Shotgunning: The Art and the Science

Recently I went to a chain bookstore looking for a text on upland game shooting. I was looking for something with warm, personal field tales and colorful pictures featuring shiny, well-trained dogs and lovingly cared for side-by-sides. I had no trouble finding such material. But it was this pulpy, somewhat dated text with dark, grainy black and white photos that I took home. Night after night I sat up transfixed while reading the results of painstaking research into why, when the moment of truth comes, we hit or miss our targets. More importantly, the text explained scientifically what can be done to up our hit percentages, whether our targets be living or clay. In this day when most of us find our protein sources in grocery stores the author provides us with advice on how to be more efficient and humane when pursuing wild game. So impressed was I with the style and contents of this book that I did a little research on the author. I found that he was not only a broadly skilled outdoorsman (he was an avid fisherman too), but a prominent and influential conservationist whose work was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. At first I considered rating this book at four stars because of its low-grade paper and the less than dazzling photos but, in light of the massive amount of useful information it contains, I didn't think that fair. Given the current climate in publishing we are lucky that somebody took the trouble to preserve this work for another generation. After reading this book some of the other offerings on the sporting lifestyle shelf seem kind of showy and thin.

Great book on shotgunning. Very informative and easy to read. The author did his homework by running many test patterns. The book is a few decades old and a little dated but not relevantly so.

The book was as advertised and delivery was on time. A good experience.

Every shot gunner should read this book.

If you want to read just one book on the subject, this is the one.

This book is very informative, improved my Sporting Clay game. I don't know why I hadn't read this book sooner.

Book does a good job discussing techniques to improve your shotgun skills. Provides distinct steps and ideas for shooting and also has a thorough discussion on shot patterns. Some of the specific shotgun shell discussion is dated but the overall concepts still apply. I have used the information I learned in the book to not only improve my shooting, but I also work with beginning youth shooters and the techniques I learned in the book helped me coach them.

Period. Well amazon wants more than that so... I'm about halfway through this book. The author takes a very scientific look at the properties of shot shell loads through the years and the science behind the function of shot with different chemical makeup. This book is not about how to tacticool up your 870... But it may well help you improve you skeet or trap scores as well as bag more birds on the wing.

I was looking for something a little more explanitive about the care and feeding of shotguns in general. This book, which is good for what it is, is more zen-like, ie., how to get in the zone with your firearm. Useful, but not what I was seeking.

I had high hopes for this book, but it did not deliver. Endless pages of experiments, all to prove the same point. The book itself is very poor quality, printed in black and white on very cheap paper. Looks like it was printed in the 1800's.
Try "Successful Shotgunning" by Peter Blakely, which I also purchased.