I finally got educated on shotguns

I own lots of guns and only 3 shotguns. I am not a big bird hunter, because I suck at shotguns. I may be lucky to get 4 dove from a whole box of shells
My son on the other hand hits everything he aims at


This past saturday, taking a break after lunch and waiting to go out again, I was telling a friend about how my cheek was sore after shooting and he said that shouldnt be happening if my gun "fit me"

He then looked at it and measured my arm with the gun and we found out the stock was way too short and the angle or what he called drop was wrong

Seriously guys, I am a damn fine pistol and rifle shot. I went prairie dog hunting in New Mexico and held my own at 300 yards with the rest of them, but I have always struggled with doves and clays

Now I get it, I finally understand that the stock being too short was causing me to do all sorts of things, especially push my face down so I can see straight down the barrel and not down on top of it, whichs makes you over shoot

I took another shotgun dad gave me, a Winchester XTR 1500 and the stock was longer on that, and I added a walmart special recoil pad (temperary fix) with an extra 1/4 inch of dense foam padding I added and now my trigger finger is inside the tigger guard and wow what a difference! I can close my eyes and throw that gun up on my shoulder and open my eyes and I can see straight down the barrel and see the bead

I went out last night and shot clays and hit 6 out of 10, which is a big improvment for me! I'm going out Saturday dove hunting and I think once I get used to the new hold that my world is going to change for dove hunting.
I am 6'6" with long arms and my friend said it would be next to impossible to get a shotgun that fit me out of the box. I would have to find something that was close and work on it

I can't thank him enough

Shotguns are a lot like bows, they need to fit the shooter. All you habe to do is look at any Olympic clay shooter. They have ever pissible angle on that stock custom fit to them. In all honesty rifles should too but its easierto get away with a rifle that doesnt fit well.

booradley is the one on here who mentioned shotgun fit to me in a thread and once I started paying attention to that, I realized why I liked some guns so much more than others. My Beretta AL-2 and old Springfield 67B both fit me extremely well. Glad you got it all sorted out!

Congrats! Proper fit in a shotgun makes all the difference in the world. When I bought my Weatherby SA-08 a few years ago, I looked at and handled nearly every autoloader on the market, and it fit me the best. Sure enough, I shoot it better than any I've owned previously.

yes sir. I guess the thing that stuck out to me was that with a shotgun, your eye acts as the rear sight so if the gun doesn't fit, you can't have good sight alignment and you will be off target