Great to be back

[Tom Flanigan]

I am gratified by the responses I received after I returned to the site after a long absence. It was great to hear from Kevin, Bill, Dean, Drew and others.
To respond to Kevin’s question, I am still living in Maryland but I plan to retire in the spring and then sell the house. I have a home in Pawling, NY, my home town. I plan to move back there full time when the Maryland house sells. That is where I’ll spend the rest of my years gunning my old childhood haunts.
I started back hunting in Pawling last year. All the old magic is still there and I hunt coverts that I hunted in my childhood and that my grandfather hunted before me. My hunting grounds are part of large estates and the 20 acres zoning in those areas have prevented some of the landowners from selling off parcels for development. There is still a lot of old blood in Pawling. My primary grouse coverts are still owned by the same family who owned the property when my grandfather hunted there starting in 1916. I remain close with that family. The land is selectively logged every 10 years which maintains the second growth and fox grapes that provides consistent gunning.
Below is a picture of some of my Pawling birds with a 16 bore high grade Smith. I’m not particularly partial to Smith guns but this one is a lightweight 16 bore and is cylinder in both barrels. An idiot cut the barrels from 30” to 26”, which worked out well for me. I hunt grouse with every bore gun including a 28 bore Holland, but day in and day out, there is nothing that can touch a 16 bore cylinder gun shooting an ounce of #9 shot. In my opinion, the 16 bore is the best for grouse when you are serious about getting the maximum number of birds for shots fired. I like playing with other guns but first fill the freezer with my 16 bore Smith.

[Dean Romig]

Tom, you posted that very picture here many, many years ago. I remember it so well because of its classic gunning composition. Great picture!

They say "You can never go back." but it appears you can and have done so!
I still hunt the same covers in Vermont I started hunting when I was ten or twelve and they still belong to the same family. I think somebody's smiling on you and me.

Welcome back!





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[C.O.B.]

It's hard to beat an open choked 16 in the uplands. The meat gun a DHE 20 with 26 inch cyl/cyl chokes does come close

[Kevin McCormack]

Tom, these are the kinds of posts I LIKE to read! Love the Pawling area; explored it over the years when the Vintagers was being held up at Orvis Sandanona; also a buddy from work and his Dad used to hunt up in that area every weekend when they escaped from NYC into the wild. So far as the best upland bird gun (at least for grouse & woodcock) ever devised, I think its the (Savage) Fox 16 ga. Skeet & Upland Game gun, 26' bbls. bored 'SK/CYL' (Savage nomenclature) and iMP. CYL. Mine mics out at .005" constriction in the right bbl. and .011 in the left. Also ideal on quail but a little sparse on choke for wild pheasants. P.S. - glad you are still in the area.

[Tom Flanigan]

I like the 16 bore best for grouse but a light 12 shooting an ounce of shot is good also as is a 20 bore with the 7/8 ounce load. The 28 does a remarkably good job with the 3/4 ounce load. I have used them all.

My grandfather liked his little 20 bore VH best and used it with 7/8 ounce of #10's. His former market shooting buddy killed grouse with a 10 bore loaded with #10's for the market but used a 12 bore damascus Colt after his market gunning days were over.

My grandfather's former market shooting partner, Dee Slocum, thought the little VH was a toy. He got it in trade for his furs but quickly sold it to my grandfather. Market hunters were usually big bore boys. Many of them considered the 12 a small bore.

Most of the old grouse gunners in the Pawling area favored #10 shot in light 12 bore guns. In those days, the mark of an amateur grouse gunner was high brass shells shooting larger shot. I remember one day I found a couple of high brass 20 bore 7 1/2 shells in my coverts. Some one snuck in. I complained to my grandfather and he said, "with those loads he's no partridge gunner (they always called grouse partridge), he won't kill any of your birds".

[Kevin McCormack]

Did they look anything like these?

[todd allen]

Apologies in advance for asking, but why number 10 shot? All of our birds eventually go to the kitchen , so why complicate the lead removal process by filling the bird full of microscopic shot?
The smallest shot size I use on any game bird is 7 1/2s, and that's on doves and quail.
Bigger shot equals less pellets, but dramatically better energy per pellet, and, for the pellets that actually remain in the bird, much easier to find,and remove.

[Bruce Day]

Welcome back Tom. It’s been too long.

[Tom Flanigan]

Wow Kevin....what great boxes. Thanks for sharing. The 20 bore box is the load my grandfather used and I love the 3 1/4 dram 1 1/4 oz box. The old pigeon load. I love the 3 1/4, 1 1/4 oz. loads. Thats all I use for turkey, ducks and geese.

I have been saving a magazine for you for years. It's a 1948 November issue of Sports Afield. I know you admired Robert Stack and this magazine has a Remington Shur Shot advertisment with a picture of "Bobby" Stack in the ad. Also, an article by Jimmy Robinson on the 1936 Skeet Champions featuring pictures of Robert Stack, Dick Shaughnessy and others. It also has drawing of Stack. It's a great old magazine from a different time and I want you to have it so I am going to send it to you.

I had always planned to give it to you at the weekly pigeon shoots but somehow I alwasy forgot to bring it. I hope you get a kick out of seeing Robert Stack as a boy, long before he actor career.

[Tom Flanigan]

Thanks Bruce. I well remember your 20 bore CHE damascus with the wood duck on the floor plate. That was one georgeous gun. I hope you still have it. It was a one of a kind with the woodduck on the floorplate.