Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters What Happened to 20 Gauge Ammo?

Yep! I don't need it either, but it sure is impressive.

But was almost equally impressed by hard 7s a couple of years ago, even in 12 gauge. Was doing a Handloader article on lower-pressure handloads for older 12s. Had somehow ended up with three guns to play with, a Greener Damascus-barrel made in 1895 with 2-3/4" chambers, a Sauer sidelock hammer gun made in 1911 with 65mm (2.56") chambers, and an R. Lisle British boxlock with 2-3/4" chambers, one of those "Birmingham guns" finished by a smaller maker, with what looks like a Webley & Scott action and typical British "half" and full chokes in the 30" barrels.

Used different loads in all three, mostly Bismuth in the Greener because it was the heaviest, tightest choked gun, which I used more after the waterfowl season opened, due to also encountering ducks in my most frequent pheasant hunting area around a big reservoir. Took roosters with all three, but perhaps the most impressive kill was with the Lisle and it's full-choke barrel, using a load featuring an ounce of 7s in Federal paper shells, originally worked up for one of Eileen's light British guns to keep recoil at a tolerable level.

We were hunting a strip of standing wheat, and getting near the end when a rooster and 8-10 hens flushed toward a shelterbelt of poplars beyond the end of the wheat. The rooster got up maybe 25 yards from me, and by the time I pulled the trigger on the full choke barrel he was just entering the shelter belt--but dropped immediately and tumbled through the branches, obviously dead in the air, and the Lab grabbed him a as he hit the ground. The range, as near as I could pace it off from where he flushed to the trees, was just about 50 yards. Was very impressed both by the number of pellets in him, and their penetration--just as I had been by the same brand of 7s in the 28-gauge years ago.

But as always, more experimentation is called for!