It is a pleasure meeting you all.

Living in Alaska I have great opportunities for handgun hunting. Really took it up in earnest about 5 years ago, and it changed me from a fishing addict to a hunting and shooting addict.

I generally hunt with scoped Contenders, but also have 2 Ruger .45 LC single actions, a .22lr/.22 mag single six and a Mark II .22. The .45 Colts are my carry gun while hunting in case of bears. As for my barrels, I currently have:
.17 HeBee (VVCG)
.17 Mach IV rimmed (Bullberry)
.22 LR match (factory)
.221 Rem rimmed (VVCG)
.223 Rem (factory)
6 TCU (factory)
6.5X50R (Bellm)
7X30 Waters (VVCG)
.300/221 rimmed (VVCG)
.309 JDJ (SSK)
.375X444 (Bellm)
.375 JDJ (SSK)
.44 Mag (factory)
.45-70 (SSK)
Think I may have to sell a few to support my other habit - old hunting books - but have avoided it so far.

Most of my hunting is done with the .309 JDJ, .375X444 and the SSK .45-70. I have taken Sitka blacktails, caribou, black bears, moose and a musk ox in the last 5 years.

My last hunt was a couple of weeks ago on Kodiak Island for brown bear and deer. The first day of the hunt I killed a good blacktail and spent five hours dragging him the two plus miles back to camp. A couple of days later he went missing from where he was stashed about 40 yards from our tent. Seems a brown bear decided he needed a midnight snack. The bear spent the next four days living within 150 yards of our tent in plain sight chewing on the carcass. Even though he stole my deer that I had worked my butt off for, I became rather attached to him, and although he was big enough his hide was rather mangey, so I passed up what would have been an easy stalk. Also passed up three other bears within 50 yards and with nothing but grass between me and them, and came back empty handed. I can tell you that even with backup, your anal opening puckers up pretty tight when a 8-9 foot brownie stands up and checks you out at 30 yards, while he is trying to decide between fight or flight. That T/C "One Good Shot" motto really starts to mean something to you then.