Home Forums Birds & Dogs Turkey Hunting 20ga turkey loads

Headed to the patterning board today with the little 20ga 870 and TSS 3" #9's @ 1100fps. Also have a couple boxes of Federal blend shells. The blend is #7 TSS, #5 lead and #6 lead. Never got too excited about blended shells, but Gander had them in the clearance bin and they were certainly cheap enough!

What chokes are you using coyote??

To tell the truth i have forgot which one it is (at 84 this seems to be happening a lot lately) but the maker was recommended on this forum. I pulled it and there are not manufacture names or size on it. Sorry

Thanks anyway coyote, I'm trying to find a better choke for my son's 20 guage.

Truth.

It's only been since the advent of HTL shot in smaller sizes and the Longbeard XR that any 20 gauge carried sufficient pattern density past 30-couple yards.

We're running the old skool Federal Heavy 7's in our tricked-out 20's and they are the SCHIZZ to a good piece past 40 yards.

Dont waste ur time...spend the cash for tss and know u have the best shells available.....as many have said the shells are the cheapest part of the hunt...

Just picked up some B&P 3” 6s, which should be pretty good too. 1100 fps, 1 1/4oz. Hopefully, the lower velocity should help the patterning. 3” 20’s have a bad rep for crappy patterns. Thinking these will be good for my second barrel, as well as a good all-purpose heavy load.

Very impressed yesterday with the pattern the 3" TSS #9's gave me yesterday and the small shot size allowed for great density, like a swarm, and seemed to have no problem going through the paper target! Lol! #9's are still a skeet load in my head...

Those 9's will put a hole thru a pig if it walks by...

If a pig walks by where I hunt in Wisconsin and Illinois, I'm in the wrong field and probably going to have issues with the farmer! Ha! Reading about TSS experiences here is what prompted me to get, and use, them and looking forward to it.

Hey Dean, what choke did you use?

A Tru-Glo extended, forget at the moment the exact one. But at 30 yards, farthest I could go when patterned, kept the entire #9 payload inside a 20" circle.

I just bought a bunch of ITX .shot . Not as expensive as tss. Been watching videos . Pretty interesting.

I agree.
I shot a piece of 4x4 lumber last fall with a 2 3/4 high brass #6 through my turkey choke. Blew big chunks of wood all over the place. I think 2 3/4 #6 would work just fine out to 30.

At 40 yards, I’ll take a 20 gauge with a decent choke shooting Apex #9s over a 12 gauge 3-1/2” shooting #4s ALL DAY LONG. TSS is for real. Expensive? Yep. So was my gun, my truck, my lease, my Camo, etc....

Just tested a 20 vs 12 with turkey loads and factory full choke tubes. The 20 gauge TSS loads stomped my old 3" mag copper plated Rem and Win loads. Very interesting indeed.

I was truly impressed with the patterns the #9 TSS shells gave me. I was also impressed with the impressive recoil! Lol! Little 20 thought it was a 12, pretty lively and I've never been recoil sensative at all. Except when I fired one 3-1/2" 2-1/4oz turkey load from a Benelli Nova, I said nope! Haha! I've shot "elephant" guns, literally, both smokeless and blackpowder varieties that didn't recoil as much as the Nova.

Has any of y’all had a chance to shoot a bird yet with tss that hasn’t prior to this year?

I shot one yesterday with TSS. 45 yards. 20ga. Federal 9s. He died. Not my first with TSS though

What the hell would you know about anything besides fatties? There's a reason I get along with you.

Anyhow I busted a big tom yesterday at 40-45 yards (in the air, but that's a different story) with a 20 gauge and a 3" #5 pheasant load (Browning BXD) with an improved cylinder. It absolutely flattened him. Feathers everywhere and barely a kick was left in him. I've killed birds with .410, 20, 16, 12 and 10 gauges with dove loads up through full blown turkey loads, and it was actually kind of eye opening as to how effective that 20 gauge load was. Maybe it was a fluke, but I kind of doubt it.