I ve always hunted with breach closed barrels down safety on....with a hammer gun breached closed hammers down no trouble for me to cock both hammers at the same time...gun pointed up till bird appears....charlie

That's pretty much it, Charlie, nothing much else to say. However, when on a preserve hunt with strangers, a guide, and dogs you are not familiar with, I hunt with an open breech even with a gun with a safety. It makes everyone more comfortable. And there's always the possibility that the others will imitate. I know of more than two guides who have had dogs killed by idiots and one guide who was shot and killed by someone who was more than an idiot. Those events were more than enough to make me hunt with an open gun.

And strongly encourage others hunting with me to do the same. It's the courteous (and safe) thing to do.





.

Quite a few years back I answered an add that this lady was selling a 16 ga L. C. Smith shotgun, when i got there she was saddened that she was selling it as it was her grandpa's who she said was killed while hunting with this shotgun by a young hunter who did not follow safe gun handling. I will always remember this. Be safe out there!

I never walk in on a point, or even walk behind dogs, with barrels pointing downward, always upward. If you trip on something, and fall, the muzzles can be maintained in a safe direction much easier when they are already pointing skyward. It they're muzzles down, and you trip and fall, your barrels are likely jammed in the ground, or damaged by a rock or root.

I've tripped and fallen while following bird dogs and was always able to hit the ground with my muzzles up, and no gun damage.

JME, YMMV

The last two saturdays at pheasent shoots I used hammerless guns , but over half the time I have the gun open with shells in the chambers safety on and the muzzle's on the toes of my shoe . When I hear the birds going up or as the case at Prospect Hall the thrower going off I lift the gun and close the barrels .

I'm not big on closing a hammer gun with both hammers back . I was shooting 5 Stand a couple months ago with my hammer 16 , had cracked it open to reload one barrel and the unfired barrel still had the hammer back , when I closed it that hammer went down and I shot the turf about 15 yards in front of me . Dunno if it jumped the sear , the sear released or if I touched somnething to cause this but ever since then the practice of walking around with the gun cracked open loaded with the hammers back I no longer do .

Incidently if I get an invite to visit Prospect Hall in January for the pheasent partidge pigeon deal I think I'm going to take Brutus (hammer 8 gauge) and a 12 gauge . Don't really need Brutus for that stuff but unless I missed something in the WVA game laws it's legal .

I might use my SC this spring when I get a chance to pattern it with 6's. I considered it last year, just for the hell of it, but never pulled the trigger, so to speak. My go to turkey gun is a 12 bore DHE that throws wonderful patterns with my turkey load of 1200 fps, 1 1/4 oz loads. I never bought into the extra heavy turkey loads that many use.

One thing to consider if you decide to hunt turkey with SBT is that most of these guns are higher stocked than field guns. If you are not aware of that and compensate, you could shoot over the bird.

Pattern your turkey gun at 40 yards with the loads you’ll be using like Parker did when they were made. This way you’ll learn it’s POI and pattern density at that distance.






.

POI is important and shouldn't be taken for granted. A couple of weeks ago, I patterned a Remington 1100 trap gun for a friend. He shot it poorly, so we decided to see what the gun was doing on paper. I usually start at 20 yards when determining the POI before moving back to 40 yards. The gun shot low at 20 yards. I was surprised and so I took a few more shots and got the same results. I had my friend shoot it a few times and he got the same results. I don't know the drop of the stock but it was a typical trap stocked Remington with a Monte Carlo. It fit me well, as far as I could tell.

The low shooting may have something to do with the pitch, I'm not sure. But if it was my gun I would take the time to figure it out. He didn't seem interested in investigating further.

I shot Brutus Tuesday with two ounce loads of 4’s and 6’s at 42 yards and they were okay . But they were in Remington hulls roll crimped . I think this week sometime I’ll pattern him with 1 3/4 ounce loads of 4’s and 6’s in folded crimp Winchester hulls . I’m keeping my eye open for someone to bring some recent manufacture factory 12 gauge 3” loads with 4’s or 6’s in to sell . I wouldn’t mind a few of them for my Model 12 Mag .