My vote is .45 Colt. The beauty of big bore revolvers is that you don't have to have high velocity to have something very effective on game. A 250gr hardcast out a .45 Colt doing 950 fps will slice through a LOT of animals and recoil is easy.
Power wise, all things being equal the .45 Colt has more power potential than the .44 Mag, as it simply holds more powder. Of course, the .44 Mag can be loaded very very hot in the right platform but then again, if all things were equal, so could the .45 Colt. It was a warmly loaded .45 Colt that lead to the invention of the 454 Casull and out of the right setup the .45 Colt can pretty much give you 454 ballistics, the key here is using the right setup.
Having shot both, I also think recoil is a little easier on the .45 Colt compared to the .44 Mag, but that's not to say a 330gr hardcast doing over 1,300 fps from my Ruger .45 Colt Bisley 5.5" doesn't recoil, it does but it just sort of rolls in the hand, so it's not bad at all.
I've decided that my next Ruger will likely be a .41 Magnum Blackhawk. Nearly as powerful as .44 Mag but it's more efficient, it just burns less powder to get similar performance. If I want a bigger bullet I'll just use the .45 Colt. But also, there's a lot of overlap when you start comparing these. Deer are easy to kill, so in all honesty it's not going to matter if you use a .41, a .429 or a .45 Colt in a sense, they're all going to get the job done. The bigger the critter though, the bigger bullet you'll want.
Power wise, all things being equal the .45 Colt has more power potential than the .44 Mag, as it simply holds more powder. Of course, the .44 Mag can be loaded very very hot in the right platform but then again, if all things were equal, so could the .45 Colt. It was a warmly loaded .45 Colt that lead to the invention of the 454 Casull and out of the right setup the .45 Colt can pretty much give you 454 ballistics, the key here is using the right setup.
Having shot both, I also think recoil is a little easier on the .45 Colt compared to the .44 Mag, but that's not to say a 330gr hardcast doing over 1,300 fps from my Ruger .45 Colt Bisley 5.5" doesn't recoil, it does but it just sort of rolls in the hand, so it's not bad at all.
I've decided that my next Ruger will likely be a .41 Magnum Blackhawk. Nearly as powerful as .44 Mag but it's more efficient, it just burns less powder to get similar performance. If I want a bigger bullet I'll just use the .45 Colt. But also, there's a lot of overlap when you start comparing these. Deer are easy to kill, so in all honesty it's not going to matter if you use a .41, a .429 or a .45 Colt in a sense, they're all going to get the job done. The bigger the critter though, the bigger bullet you'll want.
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