Why limit yourself to 50 yards with a muzzle loader, 30 yards with a bow and arrow? Or even closer with a blow dart? Because of the sport of is. I mean conversly why not just use a .50 bmg for everything and shoot things from 1000 yards away? Where is the sport? Proper buckshot hunting is VERY sporting, the patterns are too tight and the vital zone on an animal is too small to not "aim". That is a common myth, shotguns must be aimed like anything else. There is a larger margin of error, but not by much.

From Squirrel to Elephant, the Shotgun is your gun.

So now you are saying that self defense while dealing with a brown bear is a SPORT?
Guess I`ll stick to ping pong!<img src=icon_smile_big.gif border=0 align=middle>

NRA,UBP,BASS Member
New Stanton,PA

Blain,
I have never killed a bear. Have you? What kind(s)? What did you use? Did the round(s) that you used put the bear(s) down right away?

I wouldn't call buckshot hunting sport. Thats just my personal opinion. I mainly bowhunt. Now this is sporting. Just an opinion. Most people I have ever seen use the buckshot for jump hunting. Don't have any trouble with it, just see it as not that sporting. And alot of these guys, like my uncles that do this, are only after meat. They could care less about anything else. And pretty easy I might add. Kinda like when us bowhunters see someone dropped a deer and come over to take a look, and we are all impressed, then we see the crossbow in the truck, and kinda walk away. If your not a jump hunter, then I appologize. As far as the muzzleloader, better spend more time on the blackpowder forum. If you can only take game at 50 yards, you need help.

As far as your original topic. You were talking about good bear defense. Not really sporting.

I live in mississippi and we run dogs for deer down here quite a bit. The preferred gun for this is a 12 gauge with buckshot, it makes hitting a deer moving by at warp speed a bit easier than when using a rifle and it does a good job when used as it's intended. Max range on a deer for using buckshot is around 50 yds with 40 yds being a better practical maximum. It's adequate for deer at those ranges, but after seeing many deer hit with buckshot inside 40 yds and seeing how it rarely gives complete penetration on a 100 pound deer at those ranges I'd have to say anyone would be insane to use it for any kind of grizzly/brown bear defense at any range.

Edited by - boltman on 09/26/2002 02:08:35

Boltman, I hope you didn't take offense to my post about using buckshot. I have did this type of hunting before too. I just prefer the ambush method.

But I do have a question. Out of all the game I have shot, if I shot one on a running shot, they always taste so strong compared to the calm shot. Do you ever see this, since they are being ran by dogs?

Just curios.

Bigcountry, yes I've noticed that same thing. The common thought is that the strong, gamey taste comes from the adrenaline the deer works up being chased. The meat seems more tender and less gamey when it came from an unaware deer that was dropped in it's tracks.

A brown bear does not drop easy. My hunting buddy has shot 4 brownies and from those experiences he has the highest respect for the capabiliteis of a wounded grizzly. The last one he shot with a 375 mag. Bullet passed thru the shoulder completely shattering the whole upper leg and going on thru the lung. the second shot went thru the heart turning it into jelly. In spite of this the bear ran. But it did come back for a charge when he and his son tracked it. The bear was finally dropped for good on that final charge by 2 more shots from the 375 and one from his sons 30.06. It wasnt a matter of grain size, or velocity or even ft.lbs. of energy. It is more an animal that dont go down easy and is capable of doing major damage in a short time. If a bear like this can run on shattered bones and no heart how can anyone expect a round of buckshot to do any real damage. this is by far the most dangerous critter most of us will ever even think about having to confront. We will be going out this weekend for brownies and you wont see a shotgun between us. A 375, a 45/70, and a 338 win mag. Why? Cuz these are some of the rounds that have proven the most effective in these parts. A couple weeks ago a man and women were caribou hunting in the Denali Highway area. After filling their tags they spotted a gizzly in a field of berries and the guy put two shots from a 458 winchester in it.The bear ran into some alders so they decided to wait till the A.M. to go look for it. That bear despite being hit in the boiler room with at least one good shot was still able to charge and maul the guy before his wife was able to dispatch it with her 338. Forgive the rambling but when it comes to brownies and grizzlys there isnt much room to re-invent the wheel so to speak.You might want to at least talk to folks that encounter these bears on a somewhat regular basis before you go out and risk yours or some other unsuspecting persons life.