Have you ever considered a big bore rifle for smaller game? You have much to gain, and little to loose by choosing a big bore for lesser missions. The biggest disadvantage you might run into is range. You are not going to in most cases shoot extreme ranges with the common big bore rifle, but done properly, you won't have any issues at all out to 250 or so yards, and that is a long way in the Carolinas, under most circumstances you will run into in the field.
Even in Alaska for moose and bear, I always preferred a larger caliber. In Africa I wanted the rifles I carried to be as versatile as possible, able to handle anything from Impala to Elephant if required. But this was always asking a lot of a big bore, and it all came down to choosing the right bullet.
In my early days in Africa, I found myself a few times with various 338 Winchesters. Thinking ahead, I always had some sort of Solid loaded up, for that just in case encounter with something large. I retired the 338s in favor of a Winchester M70 I had in Layne Simpsons 358 STA. I really fell in love with 358 caliber because of that rifle. I took 25+ head of plains game, from Impala to Eland with that gun and cartridge. It was a magic gun actually, it would shoot a 250 gr Hornady at 2850 fps, 275 gr Swift A Frame at 2750 fps, and a 310 Woodleigh Solid at 2400 fps, all to the same or very CLOSE POI at 100 yards. I carried all three loaded bullets on every hunt, and on a regular basis would interchange the 250 Hornady and the 275 Swift, depending on the task at hand. The Solids were for encounters with heavy game, and emergency use only, which never occurred and were never needed in the field. This is a case of taking a medium, and trying to get the most out of it.
One can do the same with a big bore rifle these days, because we now have plenty of very suitable bullets to accomplish this.
We will start at 416 caliber and work our way up...............
Stated earlier, the first time I took a 416 to the field was 2005 in Tanzania, used it on several species and the only bullet used was the 340 Woodleigh at 2500+ fps. According to my records the furthest shot was hartebeest at 275 yards. Most everything else was less than 150 and 3-4 animals were less than 60 yards. This 340 Woodleigh performed perfectly for what I was asking of it.
Other bullets were recovered, they all were similar to the ones above. The test work before hand looked very similar as well................
I think it was 2008 before going back to the field with 416, and at this time it was 416 B&M and my boys doing almost all the shooting with it. Now we had changed up to a 350 Barnes TSX, which I believe was a much better bullet than the Woodleigh. The boys shot Kudu, zebra, and oryx with it, and I believe terminal performance was better with the Barnes, and noticed more animal reaction to taking the bullets as well. Translation, the Barnes seemed to hit harder and animals went down quicker.
The test work before hand was good.......
And three recovered bullets looked great.........
Another good possible lighter bullet for 416 would have been the 300 Barnes TSX, but I never went to the field with it.
The 350 Barnes TSX would have and could have been used on buffalo as well. 340 Woodleigh and 300 Barnes could have, but it would need to be a lung shot, and bypass hitting bone, hopefully..........
Another great bullet would have been the 325 North Fork, again, I never made it to the field with it either.......
In 2013 I designed a new 416 caliber bullet that came in at 225 grs. It was a Cutting Edge Raptor. Light for caliber Raptors can do big things. A Raptor is the most wicked, devastating bullet I have ever seen. It literally rips animal tissue to shreds.
I shot several buffalo with these 225 Raptors, and they did fine, bases exited full grown mature buffalo, so you can't ask for more. For Buffalo the problem with any bullet in 416, is the fact that it is not 458 caliber +. Buffalo are hard to impress.
I ran across two running pigs one day, I hit both of them too far back, again, I am not the best running shot, but it anchored both of them at the shot, and you can see some of the damage these bullets did to tissue.......
Nasty, and since then these same bullets have been used for brown bear and many other animals with incredible success. Anything short of buffalo, hippo and elephant, in .416 caliber the 225 Raptor will handle it all with ease......... No need to look for another bullet for lighter work.........