doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com patterns and chokes for grouse?

Well, I dunno for sure, but my size 11 boots are dang near a foot each, and it isn't a big trick to keep a foot of space in between 'em. So 5 paces equals about 15 yards, plus or minus whatever fraction of an inch is left off 12 inches from size 11 Red Wings, or, 45 feet. Wrong. 5 X 3 = 15 not 45.

Ted, by your calculations each of your strides is 9 feet. I do not think so. If you had those legs you would be one of the greatest NBA players making millions. You just flunked math 101, conversions of feet to yards and back. Each yard is three feet and it takes three feet to make a yard. 15 yards is 45 feet. So unless you have a nine foot stride, five strides is not enough to cover 45 feet. You would need seven feet between boots. 1+7+1=9

A stride is near a yard in distance, not nine feet, which is three yards. By your example you would cover an entire football feild in just over eleven strides. A pro running back has a hard time averaging much over five feet per stride when running. Watch one running down the feild and you will see that it takes him about two running strides per five yards.

I know that some people can broad jump over 20 feet but we are not into that group. I understand bad backs and getting older. A ten foot wide ditch makes us look for a crossing down the way.

This all could have been advoided if our Founding Fathers had adopted the metric system along with the decimal money system. Blame it on Franklin and Jefferson. Those pecks, pints, bushels, feet, inches, yards, pounds and ounces get to be right much a pain to convert sometimes.

It would be much easier to do metric. Then I only need a half meter pattern at 15 meters and a meter pattern at 30. See how simple that is.

Lowell,
I know nothing of grouse, but for quail in my neck of the woods, covering more ground has proven to produce more game than slow movement. Granted we do it methodically, having hunted the same ground for years. I look at as my exercise and my hunting combined.

I agree with Lowell again on this one. Whether fishing or hunting slow down, look, listen,and enjoy the day. Wildlife is seldom in a rush and neither should we be when in mother nature's sanctuary. Gotta get home to the rat race? Besides your
stopping makes the game nervous and prone to move.
Lowell, I remember many years ago, a friends beautiful blond wife pulled me away from a bonfire with abundant wine, to hear the worms crawl. WOW! As we moved away from the flickering light she got down on her hands and knees and told me to do the same
thing and we crawled forward on our hands and knees, inches at a time, slight rustlings could be heard in the forest leaves. She would sometimes play her mini-mag light across the leaves until she found.....worms.
MY MOTHER just died this morning at 92. I will swear to this story upon her grave. You are correct, measure your time with nature in inches and appreciate evey one of them!
MIKE B.

Chuck, with grouse moving slower with frequent stops often produces birds you would otherwise not have flushed. They will often sit extremely tight, particularly in snow, hoping you will pass by, only to get nervous when you stop. I have had them flush so close I thought I had committed a gastro intestinal social error for a moment. My favorite choke for grouse is the same as for skeet, a game originally invented to mimic grouse shooting, skeet and skeet. Cylinder and Cylinder isn't bad either. I don't worry about longer shots as I can seldom see them and certainly won't hit them once beyond skeet and skeet range.

KY Jon,
You, sir, is right. My bad. I'll blame it on not enough sleep this weekend, if thats OK.

But, get this-the 15 foot pattern, and the 15 yard pattern on my guns isn't all that different with normal birdshot. Not enough to make a difference in the end result to a grouse caught smack in the middle of it. Which, metric or inch system use isn't going to change. I've seen barrels on European shotguns for woodcock that are rifled, to spread the shot for close range shots, but, I don't own one, and haven't used one. They are supposed to work well with 15 foot, or 15 yard shots, however.

So I'll stick with later season shots, and inch system, even when I screw up with it.
Best,
Ted

Mike, I'm truely sorry to hear about your mother!
Just came back from my Dad's 89th birthday get together.
We are of the age when sad things start to happen.
Very sorry.

I had a 16ga. gun with two sets of barrels make for me by Ithaca
Classis Doubles in 2002. I had both sets choked in .000" because I wanted exact numbers. The first set was grouse 1(.003)/grouse 2(.007)....these were overchoked .003 and .007 respectively.
Anyone who hunts these birds a lot will tell you to have as open a choke as possible in your first barrel and take your pick in the second.
The second set of barrels are choked .008" and .018" by the way.

Ted Schefelbein

I knew that you were normal. Well as normal as anyone is here. Lack of sleep is normal for most of us these days. A true great shot just uses the edge of his pattern in close. You know, just the last two inches or so that the bird does nt get too torn up. Hard to eat feather burgers.

Lord Lowell and Mike B. -

CYL and MOD is the ticket. B&P 28 ga. about perfect in the mid-season cover; step; step; wait. When the birds nerves give out at your pause, it's like a leaf explosion. Yards turned into feet when trying to estimate range when I applied the same principles I learned in judging livestock for weight: the 300-lb. whitetail buck quickly shrunk when we did "guess-and-weigh" exercises.
While I never listened to worms crawling on leaves, I did have a distant relative of mine who was coal miner tell me that if you got far enough down in the mine, sitting quietly after lunch, that you could feel the earth turn on its axis. KBM

Ky Jon,
On occasion, I have convinced others I am a great shot.

However, I remain unconvinced. I hunt by myself just enough to know I have much to learn. My "trick shots" seem to happen with company, the easy no explaination blundered misses I seem to suffer in silence, with my dog wondering if anyone else might need her assistance that day.

But I do know, that in the explosion of a grouse flush, I've never been consious of attempted shooting with the edge of the pattern. I have waited for grouse to clear obstructions, waited for a bit more range, and waited for them to come closer, when flushed by others, but, those are rare things.

Typically, I just shoot. When the smoke has cleared, even if it wasn't obvious, the dog and I seek the bird.

A great shot, I will never be. But, good enough is OK.
Best,
Ted