A couple of years ago I watched a local "TV celebrity" hunting a club in Eastern Ontario. Here's how it went. Celeb shows up early and checks his gun shooting a couple of clays thrown out of the trap house. Then goes into the lodge for a seven course feast they call lunch. While celeb is feeding his face, the owner goes to the pheasant pens and loads up the mobile multi coop unit on the trailer behind his ATV. Then he heads out to the hunting grounds. A small clipboard is attached to center of steering wheel. At various spots the game keeper stops, pulls out a bird, hypnotizes it (Google "hypnotize chicken"), sticks bird's head under wing, and sets it down. Then he returns to the ATV, marks a way point on his GPS, and records the coordinates (presumably in case GPS craps out). After all the birds have been placed, he returns to the lodge, dumps the trailer, picks up the dog (some ultra expensive exotic white thing they breed that frankly wasn't worth a shit), loads up the client, and they head out for the "hunt." It only got worse. The birds were of course each right where he left them. Most would not fly. Owner had to kick them in the air or sometimes bend over and toss them in the air. A few just landed immediately. Thankfully (I guess?) the dumb dog didn't go grab them. I'm not saying all clubs are like this but I've certainly seen enough videos of released bird hunts to conclude very close shooting is usually expected. For truly wild birds, especially late in the season, exactly the opposite is usually expected. If I'd been on the above adventure, I would have been very comfortable shooting big roosters with a 28 gauge ... maybe even a 410. For a big bore, I'd DEFINITELY open up the choke as much as possible. One ounce #5 shot would be way more than needed.
