Well here is a really nice wild hog I shot this past weekend with my Bow. Check out the thick skin on this bugger. Broadside shots with anything less then perfect placement and a 100% razor sharp broadhead will be big trouble on big old boars. This was shot at 24 yards quartering away and the hog went approx 40 yards falling withing sight of the shot. There was not a single drop of blood on the ground!

I was gone for the better part of the last two weeks hunting. Being home just a couple days in between. I had some hunting with some of my best friends and in great habitat for several species. I was able to harvest two outstanding animals which made it that much better. The first was an unusual Whitetail. I was hunting for a mule deer when this odd guy showed at the very last moments of the closing light. We were able to see the antlers were big and he was in a good location for the shot, although the wind was blowing pretty good and it was darn cold too. After seeing him I ranged the distance to between 260-300 yards depending upon where we were on the ridge. It was a steep down hill shot. Because I was wanting a mule deer I was not anxious to shoot this whitetail. However I was not really in a hurry to leave him remaining alive either.



My hunting partner and I must have said "what do you think" back and forth to each other 3-4 times. I finally said "well let me look through my rifle scope and see how steady a shot I could take". I laid prone and tried to settle the crosshairs in the wind. My eyes were watering and it was getting dark fast. ..........Time to shoot or call it a day.



Well as you can see from the photo, I usually take what the bush gives me and this turned out to be an excellent choice. Check out the additional tines comining out of the base. It's as if he was growing another set of antlers!













Ok as if that was not good enough I go up north to hunt with two friends and they have found wild hogs living free near a wild boar rancher who had his fenced terrorized several years ago and claims to have had 280 hogs of all ages escape. Today the government offers a 50 dollar bounty for a pair of ears from these hogs. They have killed very few as the region is vast and mostly roadless private ranch land. Wheat and barly(and oil) being the primary resource.



They had been seeing hogs near dark at a cattle stock pond visible from the only major road in the area. There was a strip of timber between the wheat fields stretching about 4-5 miles and about 100-300 yards wide. There was a lot of debate about how to ambush these hogs. With a rifle the options are more flexable. However I was bow hunting. I needed to be 25-30 yards from the hog and have a still target. After much debate and planning I decided to set up a tree stand where any hogs pushed would go between the pond(frozen solid) and the tree line or edge of the forest. I hung two of my jackets on coat hangers in the forest in line with my stand to act as blockers. The hogs seeing them would hopefully run to the side where I was at. On the edge of the opposite tree line I hung a jacket, and another about half way across the width of the forest. I then drove the others to the main road and dropped them off. There were the three guys I was hunting with. The landowner, his son, and my hunting partner. they would do the slow push. It is critical when doing this that the line remain even. One faster or slower guy will allow game to sneak back through the line. They had about an hour to push the distance we chose. I figured I could sit still in the 15 deg temps that long. After about 30 minutes in the wind 15 feet up in that tree I was feeling cold. My toes were tingling and my face was frozen. I stood and drew my bow and thought about climbing down several times. This was not going to get better and I had no idea where the pushers were even at.



The ground was frozen solid, walking on the leaves sounded like walking on broken florescent light bulbs. Stalking was out of the question. The wind was blowing hard too, especially up in this tree. I had my hat on and my hood up. It was so windy my eyes would water each time I would stare into the wind the direction to drivers were coming from. I stood again to draw my bow a few times and burn some calories to get my blood to circulate. All of a sudden I see a hog fly past my stand as fast as a pig can run. It did not look big but what the heck the plan seemed to be working a little bit anyhow.



A few minutes passed and two very large hogs were coming by. I saw them behind me which would not offer any shot. When they saw the jacket the stopped and stared. I felt a shiver coming on and wondered if I would even be able to shoot accuratelty. The bigger one turned and trotted back the way he came. The smaller one turned and followed. They ran about 100 yards and stopped. I could only see dark spots in the bush. Then they turned and came back towards me. Again they saw the jacket( I suspect)and stopped. They were both 50 yards away. The brown one was just a bruiser with visible teeth. I would say he was 400 pounds and I'm not stretching this one bit. The smaller black colored one was also very large and had smaller visilble teeth.



They seemed stumped as to what they were going to do. The drivers had pushed them and the jackets had stopped them. The bigger one started slowly walking towards the frozen pond. What luck! he will be right where I need him in a few more steps. Then the black one starts following behind. They stop in the bush far to thick to shoot and about 35 yards away. Then another small pig shows up and bites the big brown one. He lets out a squeal and they run around in a circle all around me like some kind of joke! I don't know what to do or which one I can shoot. The little one is a female and mean as the devil. She is so angery, maybe from the drivers pushing her she is biting both the bigger males when ever they get within range of her teeth.



The bigger male is now about 15 yards and all I can see is his head and hind quarters. A tree blocks all the good stuff. The black on comes walking straight to me, also not a good shot. I'm standing and really shivvvvvvering now. Unsure I can even draw my bow! The black one turns slightly and starts to walk away from me. I draw my bow and they all freeze from the little noise they hear. I put my aimpoint on the last rib of the big black hog, allign the rear no-peep sight and slowly squeeze the trigger. At that instant the arrow burries itself 2/3 into the hog. He runs about 25 yards and spins around and around before running about ten more yards. The he stands and wobbles a bit before falling over. ..........Funny it's not nearly as cold for that instant! The other hogs bolt and vanish into the bush. My hands are so cold I'm not sure how I can climb down from this stand. Anyway that's the story of my Thanksgiving hunting trips with the hog and deer hunt.











The bigger one was fully 30% bigger!

Check out the skin thickness on this bugger. You really need power and accuracy to kill one of these hogs. It's not just shot placement with skin this thick!





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That's a good one JJ. Where did you get him? Wa.??

Nice lookin' piggie! One of these days I need to hunt hogs in the snow - it looks like fun. Of course, I sure like game that can be hunted in a T-shirt like TX hogs...

Wow JJ, that's a great looking hog!! What did he weigh? How big were his tusks? Excellent!