Hello!
As the aforementioned son who bear hunts and new forum member, I wanted to say thank you for all the replies in this thread and the discussion it has generated.
I wanted to post and clear some things up and ask some questions of my own. To start off, I totally agree with Brushawg that a handgun is not the ideal Bear gun for a hunting scenario, and as gnatshooter mentioned I use a 7mm 08 while on stand, although I am looking into replacing this, which is a totally different discussion. For me bear hunting is exclusively a northern Minnesota activity, which means Black Bears, Timber Wolves, and the occasional large cat. I also want to agree with Tripledeuce that shot placement is king, and I am just as sure that he would agree that some guns are better for different jobs than others. The 10mm discussion gnatshooter and I were having was originally focused on the issues of ideal weapon for a unplanned encounter with a Black Bear. I originally started looking for said weapon after an experience I had during the last season, while I was helping my father-in-law retrieve his bear, and another bear came in while we were pulling the first up a hill. The bear that came in started huffing at us in an attempt to scare us off the carcass and nearby bait pile. Our guns were back at the wheelers because pulling 300+ pounds of dead weight through a swamp is a two handed effort. Having a sidearm in a holster at that point would have been comforting to say the least.
With regards to caliber and recoil, I'm a small guy with small hands, and so I need to consider what's comfortable to shoot so that I don't resent getting the practice in that results in the good shot placement that Tripledeuce mentioned. This limits my ability to entertain the idea of the larger 'hand cannons'. Also, in other forums I have seen a lot of discussion of penetration vs energy transfer, and in those discussions the people who talk about large game tend to emphasize penetration due to the fact that, compared to a human being, there is simply more tissue for the bullet to travel through, not to mention thicker bone, as MONTANA308 did. It's also interesting to me that of those who say that they actually carry for similar reasons seem to mention the 10mm auto more than any other single round, and that's not just based on sketch's comment. Could be wrong on that though. Also fun fact: The Slædepatruljen Sirius (Sirius Sledge Patrol) in Daneborg, Greenland carry Glock 20s for Polar Bear protection.
I did also want to respond to unforgiven and the idea of a revolver. While I have read that the reliability of revolvers is better, I must be honest and say that's it's not really my style, nor is the Glock. I have shot a few 1911's, and one Glock, and I must say I just like the look and feel of the 1911s. The presence of a safety is also reassuring since I plan to carry in fairly dense brush.
I appriciate all of the attention this has generated, and I will be reading as posts continue. Feel free to ask me about how I plan to use whatever I end up getting, but I'm guessing that I'll spend more time reading and learning than commenting. If you have read this far, thanks for that too, I realize that this has turned into a book.
TL;DR: May need to defend against accidental black bears in the woods, governments issue 10mm auto for polar bear protection
Edit: So I realized that I totally forgot to ask a question: This is obviously an issue of balancing priorities, how do you guys go about doing that/what considerations do you make when choosing a gun for a job like this one?
