Boss shotgun ammunition

[gimruis]

Also, what happens when all the ranges are non tox also? Is the average hunter going to go shoot trap in the offseason with $15/box steel target loads?

This is where the private land exception comes into play. Sporting clay courses, trap shooting leagues, and other private entities would fall under the private land exception.

Hunting on private land would also apply. At least that's the language used when they try to propose it here in MN.

 

[cheesy]

Slippery slopes indeed.

When 2 wolves and a sheep are voting on what is for supper, guess what is going to hit the grill.

Is BOSS partnering with this non tox organization purely from the duty they feel to keep our game meat and duck ponds safe, or because they see $$$ to be made.

A total lead ban won’t happen overnight. First it will be public land. Then it will be for all hunting. As it becomes more acceptable, then it hits as a full on ban for all ammo.

The camels nose will be under the tent wall before you know it.

 

[s.davis]

Yes, I remember when they first banned dumping toxic waste into the public water supply and now no one is allowed to drink water.

 

[Munster927]

Yes, I remember when they first banned dumping toxic waste into the public water supply and now no one is allowed to drink water.

I honestly don't get where everyone comes from with the "slippery slope" arguments. Apparently banning a toxic substance in ammunition will lead to a dystopian society. Maybe I'm just a sheep

 

[s.davis]

They banned lead paint in 1978 and there's still 5,000 Sherwin Williams stores in the United States.

 

[KEOutdoors]

Its just two ways of seeing it is all.

Some are in acceptance and dont mind paying extra for inferior ammo, or 10 times the price for better than lead.

Some want to stand against it because they see the reasons fueling the change as non issue.

I bet if it could REALLY be tested and you took two nearly identical pieces of land one being non tox only, the non tox area has more upland birds killed and wasted due to hunters shooting inferior ammo than the lead shot areas do hunters + lead poison. The whole thing is fueled by raptor and bird watching groups that want every bird to live, they don't understand that humans ARE predators and the results of our actions (lead poison from shot) is part of the ecosystem balance currently... So us hunters all band together and go to non tox only to save the hawks, eagles, and other birds of pray. Yay, now we have even less game birds to hunt due to overhead predators- way to go hunters!

One of our counties is non tox only on their public hunting areas (not dnr land). The county board made this decision when 3 tundra swans were found dead in Feb in a corn field and they tested positive for lead poisoning from ingestion (did not die from it). They are migratory birds and we're likely from the tundra in northern Canada, only here for 4 weeks in the winter so there is basically no chance they got it here or that ban will do anything to protect swans... Yet thats what the board thought they were doing, it was majority eco women on the one politics side you can probably figure out. Talking with the DNR officer in that county, he said the dnr will not enforce that county code and one court case will remove it if anyone wants to fight it. He said as far as he knows nobody has been ticketed, because it would take a sheriff's officer to do it and they dont care. These types of nonsense bans are what fuel a wider area ban "well xyz county has been lead free for 10 years and people still hunt it".

 

[John Singer]

I'd contend that spent lead shot plays a MAJOR role in SOME game bird mortality!

I'd also contend that for anything to reach a bird's gizzard, it must first pass through its crop. And the fact that many of the birds I shoot have crops CHOCK FULL of whatever they recently ingested, & that I've never found a pellet, is at least somewhat significant. Not surprising though, because I doubt most pheasants in SD ever ingest a single pellet.

Some pheasants in South Dakota do ingest spent lead shot. That has been established. Sport Lead Free's statement on this matter is not a false statement.

GFP study reveals game birds ingest lead pellets shot by hunters

PIERRE — A state Wildlife Division research project at a Lyman County farm last fall found that many of the rooster pheasants killed by hunters there had previously eaten lead shotgun pellets that had been fired at some earlier time by other hunters.

www.thepublicopinion.com

Note that the investigators found lead shot in pheasant gizzards. The article does not mention whether they inspected the pheasant crops.

 

[Bob Peters]

Can we get a foundation started to ban steel shot? It cripples more game birds than polio.

 

[LittleBigHorn22]

Its just two ways of seeing it is all.

Some are in acceptance and dont mind paying extra for inferior ammo, or 10 times the price for better than lead.

Some want to stand against it because they see the reasons fueling the change as non issue.

I bet if it could REALLY be tested and you took two nearly identical pieces of land one being non tox only, the non tox area has more upland birds killed and wasted due to hunters shooting inferior ammo than the lead shot areas do hunters + lead poison. The whole thing is fueled by raptor and bird watching groups that want every bird to live, they don't understand that humans ARE predators and the results of our actions (lead poison from shot) is part of the ecosystem balance currently... So us hunters all band together and go to non tox only to save the hawks, eagles, and other birds of pray. Yay, now we have even less game birds to hunt due to overhead predators- way to go hunters!

One of our counties is non tox only on their public hunting areas (not dnr land). The county board made this decision when 3 tundra swans were found dead in Feb in a corn field and they tested positive for lead poisoning from ingestion (did not die from it). They are migratory birds and we're likely from the tundra in northern Canada, only here for 4 weeks in the winter so there is basically no chance they got it here or that ban will do anything to protect swans... Yet thats what the board thought they were doing, it was majority eco women on the one politics side you can probably figure out. Talking with the DNR officer in that county, he said the dnr will not enforce that county code and one court case will remove it if anyone wants to fight it. He said as far as he knows nobody has been ticketed, because it would take a sheriff's officer to do it and they dont care. These types of nonsense bans are what fuel a wider area ban "well xyz county has been lead free for 10 years and people still hunt it".

So you agree that lead shot is probably killing raptors? I could see the idea of less raptors meaning more game birds, but humans really suck at predictions on ecosystems. Without raptors maybe rabbit population explodes. Then they eat all the plants, and then coyote population explodes which then kills all the birds anyways. My point point is that you are equally drawing conclusions without testing them.

Lead is toxic and we should work to removing toxic things. Seems like an easy thing. However the speed of transition is dependent on how bad the effects are. At least with pheasant, unrecovered roosters don't have a measurable impact on the population. It should be strived to recover all from a moral standpoint. But we can kill a ton of roosters without reducing population. But if the lead ends up effecting hens through some other means, then it would change the population.

 

[John Singer]

Can we get a foundation started to ban steel shot? It cripples more game birds than polio.

That is the popular myth.

 

[KEOutdoors]

That is the popular myth.

Its no myth.. the average hunter cripples the heck out of birds with steel shot because they do not understand the ballistics regarding shot size/velocity and do not pattern their guns. Lead shot is so forgiving that you can do the exact thing and kill birds all day long, however there is no room for error with steel. Just go to any pheasant group on Facebook, which will be full of average joe hunters, and ask how steel shot works. Youll get 200 replies that steel sucks and its nothing but cripples. Most are buying steel 5/6s because they like lead 5/6s and dont understand that there is a ballistic difference.

 

[KEOutdoors]

So you agree that lead shot is probably killing raptors? I could see the idea of less raptors meaning more game birds, but humans really suck at predictions on ecosystems. Without raptors maybe rabbit population explodes. Then they eat all the plants, and then coyote population explodes which then kills all the birds anyways. My point point is that you are equally drawing conclusions without testing them.

Lead is toxic and we should work to removing toxic things. Seems like an easy thing. However the speed of transition is dependent on how bad the effects are. At least with pheasant, unrecovered roosters don't have a measurable impact on the population. It should be strived to recover all from a moral standpoint. But we can kill a ton of roosters without reducing population. But if the lead ends up effecting hens through some other means, then it would change the population.

Absolutely it kills raptors, just the same as it has since the 1700s.

This year was strangely lacking of hawks, but most years every single draw around here has multiple hawks sitting in trees... And we wonder why the songbird and game bird populations struggle in the winter. Raptor resource fuels the political side, as people want to look at the hawks and eagles... But there needs to be balance... You cant preserve every predator like they want.

 

[John Singer]

Its no myth.. the average hunter cripples the heck out of birds with steel shot because they do not understand the ballistics regarding shot size/velocity and do not pattern their guns. Lead shot is so forgiving that you can do the exact thing and kill birds all day long, however there is no room for error with steel. Just go to any pheasant group on Facebook, which will be full of average joe hunters, and ask how steel shot works. Youll get 200 replies that steel sucks and its nothing but cripples. Most are buying steel 5/6s because they like lead 5/6s and dont understand that there is a ballistic difference.

I must admit that it is very difficult to argue with that kind of logic... because it is not logic.

 

[BrownDogsCan2]

I brought to bag 29 pheasant and eight quail with steel shot this year. For the first time ever I didn’t shoot a bird on private land .
I can tell you that I lost some other birds. 4 on the second day of the Nebraska season, 3 in one field over my peake. I should have quit before then. But you don’t go into the eighth inning thinking the other teams going to put up 15 and the wheels are going to fall off. Poor shooting and a dog that totally lost her shit. The same day I lost another one over my other dog.
Lost one a month later in Nebraska and another this year in Kansas.
In my case I don’t think lead shot would have made much of a difference.
I do agree that steel is a crippler but it’s undersized for the job.
I had a dog that was pretty good at running down steel shot birds that had been shot earlier in the week. He’d pick up 2 or 3 a year. Almost always when you cleaned them theyd have #6 or #7 shot in them. I blame Walmart and I blame nontox dove season, and I blame guys who don’t know any better or don’t care.

 

[LittleBigHorn22]

Its no myth.. the average hunter cripples the heck out of birds with steel shot because they do not understand the ballistics regarding shot size/velocity and do not pattern their guns. Lead shot is so forgiving that you can do the exact thing and kill birds all day long, however there is no room for error with steel. Just go to any pheasant group on Facebook, which will be full of average joe hunters, and ask how steel shot works. Youll get 200 replies that steel sucks and its nothing but cripples. Most are buying steel 5/6s because they like lead 5/6s and dont understand that there is a ballistic difference.

I agree that the average hunter who is already high likely hood of crippling with lead will do even worse with steel. It is a big reason I'm against a full lead ban. But I would strongly encourage those of us who do hunt a ton, to work on using non toxic. Those of us who hunt 10+ days a year can easily put the time in to find the non tox that works for us. And I think for health reasons, it's even more important to try getting rid of the lead in the food. If you eat 5 birds a year with lead, you probably won't end up with problems. But eating 30+, you are at much more risk.

And if the harder core hunters start leading the way with non-tox, it will help companies invest more into it and encourages more hunters to be better. Otherwise we are going to have a law eventually passed and the scramble for companies and hunters to switch, will be much worse than volunteers transitioning.

 

[KEOutdoors]

I agree that the average hunter who is already high likely hood of crippling with lead will do even worse with steel. It is a big reason I'm against a full lead ban. But I would strongly encourage those of us who do hunt a ton, to work on using non toxic. Those of us who hunt 10+ days a year can easily put the time in to find the non tox that works for us. And I think for health reasons, it's even more important to try getting rid of the lead in the food. If you eat 5 birds a year with lead, you probably won't end up with problems. But eating 30+, you are at much more risk.

And if the harder core hunters start leading the way with non-tox, it will help companies invest more into it and encourages more hunters to be better. Otherwise we are going to have a law eventually passed and the scramble for companies and hunters to switch, will be much worse than volunteers transitioning.

Exactly, the resources are there for everyone to be successful with non tox if they take the time to learn. Ive killed more birds with steel than I could ever count, ducks, doves, pheasants, and small game. Back when we didnt pattern and just shot steel 2s in IC at everything it was a crap shoot whether it was coming down alive or not. We know a lot better now, but it takes someone WANTING to reduce the cripples and WANTING to put in the time/money patterning. Lets be fair though, unless you get a thought to google if steel is different than lead (size wise) or someone tells you that you need to go to a bigger size, the average hunter is just buying xpert steel 6s or 4s and going hunting when non tox is required. Average pheasant hunter doesnt know what BOSS is, and the bismuth on the shelf at $69.99/box gets a laugh.


I'm pretty set on only shooting tungsten for pheasants next year. I was using lead on private and bismuth on public, but I'm making the full switch. Ballistics is wild on TSS and the cost isnt too bad to load my own. It just means the rabbits and squirrels get a pass, but a duck getting up off a creek is in trouble.

 

[Mosby]

I bought my first case of Bismuth yesterday for my 12 gauge and although I have a decent amount of steel shot ammunition at home, I've decided to use Bismuth instead of steel going forward for pheasant hunting. I am simply hoping for better results when I have to use non toxic shot. I've never bought or shot Boss shot but I will probably be ordering some this year before the price triples.

 

[LittleBigHorn22]

Exactly, the resources are there for everyone to be successful with non tox if they take the time to learn. Ive killed more birds with steel than I could ever count, ducks, doves, pheasants, and small game. Back when we didnt pattern and just shot steel 2s in IC at everything it was a crap shoot whether it was coming down alive or not. We know a lot better now, but it takes someone WANTING to reduce the cripples and WANTING to put in the time/money patterning. Lets be fair though, unless you get a thought to google if steel is different than lead (size wise) or someone tells you that you need to go to a bigger size, the average hunter is just buying xpert steel 6s or 4s and going hunting when non tox is required. Average pheasant hunter doesnt know what BOSS is, and the bismuth on the shelf at $69.99/box gets a laugh.


I'm pretty set on only shooting tungsten for pheasants next year. I was using lead on private and bismuth on public, but I'm making the full switch. Ballistics is wild on TSS and the cost isnt too bad to load my own. It just means the rabbits and squirrels get a pass, but a duck getting up off a creek is in trouble.

I'm also getting into TSS next year. Ballistics calculator shows it's a little over 2x better than an equal lead size. So I'm testing out 1/2 ounce of TSS. Should be similar to shooting 1 1/8 ounce of lead which is perfect for pheasant. And it has 25% of the recoil.

I think people and companies are really over looking tss for upland and waterfowl. They load 1+ ounces of it which is expensive and truly overkill with pellets counts. The duplex loads in theory are smart, but they still charge tss prices for 10% of the tss which they don't clarify of its by weight or

 

[KEOutdoors]

I'm also getting into TSS next year. Ballistics calculator shows it's a little over 2x better than an equal lead size. So I'm testing out 1/2 ounce of TSS. Should be similar to shooting 1 1/8 ounce of lead which is perfect for pheasant. And it has 25% of the recoil.

I think people and companies are really over looking tss for upland and waterfowl. They load 1+ ounces of it which is expensive and truly overkill with pellets counts. The duplex loads in theory are smart, but they still charge tss prices for 10% of the tss which they don't clarify of its by weight or

The duplex loads are there for filler, as you cannot shoot 1/2oz of tss in a 12 or 20ga shell. 1/2oz of 9s is plenty of shot, it just doesnt work ballistically in those big shells, its really a .410 shell. So you load 1/2oz tss with 1oz of steel shot and now you have a 12ga shell at high enough pressure to be reliable in the cold and you can consider the steel shot bonus pellets. I do agree the price doesnt reflect the shot used within, but thats marketing.

I'm going to load 3/4oz of tss 9s and 1oz of hw15 7s in 20ga for roosters next year, pellet count will be right where I like it at 220-250 and should be lethal on roosters long past where anyone should be shooting (program says 73yds). I tested the 1oz hw15 on the last bird of the season this month and lets just say it will work just fine.

 

[LittleBigHorn22]

The duplex loads are there for filler, as you cannot shoot 1/2oz of tss in a 12 or 20ga shell. 1/2oz of 9s is plenty of shot, it just doesnt work ballistically in those big shells, its really a .410 shell. So you load 1/2oz tss with 1oz of steel shot and now you have a 12ga shell at high enough pressure to be reliable in the cold and you can consider the steel shot bonus pellets. I do agree the price doesnt reflect the shot used within, but thats marketing.

I'm going to load 3/4oz of tss 9s and 1oz of hw15 7s in 20ga for roosters next year, pellet count will be right where I like it at 220-250 and should be lethal on roosters long past where anyone should be shooting (program says 73yds). I tested the 1oz hw15 on the last bird of the season this month and lets just say it will work just fine.

That's fair. I didn't mention I'm gonna run the 410.

Just think the 1/2 ounce plus 1 ounce steel is unnecessary recoil. I personally would like to see half and half ounce to make lighter recoil but plenty of pellets. If you need 12 guage shell. But the 410 resurgence with TSS makes so much sense to me.

I liked the idea of HW15 especially with the softer metal, but the price I found was comparable to TSS.