Just a pile of birds.
 

Opening day of Dove season was much better than expected. Massive down pour in the desert where we dove hunt ( 2 1/2” ) of rain the day before. The ground was a muddy mess but the birds were coming in none stop.
3 of us and one young boy were done by 7:30 AM.
I failed to take a picture of the primary guns I shot. I took my LC Smith 26” field grade, my 32” specialty grade and my 32” Parker DHE 20 gauge out with us.
Three guns went out and only two came back. One of my friends had to have the 26” field grade. He was the only one to snap a picture with his “ New gun “

Great shoot Phil! Im waiting for the weekend to have my fun. Glad to see a healthy harvest! Still undecided on what to shoot though? Haha
Chris, AZ

I just got to Texas tonite.
I will get my license tomorrow AM and out to the Ranch for an evening shoot.
Very very dry here in my part of West Texas. I saw very few birds on my drive in,
Bob Jurewicz

That is a good sales technique. Let a guy borrow a gun he can't miss with - works every time! Nice hunt.

LOL. You are right. More than once I have loaned a gun to a friend or client and I am one gun lighter.

Got out again yesterday for the last day of the season. Rained very hard again. I went to another area to see if I could find some birds. Unfortunately I called it quits after an hour.
The good news the long barreled Parker DHE 32” 20 reached out there. Took 3 shots and took 3 birds.

Nice looking stick of wood on that one Phil !

Phil knows that the Silver pad on his DHE will look like it has been on there for fifty years after a couple of years of crankcase oil rubbed into it. My AHE trap has a Silver repro from Griffin and Howe that aged naturally since 1986 with no crankcase oil, just honest shooting.

Thanks guys for the positive comments. The cool thing about this gun it was shipped to Tucson in 1910, just 11 miles from my home.
I hope to do an article soon on this gun for our Parker pages.
It was ordered with a pad per the letter so I didn’t mind pulling off the white line and replacing it with a Silvers pad after I purchased it.

In this day and age, you'd have to differentiate between used regular oil and full synthetic to age the pad for the approval from the pecksniff authenticity crowd. Years ago I posted my process for instant aging of Silvers pads - wrap adjacent wood with aluminum foil, swab the pad with kerosene, apply the Bernz O Matic until the whole pad ignited with visible flame, then quash immediately with cold water. After the pad cooled, swab with a good leather preservative/conditioner. Zero to fifty years in c. 3 minutes!

I would like to hear more about your gun Phil. Ill be waiting for your story! I do recall you having a VHE 20 with 32" barrels years ago when you were here shooting Eurasions?

Chris that Gun was an extractor gun with 32” barrels. It was another gun I loaned to a client to hunt late season Gamble and Scale quail with.
At the end of the day he said he had to have it.
I shot him a price, too low I guess as I really didn’t want to sell it. He paid me my price and it went home with him. I kicked myself for selling it until this gun took its place.

Phil, I believe you took a turkey with that same gun? I still have the picture.
I would sure like to have that Smith 20 you sold that Federal judge, that I fixed. Wasn't it a 2E?

Yes on both accounts. I took a real big Merriams with that 20. The judge retired but comes out every December and hunts Mearns with us. Still brings that 20 gauge 2 E with him.
Finally convinced him to shoot RST’s.

Phil, any chance you can get the serial number of that extractor VH 32" twenty? I am still trying to locate my old VH 20 32" serial number 153,333. Thanks.

Sorry Bill. SN 177597