257 weatherby your thoughts??

[FastDam]

Make sure to have a 44gun on your hip when you go into the thicket to track your bear through his tunnels in the brush. He will attack you if you corner him after you shot him, and he will go straight into the thickest cover he around.
Any neck shot other than just grazing it will destroy the bears senses. It will be either a **** to the spine, a shot to the arteries in the neck or all the nerves. Its either hit or miss. With a .30 cal I would take the vitals shot, nut with a .25 or even 7mm bears stop the bullets inside. At least at long distances.

 

[winmag]

I've killed a bear with a .44mag in a Ruger Blackjack. I already made reference to in my last post. Yes they are effective.
My carry gun for all my hunting tho is a 40 s&w. It's sent 2 bonded bullets clear thru a bear st 6 feet. Once thru the skull, & the other was poorly placed. It works. Even when the bear is stone cold dead, but nerves make it twitch.... Killed it at the top of a hill with my 270WSM & it tumbled all the way down into the creek bottom. I didn't see it till I was almost on top of it. That twitch scared the heck outa me. In mid air hover (resembling Fred flintstone) my pistol came out of its holster & went off twice before I hit the ground.
As far as the neck shot went, that was a different bear altogether, & I guarantee you it wasn't a miss or a graze. I connected at the neck/shoulder area, with the bullets path should've come out in front of the off shoulder, severing the spine/neck vertebrae in the process. I knocked him off a small cliff into the brush below. 3 days later, & tons if blood that just dried up. I used a Gerber Machette to hack my way thru Hawthorne brush & black berries for 3 days with 0 success. I'm still baffled, & humbled. I hate that sick feeling.
Like I said, strange how peoples experiences differ. But I know where my bullet goes when I pull the trigger. I know where the crosshairs were when the rifle bucked. & at only 179 yds its dang tough to screw it up from a supported shooting position. Ya, I know where my bullet went. I ate my tag that year too. He had to have died in there but I have no idea where. I wish like heck I did. It again, experiences differ. Not saying your right or wrong, nor am I questioning your ability, or experience. I'm also not implying you dont know where your bullets go either........

 

[sp6x6]

Bears are easy to kill, when hit right Then I have been there on big boars hit wrong and followed them for miles to never see again.

 

[winmag]

I have officially decided AUTO-CORRECT SUCKS!
Blackjack?/**Bkackhawk**
Is/I'D
Shoot/****
Good grief this whole technology thing is a pain in the @$$.
I want to go back to an "Amish phone". Black and white, Just makes calls etc. Or learn how to use a computer....
Typically my grammar isn't quite this atrocious.

 

[Dalebow]

I think some of the responses were not meant to be serious, if they were they I think they need to start planting flowers
I dont think shooting a bear in the neck is advisable unless its the second or third shot as a follow up. Things can always go wrong but a bullet in the lungs on a bear that isnt aware your there will do just fine I have decided, kids and ladies shoot them with 243 all the time, no one would think 257 Roberts or 2506 is too small, of course a 80gr TTSX is smaller than a 100gr round but the TTSX makes up for it in size

 

[sp6x6]

Since you posted ,you shot a 500# + BEAR. You know what a big one is. Out west here a bears that size is almost unheard of,unless it is a grizz. I would not shoot a bear in neck unless it was a short gimme shot, and I had a large and powerful caliber. I was still hunting threw timber one day and happened on a bedded 6x6 bull. 1/4 to me, I thought why shoot threw all that tasty meat. He was looking my direction and I offhanded him in neck,just below jaw. He jumped up and in one step was over the ridge contour. I could not believe I missed a 60 yrd. type shot. I followed and 100 yrd. later drop of blood, I had snow and this continued for 1/2 mile, just a drop now and then. I lost him in some other elk tracks....This took me some time to sort out, I back tracked and he went up hill, straight up the steep stuff. Lot of people say a hard hit animal goes down hill. I have followed at least 3 that went up until they crashed. I caught this bull, behind a alder patch and snap shot, took out part of both shoulders,340 wby,225. There went my tasty meat. I had hit him 4'' under jaw and almost dead center neck, bullet went between juglar and neck bone, I COULD HAVE shoved a piece of rebar threw the hole. I took a monster muley w/similar shot by mistake. I avoid this shot like the plague.

 

[Dalebow]

sp6X6
I agree, I will post some pics of him when I get home tonight, I shot him in unit 851 which is Trinidad Co, he is a large bear, but the ranch I hunt typically has 400+ pound bears on it. I shot him with a 300 WSM 180gr TSX thru both shoulders and he folded up there, with a smaller caliber I would have went behind the shoulder.
They are awesome creatures.

 

[FastDam]

If your bear doesn't either drop at the shot, or give a good blood trail, the bear may be very hard to find and dangerous to look for. A400 pound fat fall bear is hard to get a blood trail from even with a large bullet. IMO, 243 is way undergunned for everything except maybe yearlings. I lost one with a boiler room hit at 358the yards with a grandslam bullet out if my 7mag. My buddy lost one from his 25-06. Use a 30 cal, get a30 cal and get a good exit or shoot them behind the ear with a small gun

 

[rooster740]

In my area I would say a 125-200 pound bear is the average. Once in a great while a 300 or 400 pound bear is killed. With that in mind my 25-06 is my bear hunting rifle out to 500ish yards. Certain places I pack my cannon, but not often. I have killed a few bears, the furthest at about 450 yards. My experience is they die real easy when chest shot.
The next story is certainly not long range hunting related, so it may not belong here, but as I am on the subject here you go. I have killed a bear with a 223 in the noggin, which is always a sure bet at close range 100ish yards. A female in my past chest shot a huge bear with 3 slugs out of her 22lr in a tree in my yard, and it was really dead when it hit the ground.
My most interesting hunting story to date is as follows. I had a young bear hunter who used his bow to shoot a bear, in the yard again. The bear was not hit good and ran into some brush and up a tree, but before the shooter could get into archery range the bear started to come out of the tree. Being as I was at the base of the tree, instinctively I utilized a large club like stick and smacked it hard on the head. I was hoping the bear would go back up the tree so the kid could shoot it again. As it turns out, I knocked the bear cold out making it fall 4-5 feet to the ground.......just long enough to be slightly self-impressed and appear cool, but scared as hell! As the bear started to come back to, whatever amount of life it had left, I used my club to smack the end of two arrows farther into the animal until they were as short as I could get them! We were in thick brush at this time and the kid was freaked out by the commotion and noises coming from the brush, and being yelled at by his father to get more arrows into the animal, and me yelling not to shoot me as I was unable to leave the scene. The bear was thrashing around raising holy hell and I knew it would expire soon from its wounds,,,,, but ****, time does not always fly when you are having fun. I just kept my club (which was quickly getting shorter) in the bears mouth, which was a trying task. By now my hollering invited my dog into the mix, thank god, and basically the bear killed itself by juggling around the arrows inside itself. We do not shoot bears with bows anymore in the yard! It can be done, but wow, I just do not want to be part of it!
Moral of the story, be prepared for super animal strength!

My only advise would be to use a 115 berger or 115 nosler bt to utilize the most of their long range capabilities in your 257 Weatherby. Yet if you like, or are comfortable with what you are shooting, then shoot the lungs, but remember bears have bigger teeth then Antelope!
Best of luck!

 

[Dalebow]

having killed 3 bears and none were super human (I guess for a bear it would be super-bear) I am going to use my 257 weatherby but am going to step up to the 100 grain TTSX, should be enough for a bear and not overkill on my antelopegun)