Do shotgun shells decompose?

[Scratch]

I was down at the range cleaning up this morning and found these old shotgun shells. We've only been shooting shotgun out here for maybe 3 years at the most, and I know that before I came here, no one else has been shooting here.
I saw no signs of the plastic hull, but I did find some plastic wads.

So do plastic hulls decompose?

[usnret]

I will bet that those have been out there longer than 3 years.

[Vlad]

I will bet that those have been out there longer than 3 years.

+1.

[Scratch]

No way. This is my backyard. This was nothing but damp woodsy area with no neighbors or houses 25 years ago, then my brother bought it 20 years ago. I bought it 15 years ago. Maybe 10 years ago I did a very little bit of rifle shooting, but an are at least a hundred yards away. This would be horrible duck hunting land.

About 4 years ago, I cleared out this area of trees and made a pistol range. Probably a year after that is the first time there had been a shotgun shot in this area, and it wasn't by me, but by 3 members of this board practicing for multi gun.
I've done some light grading in this area and these were found in the center of my range, in exactly the spot those 3 gunners would have been shooting.

There are at least 10 more that I saw in the same condition that I didn't pick up, in the same area. No way these were here longer than 4 years.

[Nougat]

even 2 years and they could look like that, its not nice outside

as far as the ( I don't know the right word even) casing? plastic/paper part, if it was plastic no it didn't decompose but rodents will ''eat'' anything its their job.

[Scratch]

Definitely plastic.

[Nougat]

I guess it would be more right to say shred or gnaw? gnaw just for keeping their teeth down shredding for building a nest-it'd be great insulation/waterproofing .

think about it like how ants go to work on stuff on their hills?

[Scratch]

I think the mystery is solved...


I know last spring I started a fine very close to that area to burn up paper and brush. Very likely that some shotgun shells were in a burn barrel that also got burnt.

Now looking at some of the leftover metal, they do look like they've been in a fire.

[crbutler]

I have a place on Swan lake in Nicollet county. That lake has been a waterfowling mecca for decades.

When the lake was drawn down, I went out and looked around.

The plastic hulls do degrade, but very slowly- the metal heads disappear before the plastic does. Generally, if the plastic is exposed to light, it will first go pale, then become brittle and then it will flake apart. Its not true decomposition in the sense that the plastic becomes soil, but they do gradually "disappear"

The more obvious ones are the plastic wads, especially the steel shot wads. They do the same thing, but they seem to be made of a higher grade of plastic and it takes a lot longer.

I could find wads that looked like they had just been fired in the muck a ways down.

Also, the old paper hulls didn't automatically disintegrate either. I found a box of them in some muck (actually the dog did and I dug them out) the outside of the box was shot but it was still in one piece and there were 25 shells that were still very identifiable, if a bit swollen- Federal Duck and Pheasant 6's. if the light and oxygen is kept away, they last quite a while too.