.... and I think with my gun/choke combo, I think I have a 30 yard gun. I'm using an 870 express magnum with a cabela's super-full choke (.665) with 28 inch barrel and non-adjustible fiber optic sights. I tried 3 different shotgun loads; Winchester HV 3" magnum #5 shot at 25 yards, Federal Mag-shok 3 " mag #4 shot at 25 yards and Remington heavi-shot 3" magnum #4 shot at 37.5 yards. Here are the results of the 3 different loads:





Winchester HV 3" mag at 25 yards; 125 hits in a 6 inch circle (33 hits in the vitals), back and front of target




Federal Mag-shok 3" mag at 25 yards; 128 hits in a 6 inch circle (25 hits in the vitals), back and front of target



Remington heavi-shot 3 " mag at 37.5 yards; 54 hits in a 6 inch circle, only 8 hits in the vitals; back and front

I know I can kill the bird with only 8 hits to the vitals but I don't want to chance wounding a bird. I'm not going to buy a new choke or gun this year so I think I'm safe if I keep it under 30 yards. I wish I could have had a larger target (like swampcollie suggested) to get a bigger picture of what my gun was doing at 37.5 yards but i was at a public rifle range with smallish target blocks barely big enough for my turkey targets. What do you guys think? Am I beingtoo conservative with the effective range estimate on my gun?