44 mag barrel

[rpharder]

Thinking of buying a 44 mag barrel for my G2 rifle from Fox Ridge for deer hunting.  They offer lengths from 16 1/4 to 24 inches.  Most rifles I see have shorter barrels and was wondering,  is there a optimum barrel length for the 44 mag ?  Does the bullet weight have anything to do with my choice ?

[swampthing]

Anyone you want. Especially if you hand-load. I've worked with the .44 exclusively for the past few years and no matter what gun/barrel length it was, it's always been a tack driver, at, what ever velocity I was going for.
I like 280g WFN hard-casts @12-1300fps. If you want a slightly flatter trajectory a 280-300g LFN @1600fps is easy to attain with AA#9 or H110. Will take any deer, including moose, cleanly.
Rifle balance will probably be more important than barrel length. Scoped or red-dot, peep-sights etc. etc. The gun will be pretty light even with the 23" bull. Still fairly short. I would opt for somewhere in the 18''-22" range and probably settle on a 20" with a red dot or 1-4X Leupold scope.
Nice choice in any configuration.

[rpharder]

Thanks for the info.