Bob, Great Blog post! I mourn for my Ruger #1 long departed to a friend who really "had to have it." It was perfectly suitable for anything I ever hunted with it. Frankly, I could reload it just a fast as the bolt guys who take the gun off their shoulder, which if you watch hunting video's seems to be almost everybody. Only needed to reload it once on a running bull elk. Some pretty poor shooting on my part as he ran across an Alfalfa field 90 degrees to me at 400+ yards led me to reload several times. Once I got the lead right, down he went. Also I have written on the "other" forum about pulling an unbroken stomach out of a doe deer with the 458 and FN cast bullet just like your story did on the bear. Shot in the chest at 15 yards or so as she ran out of a thicket. Bullet exited flank as did the stomach. I saw it and thought "oh no! What a mess this will be!" Nope bullet simply created the vacuum behind the diaphragm and out went the stomach behind the bullet with no mess at all.
Thanks Sir Dennis;
And I recall reading 'on the "other" forum' your remarks about the "unbroken stomach" following the bullet exit!
