Choke Tubes for Waterfowl Hunting Explained | Shotgunning Series Part 3

is a full choke the same as a long range choke do i need a bismuth choke to shoot boss are factory chokes good enough there are so many questions about choke tubes and i'm not going to answer all of them today but i'm going to take a pretty good crack at answering the big stuff i'm joel strickland and this is part three of my shotgunning series right here on surviving duck season hey everyone thanks for watching so what choke tube is your go to and why do you use it let me know down in the comments i really want to know so i appreciate you taking the time and giving me your feedback now when i'm producing a video for y'all i really do my homework i do tons of research and make sure that the information i give you is accurate and presented in a way that makes sense and is helpful for you so when i was researching choke tubes i looked up what others had done on the subject looking at a few videos and read a bunch of articles certainly there is some good information out there but you wouldn't believe how many articles that i found with the title something like everything you need to know about choke tubes really i wish it were that easy to boil down choke tubes into 300 words or less the articles were actually from well-known publications and several of these articles look like they were written by someone who didn't shoot or hunt very much now today we are talking about choke tubes and no it's not everything you need to know and it's not all there is to know on choke tubes but this is going to give you a good understanding and help set the stage for further videos in my shotgun series so these are choke tubes and i'm guessing that you probably already have a basic understanding of what they're supposed to do they change the constriction of your shot pattern in general a more open choke produces a wider pattern while a tighter choke makes a smaller pattern cylinder being no choke tube constriction meaning the widest and tighter chokes being like a full or an extra full or maybe even a turkey choke now most new shotguns that you buy today come with some factory chokes normally at least three like full modified and improved cylinder now the majority of factory choke tubes have notches cut into the rim like this that's so it will help you know the difference one notch is for full two notches is improved modified three is modified for improved five for cylinder so how do you know which one to shoot well there are some basic guidelines that have been promoted for 30 plus years they're not entirely wrong but only look at it as a starting point i'm going to share it with you but please don't take this as the end-all be-all there's a whole lot more to it than this so depending on the distance that you're playing to shoot a duck or a goose will change which tube you want to start with in general 20 yards and under go with an improved cylinder 20 to 40 yards modified 40 plus a full while we're talking about full chokes let me say this full chokes and extended range chokes a lot of them are not approved for shooting steel shot through so make sure you check sometimes they'll have it written on the choke if it's a steel choke and then also when you buy the choke off the rack they'll say on the packaging if it's a proof or steel shot or not that's really important on the tighter constricted chokes because a lot of them you're not supposed to shoot steel shot through and some of them even will let you shoot smaller steel shot but not like maybe bbs and some of the larger size shots so just make sure you check on that then you need to shoot your ammo and choke tube to see what it looks like on paper see what pattern looks like see if it looks decent at the yardage that you're planning to shoot while you're hunting i'm not necessarily talking about full on patterning your gun not yet this is just the very basics to get you started on the right track shooting paper get a roll of paper from hobby lobby or wherever cut 40 or 48 inches get a big square and then draw a 30 inch circle on it put a dot in the middle and shoot it at the distance you want to hunt again this is not really patterning a gun per se it's just for the guy or gal who's never done this before you've got a box of steel shot or whatever and you aren't sure what tube to start with it takes you 15 minutes now we're not going to get into counting pellets or doing percentages or any of that we're just interested in the basic look of the pattern on paper here's something else this is the stuff that really just blows my mind but just because your choke says it's a modified or a full doesn't mean that's what it really is i'm not making this up you need to look at it on paper and that's the only way you can know what it is it's important to know if you're going to buy an aftermarket choke tube make sure you look on the package to see if it will fit your gun i shoot a winchester sx4 so it uses a browning infector plus which you see that written right there all choke tube companies will have a fitment guide on their website or whatever so you know whatever type of gun you you shoot you need to make sure that you get the choke tube that goes specifically for your gun what about aftermarket choke tubes that's why y'all are here i know it's one of the biggest questions which one is the best or are aftermarket chokes better than factory chokes in the past year i've shot 27 different choke tubes from eight different companies the biggest names and chokes and i've got lots of data throughout this series i'll be sharing it with you now like i've done in my first two episodes of this series let's take a look back in history the year 1978 in the south american nation of guyana cult leader jim jones had brainwashed hundreds of his followers to drink a fruit punch laced with cyanide he convinced them of an alternate reality and so they bought into this twisted tangle of delusional thinking and committed suicide it's known as the jonestown massacre what would cause people to follow him so blindly to take everything he said is gospel truth without researching anything for themselves it was a fatal mistake now stay with me it'll make sense in a minute many of you know when is duck season in arkansas i'm a duck hunting guide and this past season i asked everyone who sat in my blind what choke and ammo they were shooting i found a common scenario that happened with nearly every group of hunters it was normally a 50 50 split with guys who shot an aftermarket versus a factory choke there was usually one guy in every group who was the company spokesperson for his brand to choke reciting the marketing bullet points you'd swear he created the tube himself if someone asked him a question he tell you with authority the research behind it and why it's the best often sharing why you'd be a fool to use anything else guess which choke brand i'm talking about well before i tell you i'm going to predict right now that it's already been done in the comments of this video now don't go edit your comment just let it go some of you are going to be surprised though that the name brand of the company i'm talking about is jebs kicks pattern master carlson's briley rob roberts you get the idea so how is it possible that each guy could be totally convinced that his tube is the best and all others are complete garbage so i asked the guys if they'd ever compared their chokes with others how they knew theirs were the best usually it got responses like well it just smashes the ducks i've never seen anything like it i asked every single person who sat in my blind if they'd patterned their gun ammo and choke tube that they were using that day and you know how many actually said yes to yep two all duck season out of like a hundred and something guys have you ever shot it at paper one time nope a few of them did say that they patterned it a few years ago but not with the ammo they were using that day how can they know that theirs is the best if they hadn't compared it with others even what's more curious to me is how that all major brands have convinced somebody that theirs is the best and all others are inferior it's both funny and sad that so many people have drank the kool-aid as i began working on the research for this series i looked at the different choke tube companies and saw how many options they all had it can be really confusing i mean how are you supposed to know which one to buy well most of the companies have a basic full modified and improved and all the other ones but then they also have these specialty chokes for example many companies have a specific tube for bismuth tubes specifically for like blindside ammo and for black cloud ammo there's tubes that are smooth some are ported and even some that have a wad stripper several months ago i had the opportunity to speak with several of the pioneers in choke tube technology i asked him lots of questions learning as much as i could about chokes scott carlson of carlson's chokes has been making choke tubes for over 30 years i spoke with him at length by phone and he helped me with a lot of information from all of his years of experience one question i asked him was how does a guy navigate all the different options of choke tubes specifically for waterfowl hunting do i really need a choke for every type of ammo that i could potentially shoot so he explained to me that the different tubes like his bone buster bismuth choke or black cloud choke are all about marketing when he said that i thought wow i can't believe you just told me that but then he went on to say that's not a bad thing we're just trying to help guys find the right choke tube for what they're shooting well sure we have our standard modified and improved cylinder for guys who know what they need but there are so many guys that have absolutely no idea what to get often many of their chokes may work for multiple ammo but it makes it easy for a guy to find the right choke the way that they've named them i've discovered this to be common practice amongst most of the choke tube industry especially for waterfowl unfortunately it seems to be that there's a lack of interest in the majority of waterfowl hunters to educate themselves in shotgunning there i said it basically the choke tube industry is dumbing it down to help guys find the right product shame on us so much of hunting has been passed on as tradition that includes shotguns ammo and choke tubes so many guys are doing things not because it's the best way but because that's what their daddy did and that's what his daddy did often nobody really even knows why we need mentors teaching people the way and teaching them why and we all need to be students of our passion we owe it to the ducks and geese that we hunt and to future generations okay you're here watching this video so you're definitely in the right place right now so when we look at waterfowl chokes we see many companies using terms like long range mid-range decoy passing timber and when we see that we instantly understand the range that we're supposed to use these chokes but really aren't they all just the same meaning a full the same as a long range the same as a passing choke you think so but you can't assume that because i can tell you right now you'd be disappointed but my intention on this series is to help you narrow it down and cut through all the marketing baloney don't drink the kool-aid and make sure you watch all the testing that i've done throughout the rest of the series okay so after you decide on a choke or two then look at it on paper your next step is to get it all dialed in by shooting multiple rounds and changing your tubes and ammo to pick out what the best combination is for you but that's not this video that's the next video make sure you watch it god bless you i'm joel strickland and i'll see you there

Channel: Surviving Duck Season

Views: 16,692

Keywords: arkansas duck hunting guide, stuttgart arkansas duck hunting, duck hunting, Shotgun, shotgunning, shotgun series, shotgun for waterfowl, joel strickland duck hunting, duck season, duck gun, Rob Roberts, Winchester SX4, Browning, Bismuth, Kicks High flyer, BOSS Shotshells, Shotshells, waterfowl Ammo, 12 gauge, choke tube, 3 inch shotgun, Carlson's chokes, Carlson chokes, surviving duck season, Patternmaster, waterfowl chokes, Muller Chokes, Jebs, Briley Chokes

Id: Q_GFmqeRNlg

Length: 13min 13sec (793 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 25 2022