If any of you are interested in historical books on how hunting used to be , definitely check out Mcafferty's books . Two that I recently finished are "The Bear Hunter" and "Death in the Canebrakes" . I've got another one about hunting lions and bears in the same region , the Mississippi Delta. Very fascinating tales about a way of life that's largely gone.

Spoiler alert ,many of the hunters mentioned in the books preferred to use a knife to dispatch bayed bears . I've knifed bayed and caught feral hogs , but really you just need to control the head while administering the coup de grace. Not the jaws and four clawed feet.