outlaw the use of steel. Just way too many cripples with it. In fact I would make the bet there are more birds lost to crippling with steel than there ever were lost to lead poisoning. If using steel for ducks and geese..use at least 2 sizes larger than you used to use in lead. It'll work ok for you. Also get some of the size 7 sportsman steel or what ever and go to a skeet(not Trap) range and shoot some clay targets. Learn to shoot the steel.

[tjwatty]

I agree with almost all of what Skeet said, except...
I think a ban of steel is just what the "anti's" want, that would make waterfowl hunting cost prohibitive to most of us. I'm hearing talk of banning lead altogether, just imagine the cost of trap and skeet shooting.
I see more crippling of waterfowl than I care to, stupid hunters are stupid hunters. If they were allowed to shoot lead they would still be crippling just as many birds. The fact is that steel will not kill at distance, you need to get them in closer, much closer. I like to shoot mallards inside 25 yards, I'll shoot them farther, but I like them close. I use BB's, 1's and 2's in 3" Winchester and or Federals. I got to shoot a couple boxes of Federal 1's in 3.5in this year and was real happy. I think Feferal made some real advances in their steel shot products.
If I'm on a goose hunt I have a box of Hevi-shot BB, I've had them 2 years and have 8 of 10 left. If I ever win that darn lottery I'll shoot a lot more hevi-shot and heavy-steel but with the amount of hunting I do it's just not feasable nor affordable.
I think for jump shooting rivers and ponds and pass shooting same, I would use the 1's. Just my opinion, that and a quarter will still get you a cup of coffee somewhere. (maybe)

[M.T. Pockets]

Welcome back to hunting, hope you get to catch up on the last few years. I agree that a 3" Remington 870 will handle everything that you're going to ask it to do, and at a very reasonable price. May I suggest getting one with interchangable choke tubes.

As far as ammunition goes, don't stay home if all you can afford are the cheaper loads, just be more selective with your shots. I hunt quite a bit of ducks. I hunt small sloughs over decoys, and some river/ditch jump shooting. I don't intentionally shoot beyond 40 yards and most ducks I kill are around 25-30 yards. I just won't shoot further than that. I almost hate to admit it, but I have very good success with Winchester Xpert loads. I use 3" #2s or #3s. Again, I think the reason I have success is that I limit my shots to 40 yards, maximum and try to keep shots much closer. The main reason is that in the thick sloughs I hunt in you've got to get them close so you can find them. Plus, it's a lot more fun.

If you're going to pass shoot ducks, then I agree that you'd be better off with better, heavier loads.

Back when lead was legal my favorite duck load was 1 1/2 oz of #5 shot. It was just poison at close range over decoys.

I fully agree that for geese you should have heavier shot. I get a couple geese every year that fly into my decoys and it takes more firepower than those Xperts deliver. I keep a few heavy shot BB's in my pocket and change loads if I have time. I have shot some geese at close range with those Xperts and you better be ready to keep shooting.

Have fun.

[Zazu45]

Thanks for the info guys.

Another question.

Does steel shot react to choke constriction as lead does ?
I mean: with my BPS, using large shot (#2-BB) I used to get better patterns with my modified than my full choke.
With #4 they were about equal and with the smaller stuff (#5, #6) the full choke was tighter.
By the way, in the days of lead my best load for ducks/geese was a load of 1 1/2oz of #4 shot in Winchester hulls at about 1250fps. It just seemed to kill anything like lightning.
By the way, my BPS did not have screw-in chokes, I had three different barrels for it: 30in Full, 28in Modified and 26in improved cylinder. It was my do everything gun and loved it.
It is just way too expensive these days, it's at least double the price of the Remington.

[skeet]

As far as the gun to buy..If you can find a Remington Express 12 ga in 28" bbl it will have screw chokes. You can actually do as well with a 26" bbl but the 28 may be better for you. Chokes are pretty much as you state..Improved cylinder will probably shoot the larger shot sizes better. I use Imp Cyl or skeet for MOST of my shooting....not all. I sometimes use light mod and improved modified for longer shooting.....Modified will be just fine for most. the thing to do is try the shells out that you want to use on clay targets. You'll see what I mean. Most of all ....Have FUN!!...and be careful too. Sound like a parent now, huh!!

[fabsroman]

Pretty much what these guys have said.

What you need to do is to get out and start hunting. If you cannot afford top line equipment and ammunition, use whatever you can as long as you are out hunting. Over time, you will learn what the limitations of the guns and shells are.

Me, I just re-learned a lesson I learned several years ago. No long shots with Remington Sportsman Steel. I went hunting last weekend and killed 4 of the 5 geese we downed, and some were pretty long shots. However, none of them came down dead, even a close one, and one of them I hit twice just to see it fly low to the ground with its feet down for well over 500 yards until it fell in a hedge row. Never found that one. Those shells were the only thing I had to use because I hadn't been planning on hunting that day. I got a call from a friend while I was out at dinner Friday night and he wanted to hunt on Saturday. So, who am I to say no.

Regarding the chokes, there is no simple solution other than patterning the gun. I finally did it myself about 3 years ago because I had one heck of a time with a Patternmaster choke tube and some wounded ducks. Found out that steel 4's pattern like crap out of that tube, but hevi-shot 4's pattern extremely tight. Going to the skeet range might be okay, but breaking a clay target with 2 or 3 pellets is a lot different than having multiple strikes on a duck.

Before I got the Patternmaster tube, I used modified for 6 or 7 years in my Benelli for everything that I hunted from doves to geese and from 7 1/2 shot to T shot.

I hope you have a great time this season. We can always use more sportsmen out there even though we sometimes do not act like it when we come across them in our neck of the woods.