I've got to tell you, this Browning Lightning Feather Citori is one classy looking shotgun. The stock and forend are made of walnut and have a high-gloss finish. The gun comes in a fitted luggage case with a suggested retail price of $3098.

The final gun in my 28-gauge battery is the Ringneck side-by-side from CZ-USA. The Ringneck has 28-inch barrels with screw-in chokes and a concave, solid rib. Overall length is 45 1/2 inches with a 141/2-inch length of pull, 11/2-inch drop at comb, and a 2 1/2-inch drop at the heel. The shotgun weighs right at 6 pounds. This CZ double uses a single trigger with the selector located on the tang safety.

Stocks on the CZ Ringneck are dark, straight-grained Turkish walnut with tasteful checkering. The buttstock features a round-knobbed pistol grip that is generally referred to as a Prince of Wales grip while the forend is of semibeavertail design with a small schnabel. Unlike the other two shotguns in my battery, which have automatic safeties, the Ringneck has a manual safety. CZ-USA also offers the Bobwhite side-by-side, which is essentially the same shotgun with double triggers and the English-style straight buttstock. Suggested retail for the CZ Ringneck is $912.

Favorite Loads
Several shotshell companies offer 1-ounce 28-gauge loads, but I think the 3/4-ounce load is the way to go. There's just something about the combination of the .550 bore diameter of the 28 gauge and the 3/4-ounce payload that strikes the proper balance. The shot column doesn't string much, and there are enough pellets (440 No. 9s and 260 No. 71/2s) to deliver excellent patterns out to 35 yards. As we've seen with other shotgun gauges, longer shells and more shot don't always make for more targets hit--or shooter comfort.

On the Highland Hill upland hunt, I checked my Ruger Red Label and found that someone had installed the Modified and Improved Cylinder chokes. I removed them and substituted the two Skeet chokes, then loaded the gun with 3/4-ounce loads of No. 71/2 shot. This is the combination that I used to take the mixed bag of birds that are offered at this great hunting ranch.

However, I'll admit that I was a bit worried about how this combination would work on pheasants. Pheasants can be tough birds to put in your bag and can haul off their fair share of lead shot. But I've also noticed something about hunting pheasants. When you step past your bird dog, the pheasant will shoot straight up in the air quite a ways before leveling off and leaving the immediate vicinity.

My experience has also shown me that they are much easier to kill cleanly while they are climbing straight up than if you wait until they have leveled off and cut in their afterburners. My goal was to focus sharply on the bird and clearly see its head as I swung up through the target. You should be doing that anyway, in order to make sure that you don't shoot a pheasant hen. I often repeated to myself the old adage "butt-belly-beak-bang" as I swung on one of these great game birds. It helps me focus and see the bird clearly instead of just viewing it as a fast-flying blur that is about to get out of range.

Whether you choose a semiautomatic, pump, over-under, or side-by-side is entirely up to you. The fact is, on the better guns, the weight can be trimmed down to pretty close to 6 pounds, and this makes for a fast, lively shotgun that is still plenty comfortable to shoot.

Another factor in favor of the 28-gauge shotgun is that upland birds, with the possible exception of pheasants, just don't need a whole lot of pellets to bring them down. The upland hunter who goes to a longer shell with more pellets in order to try to reduce his misses is just kidding himself. Instead of dropping more birds, he's probably going to learn more about flinching and missing than he ever wanted to know.

The field performance of the 28 gauge and its light recoil make it an excellent choice for children and adults of small stature. It's also a good choice for a lot of us older geezers who like the idea of taking to the woods with a light, responsive double gun.

One thing about it, there are quite a number of good quality 28-gauge shotguns available, along with a good assortment of game and target loads. We probably ought to thank the skeet shooters for not letting this good shotshell die out. In fact, I'll remember to do that very thing the next time I'm sitting over a waterhole waiting for the evening's flight of doves to drop in because, under those circumstances, there will probably be a 28-gauge shotgun in my hands.