Howdy all! The "small caliber" link got me thinking. What are your favotite calibers and loads for cougar/bear defense?
As per my comment in the other link, I carry a .45 ACP with 165gr. Hydra-Shoks, good penetration, good blood channel, around 1100FPS, and plenty of punch. I used to carry a .41 Mag Blackhawk with plain jacketed ammo. What do you carry and why?

Steeliegreg,are you sure your not talking about my post? ha,ha,ha. Anyways, you and I seem to have a similar thought process,until you said you carry a .45 with 165gr loads for bear.The reason I carry my .45 for cats is because there not nearly as tough as bears,smaller skeleton and less muscle as well as thinner skin, you don't need much penetration to ruin their day. Bears on the other hand are just plain tough, I shot a 150 lb black bear a couple yrs back with my .338 win mag shooting 225gr Federal High Energy loads, two shots in the chest at about 100yds,thats like 8000lbs of energy and he didn't drop for 40yds. If you shot a bear with the .45 load mentioned above you'd hit him with a pathetic 400lbs of energy and the bullet would be lucky to penetrate enough to kill it before it got ya! after seeing first hand how bad a$$ even small bears are,I gotta carry more gun if I am concerned about bears thats why I carry a .41 mag Ruger Blackhawk with handloaded 210gr ammo and thats because I can't always carry my .338 or a 12ga. with slugs. Just something to think about.

41 mag?Better save the last one for yourself!Min 44 mag,with 224 grain hard cast,and still save the last one for yourself.For bear go with a 12 ga,or if you got to carry a leg iron get a 454 or a 475.

kingfisher, I carry my .41 because it's the biggest pistol I own, I know it's not the best choice for bears but we don't have any griz or brown bears to worry about in Wa. I dont want to use it in self-defense anyway, it's a last resort,but when were camping or hiking I dont want to lug my .338 so I carry a pistol, and if thats all I have at the time and it came down to having to shoot a bear in self- defense I'd rather have a .41 than nothing at all.