Thanks Phil. As much as I like to think I missed a bird due to a hole in my pattern I would tend to lean towards my not-so-good shooting ability.

Two good things did happen at the range yesterday. 1) Woman and children out numbered the men. 2) I found a Rem 1100 in the back of my safe I never even knew I owned. It shot good to.

Along these lines, I took a recently acquired demo Winchester SX3 out to the range on Saturday that I had yet to shoot, in addition to two rifles I needed to sight in. After a buddy of mine and I finished sighting in rifles, we headed up to the shotgun range to put a few shells through the SX3 on clays. I will admit to being a novice shotgunner, having shot very poorly in my one (first and only) sporting clays round that I shot earlier this year. Granted that round was shot with a pump 20 ga, so you would expect the score to be somewhat deflated, but not to the point where I scored. At any rate, I only had a couple of boxes of shells with me, but between the 30 or so shells that I shot and the 10 or so that I let my friend shoot, we missed exactly 1 each. We were both floored and he was convinced that he had to go get in the market for his own SX3 that day. This coming from a tried and true (and really quite gifted) Citori owner. I will reign this gushing review in by stating that I was using a clay thrower that was difficult to adjust, so there wasn't a lot of variation in the path of the clays, but still to hit 38/40 with a brand new (to us) gun, was amazing. I can't wait to get it to the sporting clays course and see how it does with crossing birds and rabbits!

An old friend who used to write a few articles for low circulation shotgunning magazines patterned his guns, barrels, chokes, and loads for fun. If I was visiting him I found the conversation to be very disconnected due to his insistence upon finalizing whatever gun and load he was working with at that time. The little guy was a tremendous shot proving at least in part the value of his efforts.

I don't mind patterning one bit. It involves shooting guns and "science" - two favorites.

I haven't shot a pattern that bad in at least 15 years.

Not since I discovered the extended forcing cone:

http://www.magnaport.com/sgun.html

The competition barrel package:

http://www.wrightsgunsmiths.com/

And the briley Spectrum extended ported choke tube.

http://www.midwayusa.com/Search/#Briley____-_1-2-4_8-16-32_3_16_Demand desc

Fuggedabout the holes in the pattern and the piss-poor shooting.

I can easily get my limit in doves and have 10 shells left!

Who would have thought the more expensive quality load of one-ounce shot would offer comparable performance to the less expensive load of 1 1/8 ounce shot? Sometimes money really can buy happiness.

I've always been a decent wingshot but I bought a new shotgun that I couldn't seem to cut a feather with. Worst shooting of my entire my life so I patterned the gun and it was shooting TWO FEET high at 25 yards. The very bottom of the pattern was even with the aim point. Never seen anything like it.

Once I knew where the shot string was headed I was able to compensate by aiming low and I started nailing the birds again.

DAMN! Now I know what happens on those occasional station 3 straightaways that break only when they hit the ground.
They miraculously happened to be in that 20" core center gap. Thanks, Phil; I needed that excuse.

And those gaps are why the birds i shoot out at 30 yards keep on flying, not enough pellets in the kill zone, or so i like to believe.

nunyabinis: Same problem with a Baikal s/s 20ga. Had the front drilled & tapped for small cap screws (aka "post" front bead). Lovely shooter now.