Check with the guys who regularly drop their limits with a box of shells and you will find, with precious few exceptions, they are using open chokes, usually improved cylinder, although you will find some skeet bores, and their shot size preference will never be larger than No. 7 1/2. Because doves are not hard to knock down, select a combination of bore constriction and shot size that gives you a suitably dense, even pattern out to 30 to 35 yards. If the pattern shows that any bird within a 30-inch circle is going to absorb four pellets or more, you have plenty of firepower.

GUN CONTROL
No, this is not in reference to the paper you signed your name on at the gun shop. Gun control here means doing something more with the muzzle than sticking it skyward in the general direction of a dove and pulling the trigger. Unless you just enjoy hearing things go "Bang!" you will not reap a very great reward shooting this way.

To begin with, think about your shotgun the way you would think of a garden hose. Somewhere along the line, all of us have squirted someone and if you hit a running kid with the stream of water, then there had to be some lead involved. Point the nozzle straight at a moving target and your liquid "pattern" will inevitably wind up behind the target. You have to get in front to establish a lead, and then keep swinging to make it effective.

How much lead? This is a question that rears its ugly head on a regular basis. With the exception of a few serious shooters, I doubt that many of us can accurately answer it. On paper, a shot that is on the money at 40 yards requires a different lead than the same result at 20 yards if the target is moving at the same speed and along the same angle. Just to confound the Number Lovers, no it doesn't. The "apparent lead" that your eye sees increases as the distance gets greater, but the angle does not change. Confused? Don't be.

Going back to the garden hose, think of it this way. When taking a passing shot on a dove, regardless of the direction it is moving past the gun, swing from behind the target and when you see daylight between the muzzle and the bird, pull the trigger. Because the muzzle is moving faster than the target you will (a) establish the necessary lead and (b) be less prone to stop your swing. Even for the shooter who wants to put the muzzle out X number of perceived feet ahead of the target (yes, it can be done effectively), the follow-through is critical to dove-shooting success. Stop your swing before you see the bird start to fall and you can count on a miss.

Incoming and outgoing birds are the easiest of all. Black them out with the barrel when they come toward you and clear them with the barrel as they go away.