I think Scottie in Star Trek summed it up when he used to tell the Captain, 'You can't defy the laws of physics Jim'. It's all down to pattern and penetration and getting the right balance then balancing that with the Shooter's skill level. I pick up with my two Chesapeake bay Retrievers at a lot of English driven shoots and we do try to mark any pricked birds and gather them a quickly as possible. I would rather see them fall dead though. Sir Ralph Payne-Galwey wrote a book in 1913 called High Pheasants in Theory and Practice. He ddi a lot of practical experimentation and more or less concluded that the best combination to use was 1 ounce of number 7 shot and a lightly choked gun. Lagopus.....
