Most of the other sites I've read seem to have a lot of conflicting information on the DE, so I thought I'd ask here. I know some of you have Desert Eagles.

Typically people look at the Desert Eagle as a range toy, but I'm wondering how useful it'd be for protection when in areas where bears or other larger (than human) animals are known to be. I've read a lot of people having various problems with Desert Eagles in terms of reliability which is a major concern of mine. Is a Desert Eagle suitable for this purpose, or are there better options (that aren't revolvers)? Of course having one to double as a range toy wouldn't be a bad thing. My main concern is for situations in somewhat remote areas in PA where a .45 ACP would be insufficient.

Also I've read that some people use the Desert Eagle for hunting, but I didn't think semi-autos were legal to hunt with in PA (I've never been hunting). I checked the PGC site and the way things were worded seemed to me that all semi-autos (not just long guns) were not to be hunted with or does that vary based on what you're hunting?

TIA