I don't frown on it at all. If you want to shoot and hunt with a .500S&W, then by all means do so. If you can control that beast and shoot it well then I have a great deal of respect for your abilities as a handgunner. I definately have less of a problem with someone hunting with a .500S&W than a .357Mag, mostly because while there is absolutely no doubt about the ability of the bigger revolver to to the job, the .357 leaves little room for error on the part of the shooter. But in the hands of a good shot and diciplined hunter both will do the job very well.

I guess my biggest issue with the .500 is that it just seems to me to be a bit overboard, designed more for Dirty Harry-esque bragging rights than as a cartridge that was meant to fill a real gap in the handgun hunting power band. The .454 with full throttle loads does kick hard enough to get the shooters undivided attention. But when Dick Casull developed the 454 there was a definate call for a .45 caliber hunting handgun to take up where the .44mag and .45LC left off. And the real beauty of the 454 is the flexability and versatility of a gun chambered for that cartridge. If one hunts whitetails in dense cover where shots are short they can step down to a .45LC load to control noise and recoil while still providing plenty of punch. .45LC loads with hard cast lead bullets turn the costly heavy hitter into moderate inexpensive plinker, which also ensures that one can get the kind of practice in to become completely proficient with the handgun. Then, when the game, situation or desire arises, one can load up some 300gr full throttle loads and be confident that they can swiftly and ethically drop any game animal in North America and almost every game species in the world.

So don't get me wrong. I'm not criticising anyone who owns and shoots the big .500, as long as you make sure that you can handle it and shoot it well before you attempt to take game, which is just basic hunter ethics. I just can't quite understand why S&W decided to put so much time and effort into developing the new cartridge and a handgun to shoot it, when they could have just built a handgun to shoot the tried and true .454 Casull. I personally think that it was a decision made more by the marketing dept. than the R&D department. They're capitalizing on the "bigger is better" crowd.

I might consider buying the new S&W revolver...if they rechamber it for .454Casull.

Mike