Gil, I hate patterning a gun. I did it once with a four-ten to see if the pattern was adequate but that was the only time. Maybe I can just fire a couple of shots out over open water and see if the spread is sorta wide, kinda tight, or somewhere in between. The four days of rain last week killed me. It probably only raised the water a little over a foot but that equates to quite a few acres on the lake basin. I walked a few miles to shoot at four birds and somehow I managed to kill three of them. Then I paddled around and jump shot at the few that were feeding on floating peat mats. Killed the first two of those I shot at but them missed two out of the next three. None of the birds are shot up and they were all taken between 20-30 yards. Maybe I just nipped them with the fringe of the pattern.
