Shot my first deer with a handgun last weekend. Used a hard cast bullet from a 44 Contender. I was in a treestand and my shot was at close range, and a 45 degree angle just behind the shoulders, penetrating completely through. The deer didn't go far, and I saw her go down. Good thing, because there was absolutely no blood trail. If I hadn't seen this deer fall, I doubt I would have found her. Is this typical for a deer shot with a 44?

What style of bullet were you using ? SWC,LBT,RN.

Not my experience at all! My 300 grain WFN LBTs and 245 grain 429244s both leave lots of blood, but they never go far, never more than a bound or two.
If you hit the heart, there was no way to pump the blood to leave a trail? Truthfully this is the reason I stopped hunting with a 357 magnum, it killed them and they never went far, but they didn't bleed like they do with the 44.

Not being present for the post-mortem, I would be hard pressed to say for sure what you hit and how the bullet performed. I have seen equal amounts of blood from cast and jacketed bullets with similar hits.

I've seen the same thing many times with cast bullets from 44's, 45's and heavy jacketed bullets from a 375 (non-expanding). It has been my experience that often deer and other animals won't bleed much, if any at all, for roughly the first 50 yards after being hit. After that distance you'll usually start to see a somewhat light but consistent blood trail till you find the dead deer assuming it was well hit. From the exit wounds I've examined, an expanding bullet will leave a ragged hole whereas a hard cast bullet will often leave a round cookie-cutter type hole, unless bone is hit near the skin, and I think the latter is easier covered by moving skin or otherwise plugged up. The advantage of heavy cast bullets is additional penetration which isn't usually needed on deer. IMHO that marginal shot placement with a non-expanding bullet nearly always results in a long if not futile tracking job. Over the years I've taken every opportunity to back-track animals that I either saw fall or that other hunters have shot to examine the blood trail or lack thereof.

My Taurus RB has the 8 3/8" barrel and I can get better than 4" groups off a bag at 100yds. This is using the factory Hornady 240 gr XTPs. I have a self imposed limit to 50 yds when deer hunting. I've never had a shot past 25 yds in my life, which is what prompted me to start handgun hunting last year. Of course the first deer I see is almost twice as far away!

I've shot some factory 300 gr cast cores while selecting a load for a black bear hunt and got just about the same accuracy. This year I put in a spring kit but haven't really put my head down to see if overall accuracy with any load has improved as a result.

I have not started reloading yet so all my ammo is factory except for a lot of 300 rounds from the Cabela's bulk ammo section. The 240 SWC they offer shoots to exactly the same POI as the Hornady 240 XTPs out to 50 yds with about one half the recoil. These loads are great for practice, but are FILTHY! I just picked up a die set, 50 pieces of unused starline brass, 250 240 gr SWC bullets and a couple other odds and ends for $20. All I need is a press for centerfire reloading and I'll start rolling my own. Thanks to BFRshooter for the recipe and pointers. Hunt4fun, nice buck, congrats on your success.