Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns 10mm for black bear

G40 with a red dot for bears over bait. 40 yards would be a pretty long shot.

200 grain Hard cast or 200 grain hollow points? It shoots both plenty good enough at the range I’d be shooting a bear over bait.

The potential for a really big bear is always there here in Wisconsin and hopefully I draw a Minnesota tag as well.

Any experience with a 10mm or similar sized handgun on bears?

My tendency is towards a blunt-as-can-reliably-feed Hardcast.

I carry either a .45 Super or .460 Rowland for bear repellent (we have Blacks) and have both loaded with 255 grain Hardcasts. I haven't tried the 260 grain Speer in those cartridges, but I suspect they'd work, I just prefer the Hardcasts, and these are an LBT bullet. The Hardcast would allow more leeway for less-than-ideal angles and cracks skulls better.

Anybody else.

Thanks

I would carry the hardcast hoping for an entrance and an exit.

You do want an exit, bears don't leave a lot of blood most times so if you're shooting them in heavy cover a blood trail is nice to have.

Dick

Thanks guys. That’s the way I’ve been leaning. It’ll certainly be dense green cover. And I figure no matter how much a hollow point expands 2 holes will always bleed better than 1.

An exit hole bleeds FAR more freely than an entrance btoh because it is bigger and because the tissue at the exit hole is running in the right direction.

Buffalo Bore makes a 10mm "Dangerous Game" load with a 190 grain flat point copper bullet (Lehigh) at advertised 1200 fps. If you are looking at factory loads, this might be a suitable option also.

200 grain montana flat nosed cast MP as the other one is supposed to be hard to feed, 12.5 grains AA #9. I use the .401 diam in a glock 20.

Yes, I've heard a black bear's heart rate is extremely slow, not pumping much blood out as fast as they can un after a hit, never hunted them, only shot one in his left eye bow hunting for elk and mule deer in Colo back in the early to mid 90's, after using my DW 10mm to shoot through 3.5ft, and exiting of a 270 ish lb whitetail buck, I'd gladly use the 200gr XTP.

Hard cast.....unless you “KNOW” it “WILL” be a small bear! memtb

Didn’t JHack recommend a controlled expansion bullet for black bears?

No bears with my Glock 40, 10mm. I did drop in a 7” KKM barrel with conventional rifling, although I’ve heard that hard cast do OK with the Polygonal.

DF

ConradCa, True a good controlled expansion bullet, should work....almost every time. I view them much like “expanding broad heads” for bow hunting, they work great.....until they don’t! memtb

What I recall him saying was that there was more "reaction" to the impact of the bullet which distracted the bear from its attack.

They didn't kill any quicker but the bear tended to stop its lunge and bite at the area where the bullet impacted. This could be considered a "stop" and would allow more time for additional shots.

I prefer the Hardcast's ability to penetrate and break things, just my personal preference.