Funny thing about non-toxic shot....

[pianoman9701]

My warehouse years were with an abatement company, we removed lead, asbestos, mold and bio hazards, I went to the classes and handled the stuff on a daily basis.   I'm old enough to remember when Tobacco was harmless and Asbestos was a miracle material, and use and installed them, I still worry everytime I go in for a chest xray and hope they don't find a spot.

There are good reasons we abandoned lead water pipes, lead in plumbing solder, paint and lead in gasoline, it harms people and the environment.  We have been able to find effective replacements.  How long do we wait, till there are massive die offs because the insignificant lead finally built up to a problem like it did for waterfowl, or maybe we'll find out that a major aquafer is contaminated and we have to pay double or triple for our drinking water.  As far as moving good luck this problem isn't just in WA other states have banned Lead shot on public lands and and it is growing.

Learning to live with non toxics is not that painful,  I said I was getting rid of guns that that would lose value when lead ban is in place, not getting rid of heirlooms.  For the old guys I load soft non toxics and they still go out in the field allot and have upgraded to steel safe guns for high volume shooting.  For me $35 a box for soft non toxics that are loaded for my guns and is effective in the field isn't unreasonable,  it isn't that much more than premium lead field loads or or premium steel.

I don't know where you're buying your shells, but the price is at least double over lead.

In addition, as I've stated before, I understand using non-toxic in concentrated areas like release sites and waterfowl hunting, but for birds out on the range and in the woods where there's no such concentration, there's no scientific evidence to say that we're hurting the wildlife or the environment, and I seriously doubt there's any impact at all. I'm not willing to sign on to something because there "might" be a problem. The smoke from muzzleloaders or a hunter's burning cigarette might give birds lung cancer. But I'm not willing to outlaw MLs and regulate second-hand smoke in the woods because of "might". I believe the concentration of second hand smoke or ML smoke in the woods is comparable to the random concentration of lead shot.

This is nothing like the concentration of asbestos or lead or mercury in an industrial environment. If I'd been working in those places, I'd be getting checked, too. But to compare that to open range or forest hunting with lead shot? There's no similarity at all between the two. Keep getting your lungs checked, but don't make up rules for hazards where they don't exist.

[AWS]

I load my own.  That way I can load low pressure for my damascus, 2 1/2", and old timers, that way I always have the shells handy.

[Stilly bay]

I load my own.  That way I can load low pressure for my damascus, 2 1/2", and old timers, that way I always have the shells handy.

what are non-toxics are you reloading?

[AWS]

ITX from Ballistic Products and some Nice Shot from Precision Reloading.  I'm going to abandon the Nice shot as the ITX works as well and is cheaper.  The only Nice shot I'll be loading is BB's for coyotes in notox zones out of my combo gun(the one in my avatar).

For modern guns I use Dead Coyote on coyotes in firearms restricted areas where I can't use the combo rig.

[Stilly bay]

I will have to look into ITX, since I was already pretty impressed with Nice shot.

[Curly]

If checked by a warden, how does he know if your non-toxic (nice shot or ITX) is not lead?  Does he have to cut open a shell to check? 

[Special T]

they have machines that you drop the shell into and it will tell them even what mix of non tox you have... I think it uses magnetics and some kind of density reader... sonar??? But no they don't have to cut it open.

[bobcat]

Boy wouldn't that just suck if you had 50 shells and the warden cut every single one open, just hoping to find one that had lead shot in it?   

[Special T]

My brother had Every shell he had (25 shot shell limit) and his buddy checked. Its pretty easy to just check the primer and crimp to see if it is as stamped.

[fethrduster]

That's good to know that ITX is comparable to Nice Shot.  My only beef with ITX is it only comes in 6's and 4's, and I prefer 5's for ducks/pheasants in my 16's.  I could go 6's for pheasants though and 4's for ducks if I use my 12. 

[Bigshooter]

You want proof that lead is way better than steel?  If steel is sooooooooooo good and equal to lead, then why in the hell do we have companies making nontoxic shot that almost weighs as much as lead?  If steel is soooooooooo good and equal to lead would we really need, heavi shot?  Bismuth?  Or any of the nontoxics that are being made today to mimic lead for 3 or 4 times the cost of steel?   The only thing steel is good for is feeding coyotes with cripples.

[Special T]

or just feeding to coyotes.. I've killed them with BBB steel before... Up close and personal!

[fethrduster]

ITX and Nice Shot cause pretty high chamber pressures when reloading also. One has to be careful.  The best non toxic load I've used so far is for my 1896 Lefever damascus gun with 2.5" chambers.  It's a Kent Tungsten Matrix 2.5" roll crimped load of 1 1/16oz #5's.  Holy cow, it stones pheasants dead (I went thirteen in a row last year without a miss) and is a fantastic duck load over decoys too.  The downside is it's $69/box of 25, so at roughly $3/round, you tend to make your shots count.  It's worth it though, to be able to use a gun I enjoy, vs one that is just a tool.  Here's a couple shots from last year (any excuse to post photos is a good one ):

[Shoffy]

  Great pictures man!!

[Dhoey07]

Cool pics but 3 bucks a round  That's a spendy duck limit