Sounds like way too much fun. How much powder can you stuff in the Ruger? I used to have a Navy 44 clone. I could only fit about 30gns of FFF if I didn't use a wad. The only thing I shot with it was a Skunk and a huge Racoon though.

Lar45, I shot a doe with the cap and ball. I aimed at her shoulder because she was walking. Shot was between 35 and 40 yds. For some reason I hit the shoulder. She went straight up and when she took off, her left leg was flopping and worthless. I don't know how she jumped the fence, but she went down fast. Thats when I found her right leg was also broken. When I butchered I found the ball against the skin and it had lost 42 grs. I did not hit bone in the left leg so I don't know why it was flopping so bad. The bone in the right leg was completely shattered and there was a lot of meat damage. I saved as much as I could and ground it for jerky. This pipsqueek gun does more damage then the 45-70 and .44. I will have no reservations about using it for deer from now on. It hits very hard. I get 41 grs. of Swiss fffg behind the round ball. I use a BPCR lube in front of the balls because it does not blow off from firing adjacent cylinders. It's the Mathew's lube with Neutrogena soap. Gun cleans very easy too. I shot an 8" group offhand at 100 yds with it. It's dead on at 50 and 75 yds. and only drops a little at 100 yds. I'm getting over 1100 fps, don't remember exactly though.

I picked up a little brass conical mold with the thought of getting another cap and ball revolver, but it sounds like your round ball did everything you could have asked of it. Back in the 80's I saw one company that was offering a 50cal BP revolver, I should have got one but I was new to handguns and thought the 44 would be stretching it. My brother in law got the 36 cal in the same model as mine.
In Idaho you can't use a muzzle loading pistol to hunt with. I think they need to reevaluate this.

Lar45, I can't understand why you can't hunt with one. That is really backwards. These are the guns that won the west. It seems as if some states are really screwed up with their hunting regulations. We can't use the cap and ball in muzzle loader season because it has to be a single shot. A pistol is ok though. We have only two requirements for handguns. It has to have a barrel at least 4" long and for big game has to be .38 cal or above. Then, again, we can't use a crossbow even if disabled.
I tried conical bullets and they shot ok, but there is not much powder space and velocity is low. I got much better results with a round ball and half FFFG and half corn meal or cream of wheat for plinking. I just used a second flask for the filler.

We can use a crossbow during archery season with a disabled permit. I almost went that way. I was doing rehab for my bad back and ended up tearing a nerve out of it's sheath in my left elbow. I couldn't even shoot the kids slingshot. I had to take 2 years off of archery season, then turn my Darton down way low and not practice too much. Congrats on the Deer again.