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I've never shot a goose; in fact, I've never pointed a gun at a goose. And it's a long, long time since I shot a duck. Now, however, opportunity knocks. Keen to learn, I've bought some books. I was surprised to read the following in Mike Swan's good book "Rough Shooting". Talking about wildfowling, he says that his father believed in small shot and they tended to use 6's in Eley Impax with 1oz. of shot, and Hymax at 1 1/4 oz. But one day he ran out of 6's and used some Impax 7's he had in his bag; he found that "they worked admirably"- he missed no more than he usually did, and the proportion of wounded birds "fell dramatically". He says, "Today, for all normal game shooting and wildfowling purposes, I use these 1oz. loads of No.7's, with my gun bored improved cylinder in both barrels. (improved cylinder in both barrels... - my comment) If I were marksman enough to use full choke reliably, I might go up to 6s for extra range, but I know that my shooting would deteriorate dramatically". Even for geese- which he acknowledges "pose a special problem"- he breaks with tradition and uses 4's or 5's rather than 3's. He says, "Earlier this season (early 1990s- my note.) I was surprised by a Canada coming in from behind. I took a hurried shot and it fell very dead to a 1oz. trap load of 7 1/2 shot from quite a reasonable altitude". I think this is a good book ,one which I'd recommend for folk in my kind of situation in relation to rough shooting generally, but I was really surprised to read the above. I was also interested to note that he makes no reference to a need for a 3-inch chamber, though that's maybe implicit in his reference to "Hymax", etc. I wish, though, that he'd spelt that out as I'm thinking that I need to get another, 3" chambered, gun if I'm to make a job of the goose side of things. I guess this subject has been done to death over the years on the forum, but I would like to hear reactions from those with more knowledge than I i.e. everybody on here.