using target rounds on rabbits ok--? shotgun

A

awesomeame

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Etobicoke, Ontario
Since the excitement of deer season is winding down, thought I'd take my 20ga citori out for a walk in the bush this weekend and coming weekends since rabbit and grouse are open!! I have about 2000rds of #8, 2-3/4" target rounds sitting in my basement. Is there any reason I can't use these to hunt with? I couldn't find anything in the regs saying "no."

??

Matt
 
8's will definitely work as bunnies are easy to kill, but you'd see better results with something bigger like 4's or 5's as they seem to do better when shooting at animals in/behind some brush piles. small pellets like that usually don't exit, so expect to pick out a bunch of shot when you're eating the critters.
 
Thanks for the headsup. I've forgotten about picking the shot out.....with luck I just did some digging around in the basement and turns out I have about 20-ish boxes of various of 3", 4, 5, & 6 kicking around....gawd I've got a lot of ammo around here, don't even know what I have, haha.

Matt
 
Yes they will work I would recommend using very open chokes or you will end up eating a lead sandwich. Also I have noticed a increase in the snowshoe hare population this year in Ontario so the hunting should be good.
 
Its what we used to use exclusively until the rules came out for non-toxic in waterfowl. Worked fine on ducks, geese, grouse, and even the occasional squirrel. As long as you arent shooting waterfowl, you are good to go
 
Sometimes I use the more expensive Federal Prairie Storm #6s also in my 20 gauge. But often in the recent past, at the close ranges I find grouse and rabbits up here in the boreal forest, cheap Winchester 7 1/2 target loads are sufficient for this task. Next year I might just reserve the Prairie Storm shotshells for sharptails or hungarian partridge on the more open farm field edges. I strongly suspect your #8s would have not one iota practical difference to my 7 1/2 shells.

maybe
 
I prefer 7.5 or 8 for rabitts. I also prefer target loads. I have found that the lower speed and lighter pellets of the target loads perform just fine and I get minimal meat damage. In fact most of the small pellets only make it through the skin and don't make it in to the meat. I like to run one #9 in one tube of my 28 gauge and a 7.5 with a tighter choke in the other. Rabitts go out easy and with the smaller shot you will have a nice dense pattern that a running rabitt or a grouse cannot escape.
 
oneskilledshooter said:
I prefer 7.5 or 8 for rabitts. I also prefer target loads. I have found that the lower speed and lighter pellets of the target loads perform just fine and I get minimal meat damage. In fact most of the small pellets only make it through the skin and don't make it in to the meat. I like to run one #9 in one tube of my 28 gauge and a 7.5 with a tighter choke in the other. Rabitts go out easy and with the smaller shot you will have a nice dense pattern that a running rabitt or a grouse cannot escape.
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I use a 20 gauge O/U and sometimes I even find the wad has become a lethal projectile on the slightly more fragile grouse. And more often with the grouse, than the rabbits that I usually have to shoot at through dense bush or foliage.
 
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