I have an encore and am trying to decide what catridge to go with for my dad to use on a mountain lion hunt this winter. I don't want to do much hide damage and at the same time he is not comfortable with being under gunned (no 223 or similar). I was thinking about a 7-30 Waters barrel from Bullberry?
Any suggestions?
Ben

Presuming your hunting treed animals pretty much anything from 357 Mag and above will get-r-done. Arrows work great as well.
A friend has shot several with a 243.
High velocity bullets will cause sew up type damage on the offside. A 44 Mag will punch a caliber hole stright through with minimal damage.

Neal

i use a 41 mod 57 smith, david my good friend that hunts them for a living uses a contender in 256 win. only thing is a 357 - never had a good clean kill with one

The lion will be shot at a close distance, bayed or treed. I used a .44 Mag 629 on both of mine, and consider that caliber perfect. No need for bottlenecks, high velocity, long barrels or the like.

A guide in Idaho told me that they often use a 38 Special and aim for the lung area. He said that the mountain lion will tend to stay in the tree until it bleeds to death and then fall from the tree "completely dead" (sort of the like the Wicked Which of the East...) preventing a serious fight between a dying cougar and the dogs.

Thanks guys, I will be getting a new barrel here soon and it is narrowed down for sure now.
Ben

The .38 Spec bleed out shot sounds very practical, but, if your marksmanship is good enough to make that work, why not just put a .41 or .44 thru the neck and be done with it immediately?

Shack wrote:

quote:

The .38 Spec bleed out shot sounds very practical, but, if your marksmanship is good enough to make that work, why not just put a .41 or .44 thru the neck and be done with it immediately?

With that type of placement, you are going to have a huge exit as secondary bone fragments from the spinal column will figure into the equation.

Or just head shoot the kitty with a .22 Magnum.

To be clear, I have never hunted cougars with dogs (only unsuccessfully with a predator call in Idaho and Montana carrying a scoped 357 Maximum Contender pistol). But, during a black bear hunt in Idaho several years ago the guide commented that their greatest worry was the cougar coming out of the tree with any life left in it at all. He commented that the lung area was so big it was hard to miss and that they thought its safer to use a smaller caliber in the lungs rather than trying to shoot it in head or other vital area. I thought it was an interestng concept.