I am amused to read your accounting of some of the Ideas people give about their modern barrel's performances. Its a bunch of sheep dip, IMHO, but I, like you, have polite stood by and listened to a lot of it.
I once broke 98 targets in a Handicap shoot, to win the match from a man who was, apparently, that State's current ATA Trap Shooting Champion, by one target. Now anyone who is around competitive trap shooting knows that you don't give up 3 targets and expect to win. You might, but you don't expect it. I used my pump shotgun, that I use to shoot both clay targets, and hunt, and have used to kill deer in season( with a slug barrel). He had some $5,000 single barrel, back bored, wondergun made overseas - the kind of gun you see in the hands of "champions". I never met the man, before or since. He lives in some kind of rarefied air far above my low station in life. He stormed off the range, and drove off madly when he learned he had lost the Match.
Now, to be sure, I shot well above my "average"- like about 10 targets---- to win that shoot. But, I had NO expectations of shooting that well, and just concentrated on breaking the next target. I learned I broke the last 72 targets straight. I was Smokin' that day. Period. Call it "Luck'. I surely will.
But its not about the guns, the barrels, the chokes, the backboring, or what have you.( I have to admit that I did have my trap barrel's throat relieved by using a long tapered reamer to remove the factory throat.) Its a mental game, about getting the job done. I have my way to get "into the zone", which few others use, or even understand. Others use different techniques to quickly get into the zone, and then come out of it as soon as they dismount their gun. My $283(1973 vintage) Remington pump shotgun is just as capable of breaking the targets as that man's $5,000, or $10,000 imported wondergun.
Personally, I agree with you about old shotguns, and would never try to jug choke one. Save that for the modern replicas, and for the modern steel barreled fowlers.
I have my modern shotgun with different choke barrels, including one that has screw-in chokes.
Likewise, I find something very special about hunting birds with any of my black powder smooth bores. It adds some excitement for both me, and the friends with whom I hunt, who do their fair share of laughing at me, and "betting" that I can't kill a thing with that "Old gun", but then, at the end of the hunt, are the most gracious companions to congratulate me on the fine performance I did with my gun, and how much they enjoyed actually seeing me drop birds with it.
They are always so impressed with the amount of flame that comes out the muzzle, the large diameter cloud of smoke, and the much louder Roar of BP compared to their smokeless powder guns. When I use my flintlock, either at a range, or in the field, they are shocked that the gun went off, much less went off so fast. And that I got the gun to go off that fast repeatedly. How about that!
The smiles on their faces adds to the mystique of using these guns to hunt. I only have to wonder at how complacent shooters back in the day might have been, or, were they just as thrilled when the guns fired fast, and birds fell from the sky with these same guns.
The most memorable moment I have had shooting my BP shotguns was one day at a Skeet range, shooting it and breaking targets. A man in his 70s, was helping his grandson to learn to shoot Skeet(?), and he asked to look at my gun. He then told his grandson in front of me that HIS grandfather had used a gun just like mine when he was his grandson's age. He remembered hearing the BOOM, seeing the cloud of smoke, and the flame coming out of the muzzle as his grandfather killed birds on a hunt he was allowed to watch.
I offered to let him fire my gun, and he took two shots with it, missing the targets. But, his grandson got to watch his granddad fire a BP shotgun, just like grandpa had watched his grandfather. I can't imagine how impressed that young man was about all that.
I realized I was witnessing family history that I never had known, and most of us will never experience, as now five generations of shooters in one family had the chance to shoot these old guns or watch them shot. The older shooter was probably born back in the teens of the 20th century. His Grandfather was probably born back in the 1850-60s. :hmm:
I think keeping the old traditions alive is what our sport is all about. It provides a "rudder" to guide future generations.
Thank you for sharing your own practice. Good Hunting in Kansas with that Manton.
:bow:
Of course, you realize we will now insist on seeing pictures, so take a good camera, and someone to take pictures of all those smiles. :shocked2: :grin: :wink:
Merry Christmas. :hatsoff:
