I hunted ruffed grouse and turkey for 10+ years in Virginia and WV with a German combi gun equipped with a Leupold VXII scope with magnification set at 1,5X. Best ruffed grouse rig I ever used. Om going away birds I never had a problem with scope. However, I have been shooting scoped rifles at running game since a kid, with lots of success.
Having only one shot for grouse, I picked my shots carefully and scored much higher % hits than with any other gun, well over 50%. There was also great population of grouse during those years. I could hunt lots and became rather familier with where and when grouse were. A grouse not shot at and maybe wounded was a grouse I could hunt another day(s), till I finally got good shot. Never since then have I had such extensive hunting of same area.
I loosely lump drillings into those designed to be used as nice shotgun on flying birds and those designed to be used mostly (nearly entirely?) from high seats. The latter is not very good for shooting flying birds. The kombi gun I used is well designed for shooting flying birds and still one of shotguns I am most hitting with.
Niklas
