On our most recent trip to El Cortijo in Argentina, Vicki and I were taking a break one afternoon watching our students shoot birds. We talked about how, on this trip (as on many of the previous trips) when we shot and missed, we were in front. This has happened to us on a regular basis, and we’ve witnessed it with our students in Argentina and in Mexico years ago.
Experienced clay shooters will almost always miss the birds in front when they begin shooting on a hunt. Now, don’t get the wrong idea; we are not telling you to go on your next wingshooting safari without practicing on clays before you go because you will miss the birds in front. Experienced clay shooters will quickly make whatever adjustment necessary to begin to hit live birds, regardless of what they or the birds do, because they’re accustomed to making changes when they shoot clays.
Wingshooters who are not experienced clay shooters cannot make any adjustment, because the last time they touched their gun was on the last hunt – whenever and wherever that might have been. They’re hopelessly trapped behind the bird because they mount their gun and chase the birds with the muzzle, trying to get in front far enough to hit the bird. They end up shooting lots of shells but not getting very good results.
Our observation is that experienced clay shooters will typically miss birds at the beginning of the first hunt of the season or at the beginning of a high-volume hunt like the one we were on in Argentina. There won’t be many shots in front – maybe 15 to 20 – but they will be in front. That’s what puzzles us.
I think we might have stumbled onto the reason while sitting on the tailgate of a truck on our last trip to Cordoba.
As we sat there watching thousands of birds flying to and from every direction possible, we discussed the majority of our misses being in front during this entire trip. The normal cause for that was gun speed. But not with us. We work on that consistently both in shooting and teaching. We were coming up too far in front of birds we knew we should be shooting almost right at. And we knew better. So, what was the cause?
It hadn’t shown up when we were shooting white-winged doves at the Nooner Ranch the week after last Christmas. Our long time student and friend, Russ Burquine, called us one night just after Christmas. He said Gerry at the Nooner Ranch in Hondo had had some birds and wanted to know if we would like to go over with him and his long time hunting companion Bob White. We’d shoot a limit one afternoon, spend the night, shoot again the next morning and come home. We looked at the weather and the decision seemed a no-brainer; great people, good high-flying white-winged doves, and a trip to the Nooner Ranch. Well, duh!
The next afternoon found us with our K-20s just north of a tree line outside of Hondo, Texas with a 7/8th oz load of Rio #6s, handing out some diplomas to birds flying about 30 to 35 yards high. That day and the next morning, we both got our limit. But that’s a story for another day. And it helped us answer the question we were pondering in that field that day in Argentina.
As we watched the birds flying from a certain direction, every now and then one of them would lock their wings and soar. It was almost like they were floating, but they were actually moving as fast as the other birds in the sky. But the others appeared to be moving faster.
We kept asking ourselves what the difference was. Then it dawned on us. It was the speed of the wing beat that made some appear to move faster than the others. As we watched closely, we realized that there were 4 different sizes of birds in the sky at the same time. The big birds didn’t have to move their wings as fast to go the same speed as the middle size and smallest birds. Regardless of size, they were all going the same speed but the smaller the bird, the “más rápido,” the wing beats were to stay up with the other birds in the flock. And they all stayed together as they swarmed in front of us.
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