.410 Full Choke & Ammo Selection

[Gimlet]

I made an impulse purchase of a H&R Pardner .410 with a full choke to deal with a snake problem. Don't judge, the wife feels better. The salesman gave me a box of #9 to deal with the snakes. It wasn't until a few days later that I started thinking about what over loads would be compatible for other applications.
Would it be A) safe and B) effective to fire slugs or something like that Winchester (I think) 3 disc self defense load through a full choke?
What .410 loads do you guys like for what applications?
Anybody ever try taking a turkey with one? If so, I'm thinking this may be something to start the kids with.

 

[Chistech]

Do a lot of my shotgun hunting with my .410 Remington 1100. I use 3" winchester #4's for rabbit, pheasant, and turkey. The 4's are bigger and easier to remove on the game. They will usually pull in some hair and if you pull on that hair, the pellets will come right out of the meat. Smaller shot seems to go through the hair more. I will use #6's if I can't find 4's and will use Remington shells only as a last resort. A remington 3" shell after it's fired is just under an 1/8" longer than a Winchester and they will get caught on the ejection port of my 1100. Go figure, a Remington shotgun that won't fire Remington shells but works flawlessly with Winchesters!

A full choke .410 is a hard hitting gun and can really reach out more than most people think. Don't under estimate it's ability to hit game out to 35yds. You just have to be a better shot and more on target. My brother is currently shooting a .410 OU on skeet and is consistently scoring 22's and better. He just starting shooting skeet about 2 1/2 months ago. That gun is not a full choke though and he is using #9's.

 

[Woodstock]

Have you considered interchangeable chokes? Mike Orlen in Amherst is one of the top smiths in the country when it comes to shotgun barrels, and he could tell you if it would be feasible or worthwhile to do it on the H&R. Generally slugs don't shoot very accurately out of full choke barrels.
As for turkey hunting, the .410 is really too light to reliably and humanely kill that noble bird.