On tough days you can pull your hair out trying to figure out why the snow geese are not finishing. If you are hidden like a ninja, adjusted your decoys, played with the e-caller volume and they are still not finishing it is time to get underneath them and go vertical.
You can kill a pile of snow geese if they are decoying down to 40 yards if you can position yourself to shoot straight up at the geese. This may be right in the kill hole, on the downwind edge of your decoys, or whatever flight path the geese are using into your spread.
For our math example we will be using 40 yards as the height of the birds. You will notice as your shot angle becomes less vertical every yard they get away from you really starts to add up.
0 yards out and 40 yards up your shot distance is 40 yards to the snow geese
5 yards out and 40 yards up your shot distance is 40.3 yards to the snow geese
10 yards out and 40 yards up your shot distance is 41.2 yards to the snow geese
15 yards out and 40 yards up your shot distance is 42.7 yards to the snow geese
20 yards out and 40 yards up your shot distance is 44.2 yards to the snow geese
25 yards out and 40 yards up your shot distance is 47.2 yards to the snow geese
30 yards out and 40 yards up your shot distance is 50 yards to the snow geese
The next time you are pulling your hair out trying to figure out those geese make your middle school math teacher proud and get underneath them and go vertical!