My favorite configuration...16 "O" frames..

[Harold Pickens]

Although Ohio grouse season is closed, I ran my setter Doodle today thru some old strip mine/spoil bank cover that still looks as good as when we were flushing 25 birds/day there. I just wanted to get out with the dog and look for shed antlers and future sites for deer stands. In between 2 spoil banks she pulled up into a point. I thought it might be an early woodcock arrival, but was a big cock grouse. I had heard a bird drumming in that area both this spring and fall. Doodle pointed it again about 100 yds ahead as we moved around the hill. Strip mining sure created alot of great cover back in the day despite it's negative impacts.
I came across this old bucket from a shovel close to where I flushed the bird. If any body wants to help, we could get a few bucks for scrap--probably would weigh over a 1000 lbs.

[Harold Pickens]

Doodle and bucket.

[Mills]

The German Gun Collectors had a table full of shooter Sauers, including several 16’s, at the Southern a few years ago. Unfortunately, I did not get any. They were priced to sell

[stumpstalker]

Good question about that DH with the round knob. She’s a beauty.

I have a lightly-used 1925-issue, 1-frame VH 16 that my father wheedled away from a hunting and fishing buddy decades ago, when the unsuspecting owner of the gun proudly showed his new prize to Dad. I shoot it occasionally at the range, and may use it, given its full chokes, on Pheasants in open country. I also see that Ballistics Products offers a spreader insert for the 072SG16 wad, if one is reloading, which expands my options.

As for 0-frame 16s, the subject of the thread, my go-to grouse gun is a 1907, and later restored, 0-frame, 26-inch barreled 16-gauge VH. It is factory-choked cylinder and modified. Implausibly, the gun took First Place Honors in the People’s Choice Awards at the 2021 PGCA Annual Meeting and Banquet, amid an array of stunning upland guns – A, B, C, and D-grades.

The photo reveals little about the gun’s aesthetic features, however modest they are relative to the higher-grade competition, but it does convey what the gun was intended in to be used for.

[Victor Wasylyna]

Russell:

You paired that award winning 16-gauge VH with a very handsome dog. Great photograph!

-Victor

[stumpstalker]

Victor:

That previous photo was of "Zoey". She was preeminent among my guide's dogs in her day. Fantastic nose.

Then came "Hank", paired with the same doughty 0-framed 16-gauge VH.

[Harold Pickens]

The cyl/mod choking is my favorite, especially for grouse.l have a 26 in VH 20, and my DHE 16 both choked that way, and both weigh exactly 6 lbs. I've often thought I'd like to try an English Pointer.

[mobirdhunter]

Beautiful dogs, and a special gun. I followed many pointers in my time participating in field trials in Missouri. They can sure strike a pose on point that will make you catch breath.

[Dean Romig]

Originally Posted by Harold Lee Pickens

I've often thought I'd like to try an English Pointer.

.

[stumpstalker]

Here’s “Hank” with his master, a professional Maine guide, and off-season field-trialer, in an illustration for an article on Maine sporting camps that was published in the October 2017 issue of FIELD & STREAM.

Despite his considerable experience, with dogs, guns, clients, and the Maine woods and waters, my guide was late to be bitten by the Parker 16-gauge bug. He acquired a pre-1920 (that is, one with the rib extension detail) 1-frame Trojan 16 in 2022, and brought it to the Major Waldron’s New Year’s Day shoot this last December 31st.

The 16-gauge offers manifold applications, with regard open or close-cover upland birds, or waterfowl, be it from blind, boat or when donning waders and walking sloughs, backwaters, and potholes -- a blend of upland and duck hinting that my father used to do. But there seems to be wide agreement on the 16-gauge being ideal for the North American Ruffed Grouse.