Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Gun writers on Shotguns

Perhaps I should start make this a new post but this has been such an interesting thread with people who know more about shotguns than I do I will ask here.

I was out of town last week and the gun shop I was in had a Webley & Scott 700 SxS. This particular one is a 12 gauge with English stock, IC and IM chokes, double triggers and a splinter forend. Best of all it fits me better than any shotgun I've ever shouldered.

There are only two reasons I haven't bought it yet - it's expensive (compared to my usual budget) and I don't really know anything about Webley & Scott shotguns. Does anyone have advice about these guns?

Webley & Scott is an old and well-respected name in the shotgun world. In fact they're still in business, but in a different way these days.

They not only made their own guns, but their boxlock actions (some barreled by W-R, some not) and even complete guns were used by many smaller gunmakers in England. W&S guns were also sold with other major companies names on 'em. Two of the older British guns Eileen and I have, for instance, were at least made on W & S actions. If the gun you found is still tight, including the barrel soldering, it will work fine.

A lot of this "cottage industry" centered around the British gunmaking center of Birmingham, and is covered well in BIRMINGHAM GUNMAKERS, a very fine history with lots of great color photos, by my friend Douglas Tate. (You can see my copy in the horizontal stack of books in the photo of my bookshelf.)

One other aspect you might check out is chamber length. A lot of older British 12s had 2-1/2" chambers, but many of those chambers were later lengthened to 2-3/4". This isn't as big a deal, either way, as some people like to make out of it, but it's something to consider. In general, older guns shouldn't be used with higher-pressure modern ammo, but a lot depends on the individual gun and brand. Both our W&S action guns had their chambers already lengthened when we bought them, and work fine. There are factory loads available, if needed, and it's easy to handload for them--the subject of my upcoming Handloader article.

Hill is one of my favorite authors. I also dvise you to pick up a couple George Bird Evans', Burton Spiller and William harndon Foster books

Captain Charles Askins (Askins the Elder) wrote some good stuff on shotguns and bird hunting as well. If you can find a copy of his 1931 book GAME BIRD SHOOTING it not only has a lot to say about shotguns, dogs, etc. but is great look at what upland bird hunting and waterfowling was like in America during the early 20th century.

Tagged for future reference on some books that seem of interest.

No offense to the writers, however “Shooters”on shotguns…. You tube

Thanks for the suggestion. I usually go for the more technical stuff, but this reminds me a lot of the articles I used to read out of outdoor magazines as a kid. Though from the timeline.. maybe there were articles I read back then.
I'll watch for those books as well.

Many good Writers mentioned above.
Very glad that R.R. mentioned Tom Roster. He covered a lot of ground in his CONSEP study for waterfowl and I believe he worked with Bob Brister early on. (Maybe Mule Deer can confirm)
I found Sherman Bell a very short time after reading a lot of Toms work.
Both dispelled a number of myths in their research and their articles were a very good read for a shotgun nut. (Just like Bob Brister and his book and articles)
Later I stumbled on Neil Winston on another forum. His work on shotgun pattern analysis for Trap Shooting is very well documented and to my knowledge few have put in the same volume of work testing shell/gun theories or ideas. Neil passed recently and he handed the torch to a good friend who has his test equipment, and reports when he can on new shells or combinations.
Dr AC Jones wrote a long book on the subject and built a very cool program for pattern measurement by digital analysis. Its very hard to get a copy of that to run on a newer computer but it gives good results if you can stand fussing with the tech side on the computer. This work along with Neils really showed me the risk of analysis of examples of one or two when looking at shotgun shells on paper or grease. (as a kid we were frequently enlisted to "Count Pellets" on a single pattern paper)(but our Adult Idols were unaware of just how high the variability in a shotgun is shot to shot for speed and pattern)
Mule Deer offered some interesting insight here on a much older post about the quality of some of the analysis in some older writing.
The ones that put the time in to do research and show the details always seem to be more interesting.
BUT it seems to still come down to the Nut behind the trigger keeping the eye on the prize and the rock on the stock for most shots in decoy range.
Thanks to those above who provided a good list of written material.

If not already mentioned, on how to use them:Chris Batha-written and you tube-John Bidwell, Gill Ash- written and video, Dan Carlisle, Ben Hurstwith-video, John Whooley-video..

Great story! Thanks. The Beretta O/U 20 gauge 686s are where I stopped my search for fit though I confess an AYA and a London Best Wm Evans reside in the safe because one needs a proper double somedays.

"Hill is one of my favorite authors. I also advise you to pick up a couple George Bird Evans', Burton Spiller and William Harden Foster books"

Especially if you're a dedicated grouse hunter!

[quote=Bob_B257]Many good Writers mentioned above.
Very glad that R.R. mentioned Tom Roster. He covered a lot of ground in his CONSEP study for waterfowl and I believe he worked with Bob Brister early on. (Maybe Mule Deer can confirm)[quote]

Tom Roster is one reason I recommended SHOOTING SPORTSMAN magazine as a good resource. He has been writing the ammo column there for many years now.

As far as "shooting" versus "gun" books, it's hard to beat Brister's classic SHOTGUNNING: THE ART AND THE SCIENCE for a combination of both guns and shooting information. But aside from the authors Battue mentioned, British author Michael Yardley has also written some very good stuff on shooting technique, since he's a long-time Sporting Clays instructor/coach, including a book. I shot with Mike some years ago on a SC course in California, and he's very good at practicing what he preaches.

That said, shooting clays is somewhat different than shooting birds. Among the greatest "teachers" of bird-shooting technique is a trip to some place like Argentina, where the bird shooting is essentially unlimited. As I noted earlier, my first trip to Argentina was made with Bob Brister (and Grits Gresham!) in 1996. I'd already shot clays with Bob, with of course some suggestions on his part, but learned far more down there.

As he noted, you can stand in one place shooting the same basic angles for an hour or two, until you absolutely get them down--because you won't be able to load your shotgun fast enough to keep up with the birds going by. That sort of thing helps far more with gamebird shooting than any amount of clay-bird shooting. Of course, it also costs more than clays!

Have since not only been back to Argentina but also did some similar shooting in South Africa. RSA has an even larger variety of birds, and the same essentially unlimited shooting, and some of their birds are even more difficult targets. One of the guys I shot with in Africa claimed he averaged 90% on Argentine doves--and only hit one of the African Rock Pigeons with his first box of shells. They fly far faster than they appear to be, and are even more erratic in flight than any doves I've hunted. Anybody who does 30% on them is a good shot!

MD

Only the hard core shotgunners, competitive clay shooters and a few hunters spend time at the pattern board.

All will sight in a rifle cause we have too, the importance of time spent at the pattern board has never been encouraged.

Doc,

Well, in Montana it was somewhat "encouraged" when I started out shooting/hunting--though the most common "pattern board" was an empty 12-ounce can on top of a wooden fence-post at an undetermined range. If the can fell off the fencepost (and had more than one hole) then the gun was good to go!

Might also mention again (since it's a story I've told more than once before in print) that my paternal grandmother was a hard-core meat hunter, and otherwise tough woman who homesteaded by herself in central Montana right after WWI. She apparently NEVER owned a shotgun, instead wingshooting birds with her Winchester pump .22. But in that country, back then, they were mostly sage grouse, which are pretty big--and not generally taken at acute angles.

But apparently she eventually did become acquainted with famous handgun shooter Ed McGivern, who was also from Lewistown. Aside from homesteading, she also taught country school after she married the Norwegian homesteader on the adjoining claim. After he died in the middle of the Depression, she eventually worked her way up to superintendent of schools for Fergus County--and during that period Ed McGivern gave shooting demonstrations for the school. My father remembered attending them regularly. Imagine that today!

My LC Smith Long Range gun, 1923 vintage 32" with 3" chambers- the 3rd one Smith ever made- has very weird bores. Ahead of the forcing cones the bores only measure .705" and stay that way until 6" from the muzzles where the chokes constrict .040 in the right barrel and .045 in the left. Weird. To say it throws tight patterns is an understatement, as proven on the pattern board. The result is quite dead geese even with "light" loads of 1 1/8oz #2 Bisthmus @1250fps, due to goodly numbers of pellet strikes. (I load them in 2 3/4" AA hulls.) The downside is you gotta be dead on when you slap the trigger, not much wiggle room. It did force me to up my game accordingly. I've knocked geese ass-over-tin cups at ridiculously long distances with it and with that load. I refuse to subject it to "modern" 3" magnum loads of any kind.

I was told once it mimics Bert Becker's boring techniques he used in Super Foxes. Dunno for a fact.

Interesting!

One of the reasons so many older doubles are bored/choked the way they are is, of course, the cardboard/felt wads used back then--long before plastic shotcups/wads were invented.

My 10-gauge is a Spanish gun, made by one of the very good companies that went under during the Diarm deal in the 1980s. Of course it's choked tight (the reason I don't use steel opr other hard shot) but it knocks the snot out of geese at long ranges with modern "soft" non-toxic shot, whether Bismuth or Ballistic Products ITX-10.

I agree that clays for the most part are somewhat different than shooting Birds on the wing...Somewhat being relative. Walkup shooting of Pheasants, Grouse and Quail are for the most part different. Doves...Not so much in that Doves are much like clays in that as you said you can set up for them....Almost every Dove opportunity can be duplicated on a clays course, and you can stand in one place and shoot the same target over and over, until you think you have it down. Which in fact is how many of the top clays shooters practice. The average sporting clays shooter goes and shoots all the stations. While most of the top guns take a flat and shoot the same target for all 250 or until that accomplish their standard. Which may be 10 to 20 in a row. Yes, there will be slightly different variation with Doves..One may be higher one lower...but a quartering outgoing, incoming or crosser is much the same...Dove or clay.

More than once have posted a video of Digweed shooting Pigeons and Crows at distances most think can't be done.

Have been around enough top guns to know that most wouldn't want to bet against them in the fields. One has taken 5 out of a wild Quail covey rise more than once. Pheasants to him were much the same as shooting them in a box.

Rudy Etchen stories in the field are the stuff of legend..And I live and shoot with and around those that watched him often. When he had to plug an 870 he could make 5 sound like it wasn't... ​and he missed infrequently.. He was another that could make a Wild Quail wish it had never taken wing.

Know a couple old live Pigeon shooters, that still today can rack up a score on clays. There are still some live Bird shoots around here, and ZZ Birds are gathering a following.

Most of those I mentioned are Brits, and clays or driven they know the game...If one looks, they are on You Tube doing it..

Great rifle shooters are made by pulling the trigger...There is little difference when it comes to shooting a shotgun..."The Natural" was a make believe movie.

Battue,

[quote] Almost every Dove opportunity can be duplicated on a clays course, and you can stand in one place and shoot the same target over and over, until you think you have it down. Which in fact is how many of the top clays shooters practice. The average sporting clays shooter goes and shoots all the stations. While most of the top guns take a flat and shoot the same target for all 250 or until that accomplish their standard. Which may be 10 to 20 in a row. Yes, there will be slightly different variation with Doves..One may be higher one lower...but a quartering outgoing, incoming or crosser is much the same...Dove or clay." [quote]

I have shot more than enough Sporting Clays to know "most of the top guns take a flat and shoot the same target for all 250 or until that accomplish their standard." In fact, back when I was writing my shotgun book I shot numerous "flats" of various gauges at the local SC range, testing different shotguns.

But since you've never shot birds in Argentina (or apparently other places then locally) you obviously don't understand what I'm talking about. Even in Argentina the birds vary from the common eared dove (very much like mourning doves in size and flight pattern) to two kinds of wild pigeons, and parakeets and parrots. They're all different sizes and fly in different ways, and will be encountered when shooting the same area. South Africa not only has rock pigeons but several kinds of doves of various sizes, which can all appear, randomly, while shooting the same field. It's NOT the same as shooting clays.

Then there are ducks and geese in both Argentina and Africa--which can often be encountered while shooting upland birds. The ducks alone in Argentina vary from teal to "mallard-sized" ducks--but they're not only both puddle ducks and divers but "tree ducks," all of which fly in varied ways.

There's also a wide variety of upland birds, hunted not just by walking up (with dogs or not) anywhere from open country to cover much like typical ruffed grouse cover. Have hunted various species of francolin in Africa from thick riverbottoms (where during the bird hunting I've jumped animals from bushbuck to kudu to leopard) to cropland where the flushed birds range from smaller francolin to wild guinea fowl as wild as pheasants but almost as big as sage grouse.

It's all FAR more varied than anything I've seen in North America--where I have not only bird-hunted from Old Mexico to Alaska and the Northwest Territories, but live in a state where (even if we don't count doves and turkeys) there are eight species of upland birds, from Huns to sage grouse.

As Bob Brister pointed out many years ago, when I first started shooting with him, clays are far more predictable (and hence easy to hit) than wild birds. And he shot plenty of both.

Agree they are more predictable, but easier to hit? Maybe, but often times not...And if you don't understand that, then your clay shooting is limited..

Haven't been to Argentina or even outside the States shooting...However, have been on multi day Dove hunts were there were 500 to 1000 trying to get into the field..Not Argentina numbers, but enough to get the idea. Then there were Pigeons...here in America of all places....where there were no limits and enough again to get the idea..

Fortunate to have hunted Wild Quail in Georgia...Only America, I know...But 15 to 20 Coveys morning and the same in the afternoon was interesting.

Addition...And we can't forget that for perhaps 40 years I chased Ruffed Grouse to the extreme..30 to 40 flushes a day in the good times..Again only here in America...Forgot again...Woodcock for the last 5 years or so...some days when you hit the flight..100 Birds up in front of the Dogs...You should by now know where.


Congrats on your varied experiences shooting...but you are far from unique or special in that regard.

One more addition...The Sporting Clay game today is an altogether different game than when Brister brought the game here..I think he would like it more than a little...And as an aside, I was sitting next to him and talking about detached retinas and shooting... He then got up and walked to shoot for what was probably his last win...His words to me as he left..."Don't get old."

You should know Gerry Quinn also....

Oh, I know I'm far from unique. But have hunted wild birds in at least 14 states, half a dozen Canadian provinces and territories, and at least five other countries on a couple other continents. Don't know how many species of gamebirds that involved, but lots more than the locations. Have fired over 1000 rounds on some of those days.

One thing I learned long ago is that shooting clays starts to bore the schidt out of me after a certain number, whether skeet, trap or Sporting Clays. But then different strokes for different folks. And I tend to believe Bob Brister's opinion on clay shooting more than yours.