Upland Hunting, Bird Dog and Shotgun BS Thread

Nick was very helpful to me on my Minnesota grouse trip. He's a great guy and I hope I get to hunt with him soon.

 

Anyone shoot a Franchi? I have been looking for a good deal on a user Beretta 686 for a while now and am considering broadening my search to other guns. I am open to other suggestions.

 

I've heard only good stuff about Franchi instinct o/u guns. For a cheap and reliable auto loader a franchi 48al is hard to beat, in a 20ga it's the perfect chukar gun imo at 5.5lbs and cheap enough to abuse.

 

I'm about to start my 4th season with a Franchi SL 20ga. Love it! it's my goto. It weighs 5lbs and is a joy to carry all day long.
Kick is reasonable. ( I don't shoot 3"]. Standard loads are adequate over pointers and I only use lead.
I've got the 28ga S on my short list.

 

All the grouse, errr I mean paat-ridge pics on here look to be gray phase......very rare in NE Ohio and NW Pa. where I used to hunt them. 99.9 percent are the brown/rust color.

I used to have 3 Brittanies and an English setter over a 20 year or so bird hunting career. Okie Dokie Jamoke (Brittany) was by far the best. Hunting buddy had a Draathar (German wire haired pointer) when I met him and he hooked me on grouse hunting. His dog, Brandi, was the ugliest bird dog, but when she pointed you had better been ready 'cause something was about to explode!!!

OP - you really looking for an OU? I have a Beretta 686 Whitewing 20 gauge with 28" barrels/screw in chokes I am trying to sell. Have a local guy interested, but has not gotten back to me in over 6 weeks. Hunted with it less than 6 times. MAYBE shot it a dozen times. LET ME KNOW IF INTERESTED.

Used my old Winchester 59 with a cut down 25" barrel and no choke or front bead. NICE light gun due to the alloy and composite make up of it. Great for hunting thickets!!

 

Also, meant to say NICE DOGS everyone.......I have no digital pics of any of mine to share. First 2 Britts were liver and white (Hoopie Dog and Iggy Pup) while Okie was the classic orange and white. Woodie (Woodrow Buford) the setter was classic white, black and a bit of brown.

Also, my buddie that hooked me on bird hunting said bird dog names should end in "ie" or "y" for good luck, hence:

Hoopie
Iggy
Okie
Woodie

 

I shot a few different phase birds in MN but mostly grey and a beautiful intermediate phase. These were the only two fans I was able to salvage and unfortunately the setter dog got ahold of the intermediate phase and ate it.

 

My setter was a little rough on the dead birds.......he would dig at them with his front paws - plucked the backs of a few of them!

 

Lady is real soft mouthed but she couldn't resist jumping up and plucking that fan down off the mantle I guess.

 

Nothing wrong with the Franchi guns at all.

I am listing a 687 Ultralight Deluxe 12 ga. 28" on Gunbroker soon with 8 Beretta Victory Extended Choke Tubes.



It has harvested a few birds for me



For grouse I only use a 16 now and for pheasants in SD use a Benelli Ultralight 12 and an Ohio made Ithaca 37 Ultralight 12 ga. All 3 guns weigh within a few oz. of 6 pounds. But the Benelli and Ithaca have the safety located in the correct location so decided to let the 687UL go.

I'm in no hurry and going to start bidding at $1195 in the hopes that it gets to ~$1,400, or more of course. But if your interested let me know and could go lower, if not no big deal.

The Beretta 68X series are all the same. My primary target gun is a Joel Etchen custom combo 687 Silver Pigeon with 682 Gold E barrels.

Aspen. Grew up in NC Pa. and Southern Tier of NY hunting grouse in the 70's and were mainly reds with a few grays. By the time you get down to the Southern Appalacians where I moved to Mn. from you don't see any gray phase at all. The further North and West you go the more grey you will see. Not many are reds around here. So to shoot 2 reds in a day isn't common. But it happens.



Last year I also had a rare trifecta. Red, gray and a spruce on the same day.



Everyone complained how bad the hunting was last year. But had one of my best since the 70's. Mainly because a few years ago I went back to the gun I grew up with an Ithaca 37 26" IC in 16 ga.



Now that I am harvesting grouse in good numbers I am selling off a few guns so I can buy a couple of SxS guns and screw things up again LOL. SxS guns might be more photogenic with bird pictures but I'll likely carry the 37's mainly.

 

A few "rusty" Ohio/Pa. birds My only TRUE double on grouse A picture of a picture of Okie - not long before he passed

 

Once Okie passed on (not too awfully long after Woodie died) I hung up the small game hunting and no more dogs for me, either.

 

I enjoy Nick’s Project Upland Podcast. I also listen to the Orvis Wingshooting Podcast.

 

Nice guns and a great looking dog. I would love to have the 687 but I am in the $1000 and under price range. This is the main reason I am looking for a used gun.

 

The Hunting Dog Podcast and the Birds Booze and Buds podcast are a couple other good ones.

 

I tried the Hunting Dog Notebook podcast, but his audio quality is crap. Also, in one episode, he was talking about how he blatantly shot before legal shooting hours, and not in an "it was an honest mistake and I didn't mean it" kind of way, but in more of a "haha, look what I did" way. I can't support that so I un-subscribed and stopped listening. Tried Birds Booze and Buds, but waaay too vulgar for me. If I wanted to hear language like that, I'd go visit some random person in prison.

 

Now, that's a Gordon Setter that's very rare. The black and tan face on English marked body. I've seen exactly 1 in the wild!

 

Are you sure it's not just a tri-colored English setter or Llewellin setter?

 

Yeah, she's just a stock tri colored English setter. A lot of very good Grouse Ridge dogs and other notables in her ped.

 

Nope, not sure in the least...but I thought the black and tan mask was exclusive to Gordon's regardless of body markings.