33 yards is about my hard and fast limit for Dove. Before I shoot the first Dove, I place several markers at 30 years. They can be as simple as weeds cut for the purpose, or decoys placed in plain sight. Point is I know what lead I need for an incoming or crossing Dove at 30 yards, it is just harder to know what 30 yards is, depending on the field and background. I take that variable out when I can. I mostly shoot 1/2 ounce loads, running 1250 fps. I can load hotter, faster if you want, but find hotter does not pattern as well most times. Later season Doves are much harder to kill, being fully feather out and all mature birds. For those, if I take a .410, I only use very full chokes with 1300+fps loads, with 7 shot and try to take 25 yard shots when I can.

I am not Wayne Mayes, the greatest .410 Skeet shooter ever. 200 100X 100’s. But out to 30-33 yards I can hold my own with all but a few shooters. Most shooter are bad a range estimation. Many a bird hit at 30 yards is claimed at 40 or 50 plus. And where a bird lands is not a great way to figure out what range it was hit at. I have killed Dove at an honest 30 yards, which were closer to 50 or even 60 when recovered. Moment will carry a dead bird a long ways, if it is under a head of steam and has some height. But no .410 will kill Dove at 50-60 yards.

I shoot .410’s for Sporting Clays all the time. 7- 8,000 birds in the last year. I only struggle on the birds much greater than 40 yards, but am about 50:50 between 30 and 40. I don’t know I would do substantially better with a 12. For sporting clays last year my best score was 91 and worst score was 73 with my .410. I did have one 49X50 but that was a lot of luck. Mostly I am in the low to mid 80’s.

Most sporting clays ranges nearby are in wooded areas and the shots have more small windows than long shots. A few do use a tower but mostly I can find a quick window to give me a decent opportunity. I find too many incomes targets to not be a real challenge on a lot of layouts. To me incomers are gimme birds. You can smoke any incomes, even with a .410. Being aggressive helps with targets like teal, or targets with small windows. I’ll never run a hundred straight, with a .410 at Sporting Clays, but I do enjoy the heck out of shooting it. And I get 800 loadsto the bag of shot.