It's a New England Firearms (NEF). Same difference. Yep.

Hey frank, holes in a paper don't do it for me. This does.



TSS allows me to put disabled veterans on turkeys every year that they normally wouldn't be able to kill. I'm thankful for any advantage I can get when hunting with them.

Im with posco. Ive probably only killed 30 turkeys or so, but they have all been with my 1960’s 2-3/4” 20ga sxs american double. Works great. Shot size between 4 and 7-1/2 lead all seem to work fine. No need for special gun or loads for an overgrowth sparrow.

Edit - i just remembered killing 3 or 4 turkeys with granpas 20ga Remington Model 11. So not Alll of them were the double.

This is with a 410 at 40 yards.

Some people can make the simplest thing complicated....... Some complaining about the weight and recoil of a 12 guage for turkey hunting, scopes for shotguns at 50 yds, $5 a shell to kill a turkey. I never considered killing a turkey within range that difficult. Maybe if I'd would have stuck with it another 10 years my eyes would have been opened. Maybe I'm old school and don't understand the glory of the gear when it comes to hunting nowadays.

I'd say you're spot on. People really try to overcomplicate things. A lot of those ideas come from the "industry" trying to convince everybody that they need something new/different to be a better hunter. Fact of the matter is that it doesn't take much to kill a turkey. I guess if a guy isn't very good at turkey hunting and has to continually shoot at them at 40+ yards then he would see a need for pricey gear.

Yes sir I guess it works for them and that's great. Myself when I could no longer get turkey tags with my youth license I only hunted them on my ground oe a few years I bought tags. But a turkey tag in Indiana is 24$ and you.could buy two at the store for that price and not get ticks it makes no since for me. That said 20g worked fine for me with 4 and 5 shot out of an 870 express. Now I may turkey hunt again just calling for my boys but they won't get specialized equipment just standard youth guns and heavy loads.

But heck my youngest spot and stocked his first turkey by himself and killed it at 15 yards with a 15 lb bow. .No specialized equipment needed at all. Grown men can't match him.

I was loading TSS years before the "industry" started offering it commercially. I've probably loaded about 10 thousand rounds with tss in them in some form.

I don't do it because I shoot turkeys past 40 yards, I do it because I like knowing I have the best option available. Can you kill turkeys with 7.5 lead shot? Absolutely. But I feel like I owe it to the turkey to give myself the best chance at a clean harvest. I guess I just have a little more respect for them than most.

I have no issue with guys shooting lead as long as they understand the limitations and honor them. Where I have an issue is with the guys that read threads like these and go wound turkeys with their 410 7.5 shot target loads because someone said it could be done.

I still don't understand the $5 or $10 a shell argument being too much. Guys will drive hours to kill a turkey with $4 a gallon gas, wear hundreds of dollars of camo, buy expensive hand made calls, super realistic decoys, and then say they can't afford tss ammo. Give me a break. I like getting them close as much as the next guy. I'm no less of a turkey hunter than anyone else because I shoot tss. Heck, its legal in NC to shoot them with slugs. If I wanted to shoot them far I would get my savage 220 bolt action out and kill them at 150 yards. But that's not the goal. The goal is to provide myself with the best opportunity for a clean harvest. And that is worth much more to me than the price of the shot.

Coondagger

Your point about providing yourself with the "best opportunity" for a clean harvest and you having more respect than most doesn't jive with using a 410 over a 12 guage does it? Loaded with similar loads a 3 1/2" 12 guage would provide you with the "best opportunity " for a clean harvest. Both will work but keep the "having more respct" stuff out of it.

Here's my 20 gage. 85 grains 3F powder, 1 1/8 oz #4 shot.



Fall Bird too. No love sick spring tom.

Sorry if I ruffle feathers, but I talk to our state biologist and there is a few big things that are contributing to the decline in birds
Shell (Tess usage) the new 100$ decoys that have put Manny more ppl out there to hunt alongside the safety factor of the shells
The lack of trapping ( coons skunks possums ect) have an part in it
Multiple tags and shooting them for video likes and views.
I'd say the industry has taken the hunting out of it now. Get out there with a box and mouth call and hunt hmm how many ppl can do that now, I hear I scout that bird but u never left your truck I know we're it comes out of the woods to the field so sit and bush wack that's hunting ya ok
U sit on a field u can cover darn neer 150 yard radius around you it hangs up like they should do and have the hen com to them u just kill it at 70 yards get in the timber and have that Tom hunt you use the terrain to your advantage

See my previous comments about how tss is overkill in anything larger than 28ga.

In 20ga and 12ga there is plenty of hull volume to make lead work just fine. I think lead is plenty ethical in those larger gauges.

In my 410 and 28ga, however, tss does give me the best opportunity, and I do respect the bird enough to not attempt the kill with inferior loads

I posted a pick of one of my patterns with the 410. How is that pattern worse than a 12ga 3 1/2" load?

If they really believe that TSS is the cause of the decline of turkeys, then whoever “they” are, they’re more stupid than a box of rocks. Pretty sure the only person on this thread that talked of shooting past 40 was shooting lead. I don’t know of anyone that shoots TSS that thinks they can now shoot a bird out of range.
Now if you want to discuss turkey population decline and things to outlaw, let’s outlaw decoys and reaping (fanning).
We’ve been loading TSS for the past 4 years and like the performance.
What I find strange, is if we were talking bullets for bear or moose I’m betting no one is gonna go buy the Walmart brand and say it’ll kill’em just as dead. No sir, y’all gonna buy the best rifles and bullets there are. Well, I feel the exact same way about turkeys. Just like archery hunting for deer, I’m not gonna go out and buy the cheapest broadhead that would probably work, I’m gonna spend the money on the broadhead I KNOW will perform the best.

I think a lot of it might boil down to hunter success rates increasing. The simple solution to that is to reduce the number of tags.

How many hunters can have success without the use of decoys? Ain’t seen many on any TV show or YouTube.

Lots of things to talk about here. So first it seems that if I want be a "real" turkey hunter then I have to shoot heavy loads in a 12 ga and used box calls. All I use are box and other types of friction calls. As I have found them to be more effective 95% of the time than a mouth call. As most everyone is using them now.

I have shot 12ga and 3" to 3 1/2" loads and killed lots of turkeys with them. But I now know that I can use a 20ga which is 3 to 4 pounds lighter and outshoot those same 12ga loads. They are so much more effective and it does not cross your eyes every time you shoot it. As for tss being the decline in turkey numbers, I am pretty sure they all but wiped them out 100 years ago shooting lead. I think that the abundance of egg eaters, the wet and cold spring weather around hatching time and natural cycles have more to do it.

I only hunt W.V but I hunt it a lot. My work schedule allows me to hunt 20 plus days in our season. 95% of it is public land and national forest. This means long walks and lots of ups and down. The turkey numbers are good, but lots of miles between them. So if I can carry a lighter gun, all the better.

If was only worried about killing them at long range. I would just pack my rifle, which is legal here. It is also very popular with a lot of people. I worry way more about them, than I do the guys shooting tss.

As for the cost after you get sighted in. How many are you really going to use? What ever you legal limit is. So a box of 5 will last a good while. Its the same argument as traps. Why would you spend the money for a top of the line MB, Jake, Ect when you can catch them with duke traps. The reason is, you want to be as efficient as you can be. So why would you not use something that makes you more efficient.

I am shooting a Mossberg SA 20ga turkey gun. I like the 22 inch barrel. Indian Creek choke .555 . Reflex red dot. TSS in 9 and some in 9.5 shot. I am used to carrying a Remington SP 10ga turkey gun. 20 ga is so much easier too carry. I like hunting with my 410's too.

Been many years since I used my old 20 gauge w/3 inch chamber for gobblers. The first 17 toms I shot were with that old 870.

Remington 870, factory full choke, golden pheasant #5's. They are just birds FCOL.