I'm not offering any advice on the topic as I have no first hand knowledge of the subject, but my grandfather told us younguns' of his adventures on cougar hunts out west back in his younger days. He said once the dogs treed them he always dispatched them with his S&W model 10 in .38 Special. He said most of the guys on the hunt used .22LR rifles so as to go easy on the pelts, and one always carried a side by side 12 gauge with 00 buckshot in case they "accidently" got one cornered.

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