A shotgun (also known as a fowling piece or scattergun)
is a firearm
that is usually designed to be fired from the shoulder, which uses the energy of
a fixed shell to fire a number of small spherical pellets called shot
or a solid projectile called a slug.
Shotguns come in a wide variety of sizes, ranging from 5.5 mm (.22 inch) bore
up to 5 cm (2 inch) bore, and in a range of firearm operating mechanisms,
including breech loading, double,
pump-, bolt-, and lever-action, semi-automatic, and even fully-automatic
variants. |