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I am starting off with hounds and am 18 and in college and i want to know what kind of gun to carry with me to protect my dogs if I should encounter wolves or a bad cat or bear. I want to know brands, calibers, and maybe if you have a gun for sale that would work for me.

Thanks Cole

Boulder Tuff wrote:I am starting off with hounds and am 18 and in college and i want to know what kind of gun to carry with me to protect my dogs if I should encounter wolves or a bad cat or bear. I want to know brands, calibers, and maybe if you have a gun for sale that would work for me.

Thanks Cole

Here in Montana you wont have to worry about bear while you are hunting hounds as for the wolves by the time you get to them with your hounds it will be to late as you will never get to see their encounter with your hounds it will be all over and done and as far as a squable with a cougar it would be few and far between not saying it cant happen. I have carried a 22 pistol or break down rifle with me from the start and have never needed any thing else not saying this is for everyone just what I have carried. later, Andy

I have a .22 Mag pistol that I always carry along while Cat hunting. As far as Bear, a .40 cal. I have never needed to use either other than harvesting game. Wolves, well we are lucky in that regard. The .22 mag is light and packs a good punch.

I use a Heritage Arms 22/.22mag revolver pistol with a 9" long barrel. Usually stick with the .22 mag cylinder..

For the most part I didn't carry a gun. Last year I had a female lion on the ground within a few feet of me. It's a good thing she decided to go her own way or I would have been in deep shit. Since then I carry a 357 pistol. Not that it's the optimum gun or anything like that, it's just what I'm comfortable with. I just recomment something that your accurate and comfortable with. I've taken my 17 HMR with us when we are chasing bobcats and it's a rather large pain to pack a fullsize rifle along in the trees and such. If you have the intention to kill a lion, then I would recommend a good lever gun that is compact and can quickly follow the first shot. I also would recommend making damn sure the dogs are clear before pulling the trigger.

Scott

Thanks for the advice and tips guys i appreciate it.

Sincerely Cole

Not that I have ever got to run hounds out west but I have a Rossi 92 with a 16" barrel in .357 mag that packs well and shoots great. I hand load it down to shoot bobcats and have some hotter loads that would handle most anything within 50 yds. If I ever do make it out west I would be carrying it.

Boulder Tuff wrote:I am starting off with hounds and am 18 and in college and i want to know what kind of gun to carry with me to protect my dogs if I should encounter wolves or a bad cat or bear. I want to know brands, calibers, and maybe if you have a gun for sale that would work for me.

Thanks Cole

In Utah you either have to have a kill license to carry or a concealed weapon permit to pack a gun. Many of the lion units have gone back to limited entry and bear is also limited entry, so getting the tag to carry legal is probably a joke with the concealed weapon permit as the only option. I would like to say, however, that it isn't legal to "protect you hounds" because they have come in harms way with a mean bear lion lion. A person does have the right by law to protect themselves, but I don't believe there is any code stating that a hounddogger has the right to shoot a mean lion or bear off his hounds.

Years ago I had a lion working one of my hounds over in the tree, my little Rowen dog. It was a Pinyon tree and they were about ten or twelve feet up. I did not carry a weapon in those days because it was limited entry and it was therefore not legal to have one, so I left the ground screaming and cussing at the top of my lungs on the way to that lion. Just before I reached that lion it let my little Rowen loose and popped out of the top of that tree like a jack in the box. Now honestly I don't know what I planned on doing if that lion had came my way, but I guess it would have been me, the lion and eight dogs on the ground in a rolling ball of fury.



ike

As Ike said it can be a dicey situation without a harvest permit in Utah. I have a Utah concealed carry permit, and it is reciprocal in a number of states.

Rossi 16" model 92 357 Magnum MtCurhunter ....you got the gun my friend. This is an ideal weapon for accuracy to 100 yards, superior knockdown to the handgun in that calber which is enough on it's own by the way. You are not our there tackeling grizzley bears on a routine basis. Let me tell you a 125-140 gr. hollowpoint in that thing will drop the biggest wolf that ever lived like a rock. I dropped a 360+ 6x7 bull elk with that excact gun with one well placed lung shot at 60 yards. He ran maybe 90 feet and crashed dead in the aspens. Recomended for elk? Not hardly but when you are helping city folks that don't often get out in the hills at times you use the tool at hand.


Not much a man can't handle with a good 22 pistol, a pump 12 gauge and a good old 30-06. Jeff Cooper

Thanks for the tips and advice. I live in Montana and do not know the laws for sure but I am not to concerned with the laws cause i payed for those dogs and they are mine. I will kill anything that trys to kill my dogs I am not about to let my hard earned money and my time that i put into them just go down the drain. I will not intentionally kill them first. I will give a warning shot and if they dont back off im sorry but it will be over. I think there is a law that if a animal trys to kill your pets then you have the right to put it down not sure though. Any thoughts on that?

Thanks again Cole

I don't really have a clue? If a you were home and a lion came into your yard and attempted to kill your hound then I'm sure it would be within your rights, but participating in a catch and release sport on public land with public wildlife may well be a different matter. Personally I buy a tag every year and try and hunt the units where that tag applies, then there just isn't any problem if things go bad with that tag in my pocket. But in the end each person makes their own decisions in life and then has to deal with the consequences.

ike

Just so you guys know... IT IS NOT LEGAL TO CARRY A GUN HUNTING IN UTAH, UNLESS YOU HAVE A KILL TAG! NOT EVEN WITH A CONCEALED CARRY PERMIT!

Take care,
Mason

While a .22 or .22 mag can do the job, I've seen more train wrecks with them in an emergency situation than I care to talk about. My choice to take care of business is a good old 30-30 rifle or a .357 mag. Gun and ammo are reasonable, easy to pack and will do a hell of a lot more damage. Unless you live in Utah, I guess, then I would say maybe a 32 or 33 inch caliber baseball bat. Unless I'm mistaken, you're from Mt.

I think a .22 mag is fine - nice to shoot the occasional bobcat with without blowing a big hole in 'em. What ever you choose, it needs to be light, comfortable to shoot and make sure it's stainless! Guns are always getting wet when you are cat hunting.

If you look on page 40 of the Utah Biggame hunting regs you will see that it is legal to carry a firearm if you have a conceled weapons permit on any type of hunt.