The way you make any good pheasant load work is with a combination of good hard shot for minimum deformation, high velocity for good penetration and high pellet energy, and a modified to full choke to get more shot on the target. Shot size should get larger with the expected distance to the birds. No. 6s will do for early season close flushing birds but later the #5 will be better for the longer shots. A good hit with high velocity #4s will do the trick, but you have to give up some pattern density. A slower load of more shot is not more effective for quick clean kills. A 1 3/8 oz. load at around 1300 fps is hard to beat. Don't shoot pheasants under 25 yards with this load or you may get some serious overkill. You can usually let them get out to 30 plus yards and that works best.
I was out today doing some game surveying where they were cutting corn and sunflowers. In 1 hour, I seen at least 2 thousand pheasants in a 6 mile square. We are getting a few inches of snow and that will concentrate the birds in the remaining cover. It should be a great hunt this weekend for sure.
