Browning Cynergy with an Illinois pheasant

The popularity of double-barrel shotguns is growing by leaps and bounds and many companies, both old and new, are responding to the demand by offering a mind-boggling variety of over-unders and side-by-sides. In fact, the various brands and models of doubles now far outnumber the pumps and autoloaders available.

Doubles range from utility-grade knockabouts that sell for less than $500 to more expensive but still affordable guns in the sub-$2,000 price range to as much and possibly even more than your line of credit at the bank will allow. Examples of such wide variations in prices range from the Model SPR220 Spartan side-by-side now imported and sold by Remington for $320 to the Weatherby Orion Upland at $1,300 to the Beretta 686 Silver Pigeon at $2,700 to the Rizzini sidelock at $60,000. If you’ve got the money, someone, somewhere has just the double you are looking for.

AGUIRRE y ARANZABAL (AyA)
There was a time when American hunters had very little respect for Spanish-built doubles but we are now buying them faster than they can be imported.

The No. 1 grade AyA I have owned for several years is an excellent example of a great gun at a reasonable price. Weighing a mere 5 1/2 pounds, it handles like greased lightning and its quality is good enough to turn my quail-hunting buddies green with envy. Its barrels are choked .006 and .015 inch, about Improved Skeet and Modified for the 28 gauge. I have used that gun to hunt ruffed grouse in Michigan, quail in South Carolina, doves in Texas, sharptail grouse and Huns in Montana, chukar in Idaho, pheasant in South Dakota, and many more birds in many more places and it has always pulled its end of the saw when I pulled mine. On top of that, it is one of the two most handsome shotguns I own.

Like my No. 1 grade, the No. 2 grade AyA is also a sidelock gun and it is more popular because it is a bit less expensive, but in my opinion the best buy among Spanish guns has to be the AyA 453 boxlock. A quail-hunting buddy of mine has one in .410 with 28-inch barrels and it is a wand. (Contact AyA at 888-291-4636)

BERETTA
Not long back I hunted quail in Georgia with a Beretta EELL Diamond Pigeon grade two-barrel set. I shot so well with its 28-gauge barrels I never got around to removing its 20-gauge barrels from the case. What a wonderful gun! And darned handsome too.

Beretta, the world’s oldest manufacturer of firearms, offers a top-quality shotgun for just about anything anybody would want to do with a shotgun. I am fond of the Beretta over-under for many reasons, not the least of which is an extremely shallow receiver depth that makes the gun quite comfortable to carry in one hand.

Considering that the Beretta is one of the most durable shotguns in the world, its price is right too. The White Onyx, for example, retails for $1,700 and often can be found for a bit less. Extremely attractive and top-drawer in handling, it is available in 12, 20 and 28 with 26- or 28-inch barrels. The 20-gauge gun weighs around 61?4 pounds. Even lighter is the 12-gauge Ultralight at a mere 53?4 pounds. Beretta is not as big in side-by-sides as in over-unders but the Model 571 Silver Hawk in 12 or 20 gauge is certainly work a serious look. (Contact Beretta at 301-283-2191, www.beretta.com)

BROWNING
The word “synergy” comes from the Greek word synergos, which means, “working together.” Those who make such decisions decided that would be a good name for the new Browning over-under since its design represents different technologies working together. But they decided to spell it with a “C” so the name would roll smoothly off the tongues of those who already own a Citori, Browning’s other over-under. While I do not care for the racy appearance of the Cynergy I am quick to admit that I absolutely love shooting it. It is, without doubt, one of the quickest-handling, smoothest-swinging, softest shooting over-unders I have ever held in my hands.

And how quick is it? My favorite test of the handling qualities of an upland gun is to shoot skeet from the low-gun start position at station eight with an unusual twist. I break a few birds, move a step closer to the trap house and I continue moving closer and shooting until I start missing birds. Kevin Howard of Winchester Ammunition and I missed very few targets while standing midway between the pad and the trap house and we were wearing all the clothes we owned in freezing temperatures.

We later shot pheasants with the new Winchester Super Pheasant load with 13?8 ounces of No. 5s at 1,300 feet per second (fps) and the InFlex recoil pad dampened recoil to the point where I could have sworn I was shooting a 20-gauge gun. And with its revolutionary new monolock barrel-hinging design, it will surely prove durable enough for your grandson’s son to hand down to his grandson’s son. (Contact Browning at 801-876-2711, www.browning.com)

CHARLES DALY
The number of options in Charles Daly doubles has increased substantially over the past few months. According to my count, five different grades of side-by-sides and eight different over-unders are now available. My pick of the over-unders is the Field II Hunter in 28 gauge and .410. A basic boxlock gun, it retails for less than $1,000. That same gun is also available in 12, 16 and 20 gauges at the same price. (continued)