Bismuth Shot - It's not all created equal

[J.B. Books]

I noticed that Ballistic Products has some loose bismuth shot on sale. The price on 7 pounds is the best I have seen in many years. However their advertised shot counts made me pause.

The original loose bismuth shot was sold by No-Tox in 7 pound bottles. Their #4 shot was originally a pretty big pellet with 170 in a 1 1/4 ounce loading. It is and was a very effective load on ducks and geese. I believe it is no accident the pellet count is almost identical to lead, I think they made the pellet bigger to get the same pellet count as it's lead counterpart. Essentially these shoot with the same performance as lead 4's.

Some years later I bought some more of their #4 bismuth and noticed the pellets were visibly smaller. A 1 1/4 ounce load had 210 pellets. These pellets weigh 80% of a lead 4. These will perform about the same as lead #5 in both pellet count and pellet weight.

Now the new Ballistic Products offering says there are 264 pellets in a 1 1/4 ounce load. That is 95 more pellets than the original #4 bismuth sold by No-Tox, a big difference, each pellet weighs 64% of a lead number 4.

So keep in mind a 1 1/4 ounce loading of the new Ballistic Products #4 will perform in similar fashion to a loading of 1 1/4 ounce of lead #6 in both pellet count and pellet weight. It will not perform the same on waterfowl as the original No-Tox Bismuth #4, not even close.

Know what you are buying and know what you are shooting.