Part of his problem with the short range buck fever shots is that he has a special buckshot barrel on his gun, and was shooting buckshot...at the range he was shooting his spread was probably about four inches, so he was effectively shooting a slug, he just missed

It's a hard call to make in the areas we hunt; we both shot deer with slugs last year, mine at 50 yards and his at about 25. The 50 yard shot was in a spot that is just about the farthest reasonable shot we would be taking...it is a jungle for the most part, and seeing 50 yards is rather rare.

That being said...the deer I shot two weeks ago would have been dead with either, and I didn't shoot a deer that was too far away to shoot buckshot out of the long barreled full choke Winchester I was shooting. Conversely, I missed one the week before about 40-50 yards on a gallop that I probably would have hit had I been chambered up with the buckshot.

Either way, both work, but neither is perfect for every situation.

I decided that *most* of the shots come close, on moving animals, so went with buckshot. If I had to switch back to my other gun and use a slug, I wouldn't feel bad about it, it worked just fine last year.

Nick's miss had nothing to do with his gun, it is set up perfectly for what he was doing, and had the correct ammo in it...he just flat out missed.

Fish on...

Todd