ORIGINAL: GordonGekko
while I personally haven't shot it much (just a handful of shells, not enough to constitute real experience IMO) I shared a blind with more folks than I care tocount shooting it...and there were noticably more cripples on birds they shot than those I shot with Hevi-Shot.... cleaning those birds showed fewer pellets with less penetration than hevi-shot.... Like I said shoot whatever makes you happy, and I am glad it works for you, it may be the next best thing to Hevi-Shot, Bismutch, etc...but the "next best thing" does not make it an equal...that is all I am trying to say....
this is all really just a sidebar to the original question...if you likeblack cloud then shoot it, it will perform just fine, but the most important thing is to sharpen up your shooting skills, that will reduce your ammo expense regardless of what you shoot....
Comparing ANY steel shot and a high density performance wise.... is like comparing Catherine Zeta-Jones to Rosie O'Donnell. Ain't nobody going to argue or debate the effectiveness of hevi-shot (real hevi-shot that is) to steel.
You can compare Black Cloud to steel... which is really the heart of the matter I think.... but if everyone could afford to shoot hevi-shot all day long I suspect we'd all be shooting it. I use it often as my first shell for geese, backed up by two Win Supreme 3" BBs.... and its a great combonation of power and economics.... its the first one that I try and make count anyway.
I absolutely agree that any type of pellet, put on target by a dead-eye shot is worth three shells of hevi-shot fired quickly in vain to hit nothing but air.