Thursday was a beautiful day with cool temps in the low 50s and intermittent sun and clouds, with a little breeze. I was invited to a dove shoot less than a mile from my house, in a large sunflower field. The field was somewhere around 60 acres, with another one about that size about 1/4 mile away, across some scrub woods. Most of the doves were feeding in the front field, so 12 of us took to it. One gun went to the other, mainly to keep the doves from going to it and settling once the shooting started in "our" field.
In planning which gun to take, I anticipated high flying, mature birds and lots of shots at longish distances. I normally use a small bore gun for doves, and would have possibly used a 20 but, considering the size of the field and the few guns that would be there, I decided to use a 12. I have had a Smith 3E with 32" ventilated rib barrels, HOT, and 3" chambers, for a couple years but had never taken it to the field. It had shot clays once, with "so-so" results, and had lingered in it's leg-of-mutton case ever since. My feelings went towards it, and giving it a chance to strut it's stuff. The long 32" barrels are choked .037" and .037", so it had what was needed to reach out and touch the tall ones. I took Aguila 1 oz. loads of no.8s, at 1200 fps., though 7 1/2s might have been better, in hindsight.
It was a good choice. The birds were flying wide and high, and the long barrels and tight chokes were in their element. At the end of the afternoon I had a limit of fifteen. Hard earned birds, most taken at distance. Wonderful sport in the late season.
SRH