Originally Posted By: geodeon deer i have him shoot the .243 with sierra 85 grain bthp which, in my 30 yrs experience with the round almost always means, DRT. I'm alittle less confident with bear but i LOVE it for whitetails. any thoughts on that? He certainly could shoot slugs out of the 20 gauge. we'd be hunting over bait.
Slugs over bait would be the wiser choice in those two options. The 85 grain is a tad light for penetration on larger heavier bear bones. Especially after penetrating the bear's hide which is thicker and tougher than a deer, therein expanding the hollow point faster, and having to penetrating the fat the bullet will encounter beneath the hide.
Case in point... We chased one down for a local deer hunter 30 or so years ago, he shot it with a 120 grain 30-06, in the neck, at about 60 yards. He said the bear turned it's head toward him slightly just as he squeezed the trigger, the bullet hit the spinal column, traveled a foot or so down the left side, crossed to the right, knocking the top off one vertebrae and chipping the next, chipped the top edge of the right shoulder blade, and stopped beneath the hide on the right side.
He hadn't gone far, and the trail dogs jumped him in a matter of minutes. We dumped the dog box, catch dogs took off and ran over a bunch of deer, thereupon going every direction under the sun, leaving 2 trail dogs, and one that just liked to sit back and make noise, in on the chase. 4 hours and several laps around the pond later, (all in the dark), he finally bled down enough that we were able to catch up to them and finish him off.
By that time he was running on pure adrenaline. The bear was backed up into a stump, sitting upright, when we caught up with him; the guy leading the chase was packing a 6 inch, Smith & Wesson 357 magnum pistol, loaded with hollow points. He put 5 rounds center mass, 2 inch group, point blank, (as in muzzle flash burned all the hair off the bear's chest), and the bear was still trying to get back up and catch him and the dogs. Put 2 more rounds in his head to finish him off, after much cussing and swearing, and trying to back up while reloading.
While speculation is never 100% guaranteed, it's reasonable to assume that a larger heavier slug would have held a truer path when it encountered bone, therein breaking the bear's neck, and saving a lot of trouble.
I shot a 235 lb. bear running at 12 - 15 yards, in the neck, with a 170 grain soft point in 30-30, dropped her like a rock. Same gun, same round, shot a 400 lb. bear, running 12 - 15 yards, hit it in the shoulder, and it never broke stride. Pulled the bullet out from under the hide in the swamp, at the entrance wound. It went in, hit the shoulder blade, turned and came straight back out. That one was killed with a 30-30 just a couple minutes later.
Bear are extremely durable critters... We killed one that was missing 2 front toes, 2 back toes, had been shot through and through with a high power rifle - 1 rib broke on the left 3 ribs broke on the right, recovered a 30-30 bullet, another larger .30 caliber bullet, 7 - 00 buckshot, and 5 - .22 bullets. ALL OF WHICH HAD HEALED OVER!
