What's better a Boar or a Sow for eating?

I cannot tell the difference.
2 of the best pigs I have eaten were @ 325 lb boars.

This is primarily for pigs 200lbs or under, but I don't think it makes a difference as long as they don't have large obvius teats or huge balls. These are lactating sows and older breeding boars and just 'cause I don't shoot them. I try to shoot the fattest one that I see. capt david

As a general rule, sows are better tasting. Boars fall behind in the taste category due to more glandular secretions. Regardless, taste has a lot to do with what the animal has been feeding on. If it's been raiding plum, macadamia, or avocado orchards, then the flesh will be primo. If it's been scrounging for carion, "Yuk!".

Geoff

I like 'em all-especially the 60-lb cook em whole variety. Put them in a water smoker with indirect heat for 5-6 hours, and the meat falls off the bone.

If their young it doesnt matter!!!

quote:

Originally posted by dustoffer:
I like 'em all-especially the 60-lb cook em whole variety. Put them in a water smoker with indirect heat for 5-6 hours, and the meat falls off the bone.

What is a water smoker?

All of the hogs I've taken so far have been in excess of 220 lbs., averaging around 260, and I've found that sows are the most consistently good eating.

I've had some large boars that were delicious, and also an alpha male thas was horrible.The past two trips I've intentionally targeted sows to be turned into sausage.

Never get close enough to check for large balls or swollen teats

To me those are obvious at 100 yds or so on undisturbed feeding pigs. I would assume that the "use it or lose" rule applies to those alpha males. capt david

Well I'm back! We drove around saw a few 250yds but they were running,couldn't get off a shot.They looked to e big BIG. Next one looked like a small cow from 400yds.Drove around in Guides jeep for another hour. Guide had eagle eyes. He saw one laying under a tree 26.5 yds from jeep. He said "Be quite! Don't slam the door! No don't get in front of jeep!,take'em now he'll get away".I zereo my scope on what I thought was the end.K-POW. He rolled over and I saw huge tusk,he rolled down into a gulch.Feet were kickin and kickin.Guide said "That's enough" "Go take some pictures" Turned out I shot him just behind the ear.270WSM 140gr Nosler accubonds.Bucket of blood came out the entrance. No exit? When dressing him out (265lbs before) found small fragment of bullet. Guide thinks bullet broke pigs neck. The MV of my loads at local range was 3150.So at 26.5 yds it(Bullet) was moving. Maybe it shattered on its neck bone. It was fun and wet and raining.Thanks every body for advice.

Well done.
Let us know how he tastes.

Swede-been a while since I viewed this thread and should have replied some time ago. A water smoker is an indirect cooker that has a pan of water between the heat source and the meat. Lots of them around-you've seen the tall round ones I'm sure. Cabelas and Bass Pro have them in their catalogs.

The meat is steamed as much as anything, and the water pan catches all the drippings, eliminating the flare-up from grease dripping on the fire/coals.

Guys, I have been fortunate enough to shoot quite a few hogs, probably on the order of 30 or so, and there is just no predicting what a boar will taste like.

Two years ago my son shot a boar that scaled 180# live weight. He had a smell, but was shot cleanly, in the head. I dressed and quartered the pig, and iced the meat down. Three days later I decided to process the meat. I cut a slab of fat off the area above the root of the tail, rendered it down and fried some backstrap in it. I defy you to tell the difference between that and a pen-raised sow...

And then there are the other ones: boars that the meat from smells to high heaven, even having been head shot, processed the same way, iced down, aged, etc. I just cannot predict the outcome, and I don't think anyone else can either.

I was told a long time ago by Czech kinfolks that sage is put into sausage to hide the taste of boar hog meat. Makes sense to me, but I don't like the taste of sage...

And sadly, I have about 60# of inedible 50/50 sausage in the freezer right now. I took boned out venison and hog meat to a new place last month to get it processed into sausage, and they evidently mixed it with someone else's. The result is sausage that stinks up the house when put in the microwave.

Live and learn. But sows only for me from now on,at least if I plan on bringing them home. There is just too much work involved in hulling out a sus scrofa to potentially end up with something I can't eat.

My experience with hogs has told me that there's alot of variability in what the quality of the meat will be and I haven't found a good way to test it. I've had some bad sows and good boars. The only consistency has been with size. The smaller ones always seem to taste better. I've noticed that if any boar or sow under 100lb will be good for the table.

We processed a small boar at home a couple of weeks ago and I noticed a strange odor when cleaning the front quarters. I dug around with my knife in the bone and found that one shoulder bone was somewhat shattered and the other had a hole through it. This was not the shot that was made on our hunt. It was an old gunshot wound. This hog was shot through both shoulders some time ago and made it. Needless to say, those shoulders went in the trash. These are very tough animals.

The smell test on boars hasn't worked for me. A couple of years ago, a friend took a 200lb boar on one of our hunts. The guides thought it would be fine as it had no rank smell whatsoever. He took the hog to a processor and had it cut and packed. He gave me some of the meat and I fried some of the pork chops one night. My Gawd, awful tasting. I can't describe the taste, but it was somewhere between week old socks and 87 octane. So that proved to me that the smell test in the field can't be used as a conclusive test.

I would suggest that if you have a questionable hog, fry up some loin and taste test it before completely processing the remainder of the meat. If the loin is gamey then the remainder will be more gamey.

Slatts
That is a good idea to test a little bit of pig meat before you skin and butcher the "whole hog" [sorry for the pun ].
I think the flavor of the meat depends a lot on what they have been eating. Luckly on our lease near Throckmorton TX, I have never got a bad hog.
We had widl hog meat last night, it was GREAT.

Personally, I think sows are consistently better tasting, but there are way too many factors to definitively state that one tastes better than the other. Not trying to be vague with my answer!