Game Gun

[Scully]

7 hours ago, London Best said:

When you have met him you will know why.

I’ve never met him so don’t know what he’s like. He is a good shot and obviously passionate about driven game shooting, but I cringe when he tries to promote shooting to a viewer. 🫣

[Dave at kelton]

On 29/08/2023 at 19:52, chrislightning said:

Top ones only a Denton and Kennell but shoots lovely. Has 26 and 28inch barrels too. 

A pal of mine bought on of these when they first came out and they were cracking guns. As far as I know he still uses it.

[TIGHTCHOKE]

On 30/08/2023 at 21:07, Scully said:

Don’t be silly. All parties involved are made aware prior to the actual day. 

Which is when I would be asking for ALL of my money back!   

[Scully]

9 hours ago, TIGHTCHOKE said:

Which is when I would be asking for ALL of my money back!   

Bit of a moot point really; as you don’t approve of such days then you’re unlikely to meet on one. 

[TIGHTCHOKE]

10 hours ago, Scully said:

Bit of a moot point really; as you don’t approve of such days then you’re unlikely to meet on one. 

If he only goes on the "extreme" pheasant days that is true.

[Scully]

3 hours ago, TIGHTCHOKE said:

If he only goes on the "extreme" pheasant days that is true.

👍He doesn’t seem to enjoy mediocre birds.,

[Stonepark]

I think my issue with DC (and the like) is that they are pushing the law of averages beyond its limit for sportsmanship.

A 40 yard pheasant with 150 pellets within 30 inch circle will drop the bird dead 99% of the time, at 70 yards with 60 pellets in the circle, even if perfectly on target the bird will only drop half the time, meaning up to half the birds are pricked.

Whilst we can all miss or place our patterns less than centrally on the target, this is not done on purpose and as sporting guns, we our best to avoid such situations, however during the extreme shooting, the guns knowingly engage targets in less than optimal circumstances and that I feel is the difference.

[Scully]

5 minutes ago, Stonepark said:

I think my issue with DC (and the like) is that they are pushing the law of averages beyond its limit for sportsmanship.

A 40 yard pheasant with 150 pellets within 30 inch circle will drop the bird dead 99% of the time, at 70 yards with 60 pellets in the circle, even if perfectly on target the bird will only drop half the time, meaning up to half the birds are pricked.

Whilst we can all miss or place our patterns less than centrally on the target, this is not done on purpose and as sporting guns, we our best to avoid such situations, however during the extreme shooting, the guns knowingly engage targets in less than optimal circumstances and that I feel is the difference.

I’m not sure anyone can say with any certainty that any of the above is definitive, because there are many vagaries at work in shooting driven game. We all do our best to kill whatever we shoot at, irrespective of range, and we choose our loads and chokes accordingly to that range, which is why extreme game guns use heavier loads and tighter chokes. 
Plus when all’s said and done we’re killing stuff for enjoyment, and killing for ‘sport’ is growing less and less acceptable it would seem, irrespective of range. 

[udderlyoffroad]

I think it must be the algorithm. Honestly never even had a Dave Carrie video appear in my feed, much less watch one.

Have no interest in HAPI so doubt I’ll become a viewer of his output, as it sounds many worlds away from our little DIY syndicate.

Sadly we’re all tarred with the same brush of phessie murderers so I guess I do have a vested interest in him not taking ill-advised pot shots.

[wymberley]

32 minutes ago, Stonepark said:

I think my issue with DC (and the like) is that they are pushing the law of averages beyond its limit for sportsmanship.

A 40 yard pheasant with 150 pellets within 30 inch circle will drop the bird dead 99% of the time, at 70 yards with 60 pellets in the circle, even if perfectly on target the bird will only drop half the time, meaning up to half the birds are pricked.

Whilst we can all miss or place our patterns less than centrally on the target, this is not done on purpose and as sporting guns, we our best to avoid such situations, however during the extreme shooting, the guns knowingly engage targets in less than optimal circumstances and that I feel is the difference.

Very well posted.👍

For some it appears that Journee, Burrard, Lowry, Thomas, Brindle et al have all wasted their time. Another term for 'the law of averages' is 'the theory of probability' upon which any calculation for shotgun external ballistics is dependent. It can be said that the minimum pellet requirement to kill a pheasant consistently (assuming sufficient energy) is 60 and that would be for every shot and not on average. Probability can make a mockery of our good intentions if we let it. The 60 strikes mentioned relates to the 20" central circle. Because of central thickening the pellet density is usually - can't say always as there is the possible exception for true cylinder -  greater than for the outer 20 to 30" ring - which has a greater area than the 20" circle. The figures for this have all been calculated on our behalf and are readily available. As said, they're based on averages but starting with a reasonable assessment is preferable to a wild guess for determining maximum effective ranges but it must be said that either is preferable to total indifference. Indifference to suffering is the definition of cruelty

[Old farrier]

18 minutes ago, wymberley said:

Very well posted.👍

For some it appears that Journee, Burrard, Lowry, Thomas, Brindle et al have all wasted their time. Another term for 'the law of averages' is 'the theory of probability' upon which any calculation for shotgun external ballistics is dependent. It can be said that the minimum pellet requirement to kill a pheasant consistently (assuming sufficient energy) is 60 and that would be for every shot and not on average. Probability can make a mockery of our good intentions if we let it. The 60 strikes mentioned relates to the 20" central circle. Because of central thickening the pellet density is usually - can't say always as there is the possible exception for true cylinder -  greater than for the outer 20 to 30" ring - which has a greater area than the 20" circle. The figures for this have all been calculated on our behalf and are readily available. As said, they're based on averages but starting with a reasonable assessment is preferable to a wild guess for determining maximum effective ranges but it must be said that either is preferable to total indifference. Indifference to suffering is the definition of cruelty

Often quoted and have some bearing on the situation however they are in my opinion dated references 

burrard did his tests with lead long before the invention of plastic wads and plastic cases not to mention the heavy shots and the modern powders 

good starting point for entry level calculations however cartridges primers wads and shot have moved on 

along with the guns chokes and boring of the barrel 

There are more changes on the horizon which will make the reference books of latter years as obsolete as the lead and paper cases of years gone by 

 

just my thoughts 

of 

[wymberley]

28 minutes ago, Old farrier said:

Often quoted and have some bearing on the situation however they are in my opinion dated references 

burrard did his tests with lead long before the invention of plastic wads and plastic cases not to mention the heavy shots and the modern powders 

good starting point for entry level calculations however cartridges primers wads and shot have moved on 

along with the guns chokes and boring of the barrel 

There are more changes on the horizon which will make the reference books of latter years as obsolete as the lead and paper cases of years gone by 

 

just my thoughts 

of 

A state of the art Gamebore Black Gold Dark Storm 32g of No 6 (UK 5s) leaves the muzzle at 1475 ft/sec. An English No 5 from back in the day having an observed velocity of 1150 ft/sec departs at 1450. And the difference down range is........?

[TIGHTCHOKE]

Negligible!

[Old farrier]

34 minutes ago, wymberley said:

A state of the art Gamebore Black Gold Dark Storm 32g of No 6 (UK 5s) leaves the muzzle at 1475 ft/sec. An English No 5 from back in the day having an observed velocity of 1150 ft/sec departs at 1450. And the difference down range is........?

But there not using 32 gram 6 on the extreme days 

And pretty soon they won’t be using lead 

as I said a good starting point 

we have cartridges capable of 100 meters nowadays with wads that can hold the pattern things are changing 

 

[wymberley]

22 minutes ago, Old farrier said:

But there not using 32 gram 6 on the extreme days 

And pretty soon they won’t be using lead 

as I said a good starting point 

we have cartridges capable of 100 meters nowadays with wads that can hold the pattern things are changing 

 

Yep to your bullet points 1 and 3.

BP2 - My guess is from mining to end user the collective lead for lead shot time will be c10 years.

BP4 - The crux of the matter is sportsmanship above all else. The generally accepted energy requirement to cleanly kill a cock pheasant is 1.5 ftlbs. The minimum pattern pellet count to cleanly kill the smaller hen bird is 60 within the central 20" circle. Which are the cartridges that have the capability to meet both of these two criteria at 100 yards

[button]

9 hours ago, wymberley said:

Yep to your bullet points 1 and 3.

BP2 - My guess is from mining to end user the collective lead for lead shot time will be c10 years.

BP4 - The crux of the matter is sportsmanship above all else. The generally accepted energy requirement to cleanly kill a cock pheasant is 1.5 ftlbs. The minimum pattern pellet count to cleanly kill the smaller hen bird is 60 within the central 20" circle. Which are the cartridges that have the capability to meet both of these two criteria at 100 yards

Ask Dave@kelton as I believe he picks up on shoots which shows what could be classed as high/extreme and see if he spends all day picking up pricked birds, not disagreeing with your comments but interesting to see if the science translates into reality

[Scully]

11 hours ago, Old farrier said:

Often quoted and have some bearing on the situation however they are in my opinion dated references 

burrard did his tests with lead long before the invention of plastic wads and plastic cases not to mention the heavy shots and the modern powders 

good starting point for entry level calculations however cartridges primers wads and shot have moved on 

along with the guns chokes and boring of the barrel 

There are more changes on the horizon which will make the reference books of latter years as obsolete as the lead and paper cases of years gone by 

 

just my thoughts 

of 

And totally relevant thoughts they are. 

[Scully]

12 hours ago, wymberley said:

Indifference to suffering is the definition of cruelty

As I’ve said before, the above is the perfect and most accurate description of cruelty I’ve ever heard, and one which must apply to every single live quarry shooter on this forum. 
None of us want to cause suffering by wounding, but we do it all the time.

All of us have wounded quarry at some time, but it doesn’t stop any of us going back out there and doing it again.  
Incidentally, anyone who eats meat must surely be guilty of indifference to suffering also.
However, None of us care enough to stop doing it. 
We minimise the risk of wounding by using the best tools for the job; and if those extreme driven game shooters were using 28grm 7’s through cylinder choke I could understand the criticism, but they’re not.  

[Dave at kelton]

46 minutes ago, button said:

Ask Dave@kelton as I believe he picks up on shoots which shows what could be classed as high/extreme and see if he spends all day picking up pricked birds, not disagreeing with your comments but interesting to see if the science translates into reality

Depends what the guns come equipped with their abilities, and their choice of target. Yesterdays team had a number of 20 bores out using Eley Zenith 30gm 5 on birds to, I would say, 40 yds. 

So we weren’t on the highest drives and those who could shoot were killing the higher birds outright. Less confident and capable guns were taking the lower birds.  I was picking a few with the odd pellet in them but not huge numbers.

The teams who want the really high birds tend to be using heavy over and unders with 36gm 4. They are accomplished shots and will kill good numbers of birds outright. I don’t note any greater numbers of pricked birds than when on the lower drives.

The issue is that one man’s high bird is another man’s low bird. Every gun can pick which bird is within their capabilities and those of their equipment. You don’t have to shoot at everything! In respect of equipment it is simple. The  pattern plate will tell you what your preferred gun and cartridge combination produces at your normal chosen ranges. Most Wildfowlers I know who regularly shoot high birds with steel do just that.  If you expect to shoot 60 or higher yarders with an open choked side by side lightweight game gun and felt wad cartridges with 28 gm 6 forget it.

[wymberley]

2 hours ago, button said:

Ask Dave@kelton as I believe he picks up on shoots which shows what could be classed as high/extreme and see if he spends all day picking up pricked birds, not disagreeing with your comments but interesting to see if the science translates into reality

It may be advantageous to see if the practical application relates to the science.

[button]

10 minutes ago, wymberley said:

It may be advantageous to see if the practical application relates to the science.

Has he not just gave his view

[wymberley]

53 minutes ago, button said:

Has he not just gave his view

Should by 'he' you mean D at K, yes he has and is spot on. I was referring to your phrase relating to science and reality. For consistency - assuming a truly aimed shot - the science has it that for the 36g of extreme 4s - in reality closer to English 3s - and whereas the energy remains more than sufficient - a conventionally bored 12 bore having a Full choke which is performing to 'spec' will require a 30" pattern of some c58% to deliver the required 60 pellets. The reality is is that you'd do better with Imp Cyl and 5s for the same or a slightly longer range in terms of consistency as opposed to relying on luck.

Edited September 5, 2023 by wymberley

[Fellside]

2 hours ago, Scully said:

As I’ve said before, the above is the perfect and most accurate description of cruelty I’ve ever heard, and one which must apply to every single live quarry shooter on this forum. 
None of us want to cause suffering by wounding, but we do it all the time.

All of us have wounded quarry at some time, but it doesn’t stop any of us going back out there and doing it again.  
Incidentally, anyone who eats meat must surely be guilty of indifference to suffering also.
However, None of us care enough to stop doing it. 
We minimise the risk of wounding by using the best tools for the job; and if those extreme driven game shooters were using 28grm 7’s through cylinder choke I could understand the criticism, but they’re not.  

Good points re minimising suffering. One thing that hasn’t been mentioned is picking up wounded quarry quickly. I find this to be extremely important to prevent unnecessary suffering. It is for this reason I always pick up flighted ducks as they’re shot and not at the end of the session. It also helps if pickers-up on driven shoots are placed well back where the pricked birds plane in, rather than just behind the guns. The dead stuff lying behind the guns can wait till last. There are many other examples, but essentially it’s important to pick up quickly with a good experienced dog and a handler that lets their dog work.

I appreciate this is digressing from the OPs original question….so…..guns and cartridges for high stuff: for me this would be a 12 gauge O/U with 32 grams of UK 5 shot. For more ordinary birds: just about anything the user feels happy with, but UK 6s seem to work well. However, I’m sure there are as many opinions as there are shotgunners. 

[London Best]

2 hours ago, Fellside said:

, I’m sure there are as many opinions as there are shotgunners. 

And once in a blue moon you find one that knows what he is talking about!

[Penelope]

On 27/08/2023 at 11:51, London Best said:

Obviously, you need a SxS.

 

 

 

 

OK, I’m biased.

No, just right 😁