Suggestions on a good choke and shell combo for hitting snow geese at 65+ yards?

[Duck Hunter Dave]

Hello folks! I have a question you may help with me. Looking for a good choke / shell combo to use with my Remington 870 super mag. with 26" barrel. Im looking to make shots at a range of 65 to 75 yards. Currently, I have 3 1/2 bb winchester shells and Mod. choke. Wondering if there is a better shell and better choke combo to hit high flying snow geese. Thanks for any suggestions!

[Feather_Duster]

It's a shotgun, not an anit-aircraft cannon. no shell/choke combo will consistantly bring down geese 65 to 75+ yds. up. look for a better spot where the birds pass over lower if you are pass shooting or get more decoys to bring them down closer.

[Duck Hunter Dave]

Too bad the days of the Punt gun are long gone... Thanks for the suggestion though! I had handmade 135 texas rag style decoys and 8 canada goose decoys (with 1 canada flyer I did purchase online) but the birds were staying well out of range. I have handmade 40 silhouettes and 7 wind motion snow goose flyers this week, and hope to add another 100 rags by the weekend. This will get me a little over 300 decoys. Not bad for a few hours of building in the shop. I spent roughly $75 on materials for all 300 decoys, made from quality exterior construction materials that will last for years. I sewed double seems on every decoy to be sure they will hold up to 60 mph winds. Ill add a pic of the first set of snow goose rags and canada silsock type decoys I made. Naturally, the decoys look a bit better when the wind picks up to about 10 mph but it was a calm foggy morning in this pic. The new snow goose flyers I made this week look great, and the silhouetes turned out ok too. Hope to get the snows to commit this weekend with the increased spread. Thanks again!

[Jay2125]

A friend of mine like that hevi shot He also talks about those tungsten matrix shells. I like black cloud I have smacked ducks at 60 yards away with them. I always use the mod choke

[Yellowfin]

Still a couple months left to go after snows, right? The wife and I might be up for some action soon if so.

[Quacked]

While not impossible to make shots of that range it surely is not optimum. The very first rule of water fowling is to set you spread up where the birds want to be. The decoys and your calling should close the deal for you and you can take them when they come in to join your decoys. There is a saying about deer hunting that if you want to shoot a big buck, don't shoot a little one. Meaning if you shoot a small deer you are out of the game and you stop hunting. If you crack at every goose that flies by you, there is no chance for giving them to swing around and take a look at your spread again and commit to it. Snows are often very difficult to pull in until a couple birds commit, usually its the yearling birds.

There is nothing wrong with pass shooting, very often the roosting area and the feeding areas are not hunt-able, then you have no choice. Better to pass on a shot then cripple up birds at 75 yards (which when looking up is very hard to determine range with no background but sky)and wait for a sportsman like chance. Chasing cripples all over the marsh burns a lot of time up and missed opportunities on geese.

As for the shotgun you have tons of options, the premium chokes available are very fine today, some of the extended tubes can be very effective when combined with having your chamber forcing cones reamed and lengthened for steel shot.

Mostly the best thing you can do is get to a range where you can pratice the "incoming overhead shot" over and over and over. It is one of the more difficult to master. Best of luck to you.

[Duck Hunter Dave]

Still a couple months left to go after snows, right? The wife and I might be up for some action soon if so.

Conservation season started yesterday ( Jan. 28th) here in Pennsylvania. Runs until the end of April. Hope you are able to get out a get some birds!

[Yellowfin]

Will certainly try, gotta find people to go with since I don't have any decoys yet and we're really just getting started. We're new to the area here so it's a big puzzle to put together.

[ecuchief]

Gonna try an get out myself. I've hunted in Canada and we use 3" #4s with Mod or IM chokes. The PA season did open for the Atlantic zone (where I live) though I have not seen any in fields, always over head. The Resident zone doesn't open until March 1, which is where I know some will congregate.

Good luck all!

[sincitynut]

Man thats a long ways out, sounds like you need a Russian ZSU 23-4, a 4 barreleed 23mm Anti-Aircraft gun for them birds