In my last story on this gun, I said that I thought that slinging the Pardner was probably not the best way to carry it. I’ve changed my mind. I added a barrel-band sling-swivel up front and a $6 nylon sling. It does indeed carry quite comfortably that way.

Well, certainly a load of birdshot in the face should give serious pause to an attacking fox or other small, rabid furry creature such as a skunk or a racoon, but what about stronger options for the .410, such as slugs and buckshot? Besides for self-defense, how about slugs and buckshot for general small-game hunting purposes with the .410?

The only testing I had done with the Pardner so far was to blow away some empty pop cans at short range, and to hit a few hand-thrown clays in the air. I decided to gather up a few different loads including birdshot, slugs, and buckshot to see how they look on paper.

First I wanted to see what the birdshot patterns looked like. But just shooting at a blank sheet is no fun, so I did a quick internet search for a good picture of a rattler for my target. Sorry to disappoint, but I didn’t take the first photo in this story of the coiled rattler in person! I also still had some small furry game targets left over from a .22 shoot we held up in the pines a few years back.

My first test load was the 2½” Winchester AA target load. This load holds ½ ounce (219 grains) of #9 birdshot. I figured that 5 yards would be about the maximum distance that you might stand away from a rattler before pulling the trigger. I mentioned that I removed the sighting bead from the top of the barrel to prevent snagging brush while carrying. I sighted straight along the top of the barrel, covering the target with the end of the barrel. I found out that this particular shotgun throws its charge a little high and right, sighted thus. Still, enough of the swarm struck head and body to have done the job.

2½” Winchester AA ½ oz. #9 birdshot, 5 yards

The next load tried was another birdshot load, the 3 inch Federal with 11/16 ounce (301 grains) of #7½ shot. This is a heavier payload of bigger shot. This time I aimed low and to the left to compensate for the high-right impact point I had seen with the Winchester load. My target backer is a piece of red corrugated plastic. It was interesting how this load opened up the paper target in the fat part of the snake’s body, which made it look like raw red meat was exposed!

3” Federal 11/16 oz. #7½ birdshot, 5 yards

OK, so besides the fact that the center of the swarm hits a little high and right, the effect of the birdshot pattern on a diamondback target was pretty much as expected. What could we expect from the slugs?

As it happened, one of my furry creature targets was a fox. Printed on 8½” x 11” paper, I would say that the fox was about 2/3-scale. I stepped back to 10 yards and fired two slug rounds at it. I had only one slug load with me, the Federal ¼ ounce (109 grain) Foster-type rifled slug.

I was impressed when the first shot printed right inside the kill zone of the target. Remember that I have no sights on this gun, I’m just sighting along the top of the barrel. The second shot was also a stopper if not a killer, striking just forward of the on-side hip where it would have continued traveling into the center of the off-side hip.

2½” Federal ¼ oz. rifled slug, 10 yards

For this gun, I see slugs as having greater utility for small game hunting purposes, rather than for defense against rabid critters. Maybe best suited for pot shots of opportunity at cottontails or jackrabbits.

For self defense against rabid critters, I think buckshot is the better choice. However, the .410 with buckshot has its drawbacks. First of all, in such a small shotshell, you will have a small number of pellets. The whole reason for using shot rather than a slug, is to increase your hit probability. However the other drawback is that to have more pellets, the pellets will have to be smaller, limiting the delivered energy of each individual buckshot.

I have found only 3 or 4 commercial loads of buckshot for the .410. Two are made by Winchester (sort of). Winchester catalogs a 2½” load of 3 triple-ought buck balls, plus a 3” load of 5 triple-ought (000) buck balls. Trouble is, that the 5-ball load seems to be produced only very sporadically. No one has this load on their shelves right now. The 2½” load has proven to be popular with owners of Bond Arms .410 derringers and with owners of the Taurus Judge .410 revolver. Triple-ought buck has a diameter of .360” and each ball weighs about 70 grains.

Speaking of the Taurus Judge, Federal has just introduced a 4 pellet 000-buck load marketed specifically for the Judge. In fact, Federal calls it Premium Personal Defense Handgun ammo. Right on the box, it says “.410 Handgun”. It’s a 2½” load, as that’s all the original Judge can handle. There’s a new longer Judge that was just introduced that can now handle 3” shells.

The one other load out there is a Russian load marketed as “Golden Bear” in this country. This is the buckshot load that I had on hand for testing. It is sold as a 2¾” length cartridge, but in reality it’s a lot closer to a full 3 inches. This load uses 5 pellets of #4 buck. The diameter of #4 buckshot is .240” or 6mm, and each pellet weighs only around 21 grains. That’s less weight than the bullet from a standard .22 LR rimfire cartridge. The other interesting thing about this load is that the cartridge body is 100% brass-plated steel. It is Berdan primed, as you would expect of Russian ammunition. It was originally intended for the Saiga AK-47 based semi-automatic .410 shotgun.

2¾” Golden Bear buckshot, 10 yards

Instead of changing targets, I fired my first shot of the Golden Bear buckshot at the slug target. You’ll have to mentally subtract the two slug holes from the photo above. As you can see, the buckshot pellets fairly well-centered the critter. I fired from the same 10 yard distance. This distance might be typical of the rabid critter self defense scenario. But be careful with skunks; they can shoot back, but only to a distance of 8 to 15 feet. The mist can carry on the wind farther than that, so vamoose after taking a shot!

Next, I considered the small-game hunting scenario for .410 buckshot. This would probably be at longer distances. I set up a jackrabbit target and stepped back to 20 yards distance. Actually, I took one shot, set up a new jackrabbit target, then took a second shot at 20 yards. In both cases, only one pellet out of the five struck the jack’s body. One of the hits was a vital zone hit, so that was good, but the other was a little further back. It might have been a spine hit – maybe.

So at only 20 yards we start to see the limitations of .410 buckshot. Even if both shots hit vital areas, one has to wonder how much energy the 21 grain pellets are still carrying at the 20 yard distance. With this limitation in mind, I tried one more time, this time at 15 yards. I set up a cottontail target and fired the Golden Bear buck at it. This resulted in two body hits, neither optimal.

Alright, my results seem pretty clear cut: For snakes – birdshot. The 3-inch load of #7½ shot does seem to have advantage over the 2½” load of #9s.

For close range self-defense against rabid critters, it’s buckshot. I need to obtain that new Federal buckshot load and test that though. Only one fewer pellet than the Golden Bear, but the bigger pellets strike harder.

For taking small mammals of opportunity, the slug is the best choice. In this scenario, you’ll have time to take more careful aim to make the single projectile count. But really, a .38 or .357 on your hip is a better choice for that.