Shooting Big Dogs With Handgun Ammo

T

Texas Star

US Veteran
Joined
Mar 11, 2005
Messages
20,360
Reaction score
16,164
Location
Texas
Have any of you had the need to shooot a big dog (or a coyote or wolf or hyena) with a handgun?

Tell us what you used, the impact area on the animals, and the results, please.

Thanx,

T-Star
 
I can tell you that I have seen a couple of State Troopers have to dispatch a deer hit by a car with a 9mm. Goes something like this. Bang..bang..bang bang bang...bang. With a .45 ACP, Bang. I do know of a guy who whacked a coyote with a .357 Magnum, don't recall the bullet he used, but he said it went down like it was hit by a truck. I have shot a half breed feral cat with a .22 Magnum (that was interesting). I imagine a good .38 Special if put right through that coyote's boiler room should do the trick, anything more powerful should be as equally efficient. If you can kill a whitetail with a .357, a coyote or a dog should not be a problem.
 
If I have to shoot a dog, it will be because it is attacking me. On duty, it will be issued 45ACP 230 grain Gold Dot. It has a good track record on humans, but dogs are tougher, quite often. If off duty, it would be attacking our dogs; I carry a 296 (44 special) with the blazer 200 grain gold dot, and anticipate a contact or near contact shot, as close as possible to the center of the chest. Making sure I hit the problem and not my dogs or a bystander is one of the reasons for the contact shot.
 
It wasn't a dog, but it was the biggest woodchuck I've ever seen in my life and it was all of 35 lbs. I shot it with a 6" 686/Remington .357 125 gr. SJHP through the left lower back with the bullet traveling up into the chest cavity. It rolled over on it's back and locked up like it was hit by lightnining. It's nervous system was obviously in a state of overload and it was an instant stoppage. I then shot it in the head to end any suffering that it might be experiencing (besides it's teeth were about 2" long and they scared the hell out of me). A smaller animal I shot with the same gun and ammo was a racoon that I would guess to be about twenty pounds. I caught her on the run and shot her through the pelvic area. It literally knocked her ass end over, but didn't stop her. She ran for my mother-in-law's fence and I ran up to her as she was just getting done squeezing through a hole. I hammered her with three rounds through the chest in rapid fire. The first one through the chest was, in retrospect, all that was needed.
 
A handgun is not my first choice for dog/coyote dispatch, 12 ga with 00buck is the ticket.

But the times I have used a handgun on yotes, it was 45acp shooting a 230gr LRN bullet at 880FPS.

One shot drops on the 3 times I have had to do it.
 
I can tell you that I have seen a couple of State Troopers have to dispatch a deer hit by a car with a 9mm. Goes something like this. Bang..bang..bang bang bang...bang.
Click to expand...

I heard about an officer who had to dispatch a cow that was hit by a car. Bang, Bang, Bang... And the thing is just as alive, and now in considerably more pain. It just wouldn't die. It kept wheezing and wheezing, but wouldn't die. Well, The officer wasn't very familiar with bovine anatomy. He shot it between the eyes...which is the nasal cavity, not the location of the brain. So in addition to broken legs, ribs, etc. - the cow now had a severely broken nose. I believe someone with some knowledge about cows finally pointed out his mistake, and they were able to put the poor thing out of its misery.
 
Originally posted by dixiedawg119:
I can tell you that I have seen a couple of State Troopers have to dispatch a deer hit by a car with a 9mm. Goes something like this. Bang..bang..bang bang bang...bang.
Click to expand...

I heard about an officer who had to dispatch a cow that was hit by a car. Bang, Bang, Bang... And the thing is just as alive, and now in considerably more pain. It just wouldn't die. It kept wheezing and wheezing, but wouldn't die. Well, The officer wasn't very familiar with bovine anatomy. He shot it between the eyes...which is the nasal cavity, not the location of the brain. So in addition to broken legs, ribs, etc. - the cow now had a severely broken nose. I believe someone with some knowledge about cows finally pointed out his mistake, and they were able to put the poor thing out of its misery.
Click to expand...

If you ever have to put a large animal down, draw an imaginary line from the left eye to the right ear, and the right eye to the left ear.

One bullet at the intersection of those two lines guarantees a quick, humane kill.
 
I shot a big chow just under the chin with a Glock 27 loaded with 165 grain Hydra-Shoks. He was facing me at about 15 yards. He bolted at the shot and I thought I missed him, but I found him dead the next day about a quarter mile away. No autopsy, but I suspect the abundant neck hair plugged the hollowpoint up some.
 
Back in the mid 80's I was attacked by two Rottweilers. I fired a single shot from my 4 inch 38. The round was a Speer lawman 125+p. It struck one square in the chest which staggered it and turned it away....the second ran off like a cartoon character at the sound of the shot. The wounded Rott survived because the owner was willing to pay for the surgery. The Rott continued to walk around and bleed for at least 20 minutes until animal control showed up. I would count this as a stop because the attack ceased and the dog had no desire to continue it but consider myself lucky.
 
Last year I had the undesireable task of rounding up three pit bulls in the ciy. One turned on me without provocation and bit my gun hand. In that instant I just knew he was about to die of lead poisoning. I drew my Sig 229, kicking the dog away from me as I was drawing. This caused him to bite my shin, but he let go as I cleared the holster. He then started to run around to attack my back, which could've been tricky because there were two other officers and a citizen behind me. I swung through from behind and dropped the hammer just as the front sight crossed the shoulder at a range of 5 yards max. At the shot the dog started yelping in agony. I looked at my hand and realized I was bleeding. All I could think is "Damn, I hope he dies soon so I know if I'll need rabies shots or not." He then circled around and came back in front of me. The Speer .40 180 gr. Gold Dot Hollow Point hit dead center in the chest, slightly behind where the front sight had been. He had been moving faster than I thought and I didn't lead quite enough. He was still screaming bloody murder and blood was shooting in a very high arc from the entrance wound as he staggered away. I remember thinking it was like the proverbial garden hose. Finally the dog slowly staggered about 10 yards onto the closest porch to lie down. After about a minute of very labored breathing it finally died. There was no exit wound, which did not surprise me, as in my experience these Gold Dots don't penetrate people very well either. I feel the Gold Dot is the best bullet out there but Speer does not load them hot enough. They lack velocity. Of course, this greatly pleases the police administrators. And I have seen these bullets literally fall out of the entrance wounds of other dogs and humans that we have shot. I really like the Gold Dots but would prefer a bigger cartridge with more velocity.

Dave Sinko
 
The one time I pulled a gun on a dog, the dog was a medium German shepherd, and the gun I had with me was a J frame .357. I didn't have to shoot, but it sounds like the consensus is that it would have been sufficient.

I recently got a 4" model 29 .44 magnum for hauling around in the hilly woods of Western W.Va., where the coyotes are getting fat off the ground hogs. The coyotes are likely the biggest problems out there, but there's everything ranging from cougars to black bears, no telling who you're gonna meet.
 
A very large German Shepherd mix. About 2 feet from the muzzle to his nose. 6 inch Model 66 with Federal 125 grain .357 Mag ammo. The dog was coming straight at me, mouth wide open when I shot. His head was tilted upward as he looked like he was staring at my face.

The bullet entered his open mouth and penetrated the top rear of his throat. It exitted his neck just below where the spine connected to the skull, I believe, above his shoulders. 3 inch diameter exit wound that contained small bone fragments, and I could see the severed upper end of the spine where it was cut by the bullet. It looked like a vertebrae was just missing.

The dog was running at me, the low, crouched, smooth run as opposed to a bounding run. He seemed to just 'shut down' as I shot but he still ran into my legs, probably from momentum as opposed to leg action, nearly knocking me down. His rear legs and tail quivered for a few seconds but nothing else moved.

I quivered for about a half hour!

My patrol area at the time included the foothills of the canyon containing Snowbird and Alta, the ski resorts. I had to shoot dozens of injured mule deer there, along the roadway, mostly in the winter. Even though the deer were badly hurt from being hit by cars, being filled with adrenalin made them harder to kill than a deer that was healthy and didn't know you were there, like when hunting. The 6 inch .357/125 grain combination always exited. I usually used neck shots, but the bullets exited torso heart/lung shots, too. For a while I carried a .22 LR in my gear bag for this task, which worked pretty well if I put the bullet just behind and below the base of the ear. If the deer could move it's head, getting the right angle for that shot was hard sometimes as the deer kept moving it's head to follow my movements, so I went back to the .357.

I tried a 12 ga. pump with #6 or #8 birdshot in areas with houses close by, to try to minimize the risk of richochets. At a muzzle-to-deer range of about 5 feet, it worked great but was very messy.
 
Attacking Rotweiller, thorax hit with Cor-Bon 115 gr JHP, dropped at the shot, DRT.
 
I've killed a few medium to large dogs with handguns over the years, and have forgotten specifics of many, and most have been dogs suspected of being rabid or that were critically ill, and that I've killed with head shots from very close range.

I killed a coyote with a Star BKS loaded with Sierra 115gr. JHPs over a case-full of Herco many years ago. (Speer #8 max., as I recall.
icon_eek.gif
) Range was about 15 yards, shot was broadside to the shoulder/chest, and it dropped dead instantly. I shot a mongrel bitch that would have weighed about 40 lbs. after it wandered onto my place and snarled at my kids playing in the yard. I hit her from about 25 yards with the dog on the run, using a Commander loaded with my old IPSC loads, a 200gr. H&G 68 at about 900fps. Again, DRT, with a shot to the shoulder. My brother had to shoot a big Rott that a drug dealer sicced on him a few years back when he arrived to serve a warrant. The gun was a Colt Commander, ammo was Speer 230gr. Gold Dot. Two rounds, square into the front of the chest, from about 4-6 feet away, instant stop. Both bullets exited, having traveled almost end-to-end in the big dog. Unlike some of the underloaded .40 Gold Dot loads, the 230gr. .45s penetrate adequately.
 
These cases are interesting Keep 'em coming.

I've heard that a big dog is hard to stop, and I work a security job in an upscale area where people are careless with leashing their mutts. They have some expensve, big dogs that look like they'd bite off a human limb with one chomp.

I'm seriously worried that I'll be attacked some night.

Been carrying the Federal No. 38G lead HP .38 round. May decide to go to .357's in my M-66 with four-inch barrel. Been thinkng of carrying a 9mm Beretta at times, but am unsure how it would deal with a big dog.

The more posts we get here, the better picture will emerge.
 
One advantage to the revolver is that if you have to make a contact shot (which you may well have to in order to minimize risk to others, or because the threat is not apparent enough to allow for other options until the dog is right on you), you can do so. With an autopistol, you may push it out of battery under the stress of the moment. That could suck.
 
I've shot feral dogs over the years with everything from .22s to the .45 Colt. Large or small, they all were easily stopped with good hits. That is except for a certain medium sized dog which seemed to shrug off good hits with a .44 Magnum. Won't go into detail but one would have thought the .44 Magnum was inadequate. I guess there's one in every crowd.
 
Years ago, I managed as many as 125 cows on a 450 acre farm, and I had a constant running battle with the feral dogs. Many of these were pets to somebody, coming in packs over a big hill from a housing development almost 2 miles away. I always hated shooting someone's pets, but these packs can put a full-grown cow down in a matter of minutes -- and for them, it's all good fun...

I shot dogs with all manner of rifles and handguns in many calibers, but about the most "definitive" handgun round -- even on a couple of really HUGE dogs -- was the .45 acp. I never saw a dog go 10 feet after a solid hit with a HydraShok 230 gr. jhp. I much preferred its performance over that of the .357 magnum. I didn't own a .44 Magnum st the time, but there's no way it could have killed them deader, quicker.

Not quite as awesome, but still plenty effective on ribcage shots, was the old Federal 9BP load, a non-+P 115 gr. JHP. A widow friend of mine had a pair of barns literally infested with dozens of feral cats, and an Argentine 9mm Hi Power pistol using the same load proved to be sovreign medicine on those critters when she asked me to help her get rid of them.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

rubiranch
.41 Magnum vs .44 Magnum
2
Replies
22
Views
1K
Claymore33
Claymore33
A
question about legacy 357 magnum ammo
2
Replies
33
Views
2K
agent00
A
JRB416
Vintage early Western .44 Magnum ammo
Replies
13
Views
1K
Kinman
Kinman
S
-original- old school .357 Magnum
Replies
19
Views
1K
DWalt
DWalt
BoulderTroll
Safe ammo for new Model 10 No Lock
Replies
17
Views
783
usm1rifle
usm1rifle

Latest posts

Back
Top