Home Forums Birds & Dogs Upland Game Anyone hunting pheasants with steel shot?

tell about your load please.

Where I have to use steel, I use 1 1/4 ounce of 2,3 or BB in a 12 gauge.

Where I live (Oregon) we don't have nearly the number of Pheasants this state once had.

We have to use Non-Toxic shotshells on all State Wildlife Areas and all NWRs where Waterfowl hunting is permitted.

Because I do a lot more walking than shooting, I'd prefer to probably carry/use a 20 ga., however due to the paltry capacity of 20 ga. loads, I use a 16 ga Citori Lightning.

With it I'm shooting 15/16 oz. loads of Steel #4s. On planted birds (on one WMA) I use Skeet/Imp. Cyl chokes and those seem to work well. Lethality is usually pretty good.

For wild birds I switch to Imp.Cyl/Mod for Steel and that works fairly well, but certainly not like Lead #5s or #6s.

Occasionally I'll hit a bird that folds and falls only to get over to it and find that it's become a runner. Sometimes the dogs will locate these and sometimes not.

I do LOTS of Waterfowl hunting using Steel Shot and I can tell you that in 12 ga. a 3" load of Steel #3s at 1,560 fps would work pretty well on birds as long as they weren't too far out.

I use #6 steel for the first shot over my pointer and back it up with 4's. I see that Kent is coming out with a #5 upland steel load I'll be orderring a case for my 20ga and back them with #4 Blackclouds.

erich

When I hunted eastern Nebraska my best pheasant load was a handloaded WW "AA" case with 1 1/4 oz of #5 copper plated shot with 34.5 grains of IMR 4756. Velocity was 1330.

That load would knock their dicks into the dirt. Even thru a IC choke it would kill out to 45 yards cleanly.

Doc

If you must use non-toxic shot for pheasants, there are much better choices than steel. i.e. bismuth, hevi-shot, and tungsten. More expensive, but better in every way. Your game bag will thank you for it.

I'm with battue. None of the smoothbores I own, will digest steel anyway; but if they did, I wouldn't use it. I've found Bisimuth and Tung/Polymer to be far better killers. JMO.

Jeff

I refuse to use steel and where one must go unleaded, I'll use the newer non-toxics, preferring Bismuth.

edited to say, pheasants deserve better.

I use the Fiocchi Golden Pheasant 16 Gauge 2-3/4" 1-1/8 oz #5 Nickel Plated

Amen! Except I loaded mine (same load, except sometimes I use Nickel Plated) using Herco.