Good Grief Colorado!
Doing some research for future hunts and realized that as per Colorado's 2024 Big Game Hunting Regulations... an Expanding bullet must be used.
Copy of Regulations...
6. HANDGUNS a. Barrel must be a minimum of 4 inches long.
b. Must use a minimum .24-caliber (6 mm) in diameter expanding bullet. c. Shoulder stocks or attachments prohibited.
d. Must use a cartridge or load that produces minimum energy of 550-ft.- pounds at 50 yards as rated by manufacturer.
So a 475/500 shooting 400+ grain hardcasts is insufficient. But a .24 caliber loaded with some Berry's hollow points is ok.
Ok rant over. 😎
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I have enjoyed reading the replies to this thread. Honestly I posted it expecting to generate some good discussion and it has. My initial thoughts when reading the rules is that there must still be a lot of misperceptions out there about the effectiveness of handguns on game; specifically large bore calibers.
I would imagine that a lot of people on this forum would probably agree that a .45/.475/.5/.51 caliber WFN in the 250-400 grain range running 1200-1400 fps would WALLOP western game. The fact that the rules are written to exclude this type of caliber/bullet combo is odd to me.