I’ve been surprised by the number of guys who leave them where they lay, which can add up to a pile when dove hunting.

Of course, when you do find an old shell in the woods, it tells a story of someone having a good day out there once.

Dove?

Always.

Upland?

No.

Exactly...

Every time, every place.

Same.

Ducks? Maybe - if they float away, no.

Oh my does anyone remember thr smell of a paper shell???

Oh my so nice, my grandpa …blah blah blah fuggin blah



Shells?

I leave the birds too 😃

Yes

Yes. And after owning our farm for 37 years, I may have all the old shotshells my predecessors left laying around picked up.

Always do.
No dove hunting here in NJ (they're classified as songbirds, LOL!). Closed season for quail and ruffed grouse, as well, so only upland birds hunting is for pheasant. So nothing that you'd call high volume shooting, but yeah, I pick them up.

I remember years ago, finding just the brass bases in the dirt, proof that they'd been lying there so long the paper hulls had disintegrated. Now the brass plated bases will rust away, leaving the plastic there forever.

Try to. Autos make it tough.

My club has a nice 5-Stand setup. The shooters all help police the area when done shooting. The wads on the field are another matter. Regrettably, the nice paper hulls and fiber-wad shells that are common, and often required in places like Britain are tough to come by here. I’d buy them if they were available.

Some of our shooters reload, and go through the pick-ups for good hulls like AAs. Those guys are felling the primer crunch too, and shot prices are tough on them too.

Been planting the same sunflower field with dove loads for 30 years and they still won't grow.

I pick it all up.

I load everything I shoot so I keep all my hulls, plus I try not to litter.

Always - all

Yes. Well I shoot an over/under when upland hunting so my shells never hit the ground.

True, but it’s interesting if you can read the shot size and load, high brass/low brass, brand/gauge. Single shells don’t bother me much.

I would expect the plastic would degrade to fragments before the brass is gone.

Incidentally they say every piece of plastic ever made still exists, somewhere.

Rifle shells always, but then I’m a handloader.
Shot shells I do if I’m using one of my 16s. I’ve got a Mec, and 16s are hard to find, and expensive when you do.
But 12s and 20s, no.
7mm

^^^ This

Sitting on a bucket next to a pond shooting doves you’d be a lazy ass to not pick up the pile of empties lying on the dirt.

Walking 3 foot high CRP grass for pheasants you’d be a dumbass to root around in the grass for one or two empties while your partners wait on you to continue the push and the birds keep getting further ahead of you.

Yes, which is why I like extractors in my double.

I pick mine up if I can find them and any others I come across.

Trash is trash, no matter the source.

Pisses ranchers off when cattle eat the plastic hulls.

Seen some cattle die from it.

Doesn't make for very good hunter/rancher land relations.

Every one.

yes every one I can find. I have used an O/U for several years for that reason. If you are hunting in open pasture or farmland, you should police your debris. Cows can pick up those hulls and stuff doesn't deteriorate much like it used to. Plastic wadding has eliminated bore scrub and made for better patterns in modern shotguns but it comes with a price. The plastic will float around out there for a very long time.

Not sure why...public shooting areas around here

BLM or State Trust Land.....empty hulls from clay bird shooting sessions...

6-7 shooters x 50 rds each...? My hell pick up your empties

Bring a lawn rake & let the kids clean up & set a good example

How hard would that be ?

Always. Hate it when I can't find one, especially grouse and woodcock hunting. Why would you want to advertise where the best spots are?

I pick up all brass, hulls and the plastic wads when I find em. I hate littering, plus with brass at $2.04 a pound I cash em in for a steak-n-shake.....😁

yes

at the gunclub, no, those little 16yo kids working the shop can get off their phones and do it. That's partly what they get paid to do. Plus I dont reload and leave them for the hull whores.

Always, if I can find them.

I keep most bird hunting. The occasional hull gets missed. I hunt with doubles and pumps mostly.

I always pick up what I can find. Always have. I figured people would be more likely to let me hunt if I left it like I found it. Or left it better.

I remember once picking up 20 1X'd 243 Norma brass along with the paper box

What a ding dong that would leave 1X Norma brass on the ground

I like to find stuff that others left, years ago, it kind of gives you a sense of history. I don’t worry about most of the shells, the only difference between a artifact and litter is time…

Yes

Osky

I usually leave them. I like seeing a shell occasionally and wondering it’s history. Candy wrappers, pop bottles, grocery bags ect, I hate seeing that chit. A spent shell is different IMO.

Dove hunting try too as best as possible.
Last year wasn't a issue 🥴🥴🥴😔
Tree rats ... hell no ain't searching for them. Too much moving around.
Turkey I will save the spent shell to go along with the kill.


Let's hear some comments the non posting " pics or it never happened" apple dumpling gang types....
🤣🤣🤣




Oh PS..
Solid guys that don't post pics, we don't doubt what you cats post.

Same here, it’s been decades since I shot a factory shot shell, except 410, and I pick those up as well.

I try to. Keep cows from chewin’ on em

Was taught to pick up hulls growing up. Still do especially on private land where I am a guest.
It’s a common courtesy.

Darn right, just because I can't replace my stash of OLD Winchester AA hulls

I pick up mine and any others I find. I really don't care to see trash laying around.

I always pick up my shells as should everyone else! If someone was going around throwing gum wrappers on the ground he would get chit, same should apply for shotgun shells, IMO

I always pick up my hulls. I reload and I shoot a double. Makes it easy and worth it.

THIS

YES

YUp, when upland hunting and before lead was banned for migratory birds.. Those Win AA and Peters Blue Magic hulls were reloaded many times. When waterfowling I pick up all that I can reach, but the odd one floats away when it's windy.

Had to watch the crimps on the older hulls. I had an accidental discharge at the skeet range when a crimp opened just bit and a no. 9 pellet got loose and fell into the Ithaca M37 trigger group. I was cycling the action to unload a shell and BOOM. Muzzle was pointed in safe direction as was my standard practice.

I consider it good...when I go afield and come back w more empties than what I made.
State dove places, some A holes just leave em all.
Rules say pick em up.

People suck.

Remember that guy that stopped by that big oak tree we was at the day before ? On Robertson??

“Gahhhhhh dayummmm”

🤣

I pick mine up and usually others that I see too. Can’t believe how many guys are too damn lazy to bend over and pick up their litter when the shells are clearly visible!

Yes
Try to pick them all up as most of the places I have access to hunt are cattle ranches.

A little off-topic, but a few years ago exploring a slot canyon in Utah, I found a very old 25-35 shell on a bench above the canyon bottom. It made me wonder who and when and under what circumstances that shell was fired. It had definitely become a relic and was no longer trash.

"They stay as they lay."

I even try to pick up spent brass when hunting. .22s are about the only thing I don't pick up.

No upland hunting. It’s been 40 years since I’ve hunted pheasant’s that’s hard to believe. I’ve hunted deer since I was fourteen.

LOL!

^ This

Empties go in the pouch with the birds.

Jerry

Picking up shotgun shells after a hunt was boiler plate language in almost every lease contract we ever signed and you could find your lease terminated real quickly if this wasn't adhered to. Can understand the cattle eating them after watching a cow trying to eat the sparkplug wires off a running irrigation motor. They ain't the brightest critters.

I picked mine up, reloaded them

As a general rule I don’t litter. This thread also reminded me I haven’t shot a shotgun in probably 6-7 years.

Yes. And anyone hunting with me as well.

Don't trash the woods up.

Can't always reasonably find them. And I don't start a search party. But I pick up every shell I see.

-Jake

I don't spend much time searching but grab most of them while hunting.

I pick up empties all year while out and about, makes up for the ones you leave behind.

Usually...

Not always, depends on gun used and property I'm on.

OF COURSE

My dove club requires empties to be carried out, but I spend half my time picking up empties from the dipsh*ts that don't clean up after themselves.

I don't pick them up when squirrel hunting in the woods.

I follow an old guy on Youtube who does a lot of metal detecting in the TN mountains. He finds a lot of 100+ year old shotshell heads and that's pretty cool.

I love the dead cow/horse stories.

LOL

Gimme a fugking break.

Yep, all of them.

Yes, only slobs leave their garbage outdoors. Same for rifle brass. Pick it all up if at all possible

It's a fact.

On our ranch out west, dove hunters left a bunch of hulls around waterings and the ones I found later were chewed up by cattle. No telling how many were swallowed.

It causes a condition known as hardware disease and it is a fatal condition.

Yes, mine as well as others I find. Brass too.

Birdwatcher: Waterfowl - always!
Upland Game Birds 90% of the time.
We have game wardens here in SW Montana that HAVE issued "littering citations" for waterfowlers I know who have left the spent shot shell hulls in the field.
I have come across piles of 3 1/2" shot shells lying in wheat fields that other "Hunters" discarded and I have even picked them up.
I imagine the farmers who own the fields don't really want the hulls lying around?
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

All matter ever made exists somewhere.

Always.

Unfortunately could not get them all . When quail hunting some always find their way into some cactus. Hasbeen

Anybody who I allow to hunt on my land picks up their empty hull mess. If not, they aren't invited back. Ever.

I shoot double guns and the spent shells never hit the ground.

I leave them for artifacts I’ve run across some from 30 yrs ago brought back memories

I didn't always as a kid but, have picked them up for a long time.

Yes

I'm glad these guys didn't pick up their shells.

Candy wrappers, cigarette butts and other small waste, is a whole different thing, but shells tell history...

I'm reminded of the pictures of the US dumping munitions into the ocean after WWII. One picture that I remember in particular showed them dumping a huge quantity of brass artillry shells.

Mostly not, but I also burn tires.

I switched to an over/under just so I wouldnt lose them by accident anymore on dove.

pn pheasants, I take the semi, and loose a couple a year, but not many.

A little history found last summer.

At a spot in the road we've been over thousands of times.

20 ga shells could be long forgot about 100 yrs from now the mountain is littered with them and I’d sure hope my dbl is hangin over a fire place with stories

That there is some serious "Cold Weld!"

Shrap, that is the first loaded (old)cartridge I've found!

This isn't the picture I'm thinking about, but its close. The one I remember was spent brass artillery shell casings.

https://forum.cartridgecollectors.org/t/scuba-anyone/8356

When i moved out here years ago i was told to pick up any shells because the cows would eat them.

That was over 40+ years ago and still pick up mine and if others are found they get picked up as well.

It's like throwing trash out the window it's just now right.

I even pick up brass when out shooting at the pit,even if i don't have a use for them.

They make owners not want to let anyone use them if they get trashed out.

I always pick them up, even the non-reloadable ones. I try to leave nothing behind. Leaving trash on someone else's land is a good way to get yourself barred from coming back. Leaving trash on public land is a good way to get it closed to hunting.

Yes.
Unlike cigarette butts they are garbage.

I put the butts in my pocket when done hunting.

Seems the right thing to do.

Yep

Almost always pick up my own. I usually shoot a double so most never hit the ground. Upland hunting with an autoloader would be different because I’m working the dog while marking the bird’s fall, so the empties could be easily lost.

I typically pick up others that I find as well. Just lately I’ve been working a young dog at a friend’s pheasant preserve. I pick up most of the empties I see there while walking around. Kind of a payback for him graciously letting me use his grounds.

Every single one

Ground swat em?

Of course. They get tossed onto the pile and sent through the press to hunt again.








I do remember the smell of of paper shells, and quite recently I might add. I have a goodly supply of Federal and Cheddite paper hulls. They're mostly for use at my up north house since the climate here in Aleutian Hell is too wet and nasty unless we're having a cold snap. Hell, the heads rust on modern shells just sitting in my cruiser.