If a writer is any good at his game--and the late Mr. McIntosh was better than most--he knows his audience. If I recall correctly--and I'm pretty sure I do--there used to be a specific column in Shooting Sportsman aimed at target shooters. That wasn't McIntosh's column. His was simply "Shooting". And in the article referenced, while he didn't write--maybe emphasizing in bold type--"CLAY SHOOTERS, PLEASE DISREGARD EVERYTHING CONTAINED HEREIN", he did make it pretty clear (by scarcely mentioning targets) that the column was aimed at upland hunters. As in: "For upland hunters, choke now is more bane than boon."
If one excludes doves, which are shot more like waterfowl than they are upland birds (over dogs), the most popular species in this country are pheasants, ruffed grouse (mixed with woodcock in the eastern half of the country), and bobwhites. On all of those, your average upland hunter, choosing his loads well, can kill plenty of birds with no choke at all. Having lived in Iowa when it was the #1 pheasant state in the nation, I had a chance to hunt them frequently. I seldom killed a rooster--or even took a shot at one--beyond 35 yards. I'd say I hit probably 80-90% of them inside 25 yards--at which range cylinder performs pretty much like full does at 40 yards (70% patterns).
McIntosh also understood--having coached a lot of shooters and participated in a lot of hunts (like those sponsored by Shooting Sportsman) with a pretty broad cross-section of hunters--that most are not very good shots beyond about 30 yards. And inside that distance, a gun with no choke has two clear advantages: the additional pattern spread compensates for aiming error; and the wide open pattern lessens the possibility of blowing a centered bird to pieces.
He specifically excludes turkey hunters and "crack long-range wildfowlers". Perhaps he should have also excluded the guys who are aces at trap and sporting clays. But not having addressed target shooting AT ALL in the article, I would have thought that would have been clear to readers.
But you can't please everyone with everything you write, which is something I learned myself pretty quickly when I started writing for various magazines.
Great post Mr. Brown
MM gets accused of just being a writer with no clue as to what he's doing, like Mr. Hoggson intimated.
McIntosh would shoot up to 20,000 shells per year at clay targets in his younger years and probably that much later in life at live birds. And coached hundreds of novice students and studied every aspect of the sport. I'd say that's enough experience for him to know what he was writing about.
Also, Do you think he saw just a few guys show up at a lesson, or attend one of those bird hunting excursions with a full choked model 12 or Parker and struggle to hit anything? It is likely that those shooters were his intended audience, not an experienced gunner who is adept at killing birds with a full choked 410. That is a rare level of skill not shared by many who take to the dove fields on September 1.
Vernal Pike
