Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 180 grain Buffalo Bore .357 load for grizzly.

When you "fetch ye another", what will you be a-usin?

whatever i happin' ta be a-carryun at the time pilgrim... just hope they don't find my scat residue on the bars face... only lesson i can give is, When in bar country, Load for Bar!...

I have never had a bad bear experience. A few bears have had a bad experience with me

There you have it, straight from the bear expert's mouth.

If I ever meet Phil Shoemaker, I'll ask him what I should carry for bears and such. If he's inclined to give me any helpful advice, I'll do whatever he says and consider myself to have been reliably informed.

Phil used the 147 hardcast lead load by Buffalo bore

I know Phil well, and have talked with him considerably about all of this. (I suspect he hasn't commented here because he has a new grand-daughter, and has had his fill of Campfire BS over the years.) But this is what he's said to me:

First, no repeating handgun round, whether for a revolver or auto, comes close to being a "stopping" round, despite what many apparently believe. By "stopping," Phil means a round which stops the bear long enough to put another shot into it before it continues charging. (This is also the the opinion of several African PHs I know.) Based on his experience, the minimum rifle round to start to do this is around the .375 H&H, but .416s and of course his .458 work even better.

But a 9mm or .357 with deep-penetrating bullets will indeed kill a big grizzly or brown--if at least one bullet gets into a vital area. And you can put more of 'em into a charging bear than with a far harder-kicking round. (Phil has also stated that he might have preferred his S&W .44 Magnum Mountain Gun, but even that has less recoil than a .454 or .500.)

He has also used as back-up rifle rounds up to the .505 Gibbs, which has so much recoil he couldn't recover from it quickly enough to put another round into the "stopped" bear before it started to come again.

Which is the problem with assuming the really big handgun cartridges will "stop" grizzlies. They are far less powerful than any rifle cartridge considered adequate for "big bears," even the
.30-06 with heavier bullets.

Sounds like you’ve got a good friend. You should listen to him.

I've watched a few bears, both black and grizzlies. Well adapted to their environment, and cagey, in their ways.

But they are not Einsteins and I would assume that their brain inhabits a smallish area in their skull. And that, particularly in a grizzly, the skull is well covered with fur, hide, and flesh.

Having hunted, hiked, camped, and slept where grizzlies roam, I've given thought as to just what to aim for from different angles on a bear, but I plead ignorance.
I've read that a grizzly skull is not all that heavy, or thick. But from a frontal angle it surely is sloped in a manner that might deflect a shot.
I would guess that the brain is located above and behind the eyes. Right where their heads begin to get thick and meaty...

Experienced advice appreciated...

In my experience things happen so fast when you have an actual problem with a brown bear that the best you can do is shoot the middle of the brown blur with something big enough to matter. The idea of aiming at a specific spot is often mere fantasy. There are some exceptions to this, such as when a bear is perhaps not being as serious about things as the person feeling threatened is and the bear gets shot for it. Another possibility is with the way involuntary human response to stress works, whereby you end up experiencing an event in slow-motion time. In that circumstance it can seem as though you've got plenty of time to sort things out, but that's beyond your control and is nothing to count on.

Due to the angles presented with the event and ranges at which they occur, defensive shootings of bears necessitate penetration through skulls, necks, shoulders, or all three before the bullet can drive through the chest. The best case is a mix of bullet expansion and penetration, but if I was forced to choose between the two I would pick penetration every time.

One thing that changed my thinking when it came to handguns and bears is actual experience. I've killed quite a bit of game with things ranging from 9mm to stoutly loaded .45 Colts, including various loads in the .357 and .44 special. I've also seen a number of deer killed by the .454 of a friend. As a result of this experience I decided that handguns kill stuff in a way more akin to a broadhead than a rifle. I also learned that out to about 75 yards there's not much difference in actual killing performance between something like a .44 special shooting 255gr WFN at 1050 and a .45 Colt shooting a 300gr LFN at 1250. Both penetrate sufficiently, and holes do the killing. The .454 with lighter bullets at greater velocity hit deer harder, but with the trade off of a heavier, higher recoiling gun shooting loads with less penetration than things going slower. As Mule Deer alluded to previously, no handgun round is going to solve problems as decisively as a rifle.

I've always generally been a revolver guy when it comes to my choices in outdoor handguns. A couple years ago my wife asked about getting a handgun for bear defense so her hands could be freed up while walking the dogs and dealing with kids during walks around town. She's never much cared for revolvers, so it was pretty obvious a 10mm would be a good choice for her. I'm not a bandwagon sort of person, the more popular something becomes the more likely I am to avoid it. So the more popular 10mms became, the more stubborn I became about liking my S&W 69 for my brown bear country handgun needs. But I yielded to what would work best for my wife and bought a couple 10mms for her to try out. In the process I did load development and shot them quite a bit myself.

The shot timer was a revelation. I discovered that at the distances where I'd most frequently sorted out charging bears with a rifle (2-12 yards), that I could get three hits with the 10mm shooting 200 grainers at 1150 in the same time that I could get one hit with the .44 shooting 300 grainers at 1150. I realized the following:

1.) I know for a fact the 10mm load will penetrate just as sufficiently as the .44 load will.
2.) Given the limitations of a handgun compared to a rifle, multiple hits quickly are a great idea.
3.) The 10mm lets me get more behavior changing goodness into a bear faster than the .44 does.

For bear defense, a handgun is a weapon of compromise and convenience, a get-offa-me gun, and a rifle's sidekick. A smart person would never choose to fight a bear with just a handgun but nevertheless carrying a handgun in bear country is a great idea for people who invest the time to be proficient with one. All of which is to say that if a person liked their .357, it might not be my choice but I reckon a good 180gr .357 load would have sufficient penetration to make it into a bear's vitals on a frontal angle.

If you put the bullet in the brain or have time to get multiple shots off it surely will work. If not make sure and file the front sight down so it hurts less when the bear inserts it.

Opinions on this?

Maybe I will file the front sight half-way. Sometimes compromise is the best approach.

Thanks for your sage advice!

Many years ago when I still lived in Nevada I used to go to The Aline reloading Room, an LGS with a couple of very knowledgable owners. My buddy and I were in twon so stopped by to pick up reloading supplies. I was getting stuff to feed my .44 mag Ruger Super Blackhawk.. Things were slow at the store so we were talking with thw owners One asked my why the .44 mag. and I said I was in the running for a job in Alaska and I bought it for bear protection. He told me that if I had to use it to fight a bear, shoot him five times. Save number six for yourself. You could take a long time dying with you guts spread out over the tundra while the beat eats you choice parts. Sad to say I didn't get the job so we'll never know if he was right.
PJ

What vel does BB advertise their 180/357 out of a 4" barrel??
Whatever you carry for griz, anything over 1250 fps is diminishing returns. If your load is running 1450fps, then use a heavier bullet until you are at 1200-1250fps. According the John Linebaugh's testing, 1200-1250 provides the best penetration w/o other trade offs. So if you are running faster, use a heavier bullet until you are in the 1250 zone. This is for handguns, I think 2000fps is the goal for rifles in Africa.

Example (no cal or specific bullet weights given because it applies across the board)

80% weight at 1500 fps = 75% penetration
100% weight at 1250fps = 100% penetration
125% weight at 1000fps = 85% penetration
100% weight at 1500 fps = 102% penetration

You do gain a small amount of penetration with higher vels, but you have to increase the vel exponentially to get more pen.

I have chronoed my 357 180 Buffalo bore hardcast out of a 6" barrel. Velocity was 1465 fps.

Phil Shoemaker performed extensive penetration tests with the Buffalo Bore 9mm 147-grain load before he used it in the field--and if I recall correctly the fatal shot on the 9-foot brown bear was through the shoulders. The bullet was found under the hide on the far side. (Will recheck that from my info on the incident, but am very sure.)

A 180-grain .357 would obviously penetrate at least as well.

Every shot that Phil fired made it under the skin on the far side. Phil knows bears that is for sure and certain

Which is why its always amazing to me how many people who have never even seen a grizzly, much less a big brown bear, know so much about "adequate" handgun cartridges....

Maybe think about a 200 gr.