This hunt was not what I would really classify as a hunt. The point of getting out there tonight was to get out and to clear my head. I came to kill either hogs or coyotes. I say it wasn’t a hunt because I did no prep work in advanced. I simply came out to check the usual problematic areas for hog activity. Only this time the hogs were maybe 70-100 yards from where I parked my truck and in area where I haven't seen them presenting too much of a problem. It was about 57F and the humidity was around 66%. There was a virtually full moon and intermittent wind gusts.
Once I got my torch mounted atop my scope, I mounted my ScanPro headlamp, and sprayed myself with mosquito repellant. Next I affixed my holster to my belt and placed my Huben GK1 on my hip. Then I slipped a loop lead over my dog’s head and we set out on foot towards a previously troublesome area. I don’t recall getting too far before I started hearing branches snapping and snorting. Then I began hearing an eerie sound that sounded how I’d imagine a cougar fighting two bobcats over a couple of dying wild pigs that they hunted. From there I woke up my Burris handheld thermal scanner and swept the area in front of us to assess the situation. There were hogs in two different parts of the woods and hogs crossing the road between the woods. Of the three segments of this sounder I could see two. Some of what I saw as we began to advance toward the hogs.
As I walked along side of the road on the edge of the pasture I saw maybe 9 hogs through my thermal scanner. There are some weeds growing moderately in this part of the pasture and they can be as tall as thigh high.
The hogs formed a thin line in front of me but the bulk of them were just off the road to my right. I focused on the noisy one screwing a sow on the road and the 3-4 that were either in front of me or in the pasture. This part was really intense because I’m working the scanner, controlling and instructing my dog, and stalking through tall weeds and grass under a full moon. When it felt like they were looking at me I kneeled where I stood. A couple of times I kneeled in some thorny vines or those plants that make small spiked balls that stick to your socks, shoelaces, and pants and stab your finger tips when you try to remove them (pictured below).
Every so often a pig would start towards us and then veer off in another direction. I wanted to take out the dominant boar or a big pregnant-looking sow. It's really tough to gauge the size of an animal that is close to you with a digital optic with a 3x base magnification. Almost everything looks big without an object of known size to reference. I really didn’t have much time to single out a choice hog, nor did I have the best opportunity to work my way undetected towards and set up a shot on the initial hog that I selected. There were too many, they’re were shuffling around eating, screwing, and fighting. Several were close to me at different times. I was within 25 yards or closer to 2-3 of them.
Also, using a handheld thermal scanner with a 3x base magnification, the pigs can appear to be lot closer than they are sometimes. The trouble I was having was finding a shot I was comfortable with, with so many hogs obscured by the weeds.
I decided to shoot the pig that I shot because he presented a desirable broadside shot and he stood still long enough in an area where there was nothing obstructing my preferred shot. My target boar is pictured below - furthest to the right in the forefront.
I made sure I was kneeling in a manner in which I was positioned comfortably. When he was still, I placed an elbow on the top of my thigh just above my knee and shouldered my rifle. I switched back and forth between thermal hand scanner and riflescope to align my reticle’s illuminated red dot with the hog before switching on my rifle mounted torch. At some point prior to this I’d already switched on my Vector Continental’s illuminated center dot. My reticle was on the lowest magnification (5x) so my FOV was pretty wide. I turned on my rifle mounted torch and searched for my hog in the light through my scope. It was tough to recognize which part of the body of which hog I was looking at until I caught reflections from their eyes. As he walked slowly and sporadically, I found him through my scope. I then placed the red center-dot just behind and slightly above the boar’s elbow. I shortened up my dog’s lead and whispered firmly to him, “stay!” Next, I flipped off the safety, pressed the trigger, and sent a 140 grain Griffin Airgun Ammo hollow-point boattail slug ripping through that sucker.
I really don’t remember much other than this hog walking maybe 7-12 yards to my right and falling over beneath the weeds. He didn’t look dead, but I could tell he was dying. The others took off in several directions making a lot of noise on their way out. After chambering another slug. I didn’t see any other shot opportunities. It got hectic
fast!
My next play was to remove my dog’s lead and to sic him on the downed pig. This was live-fire training. The young boar was dying and had the potential to pose a threat to anything close to him. Here was an opportunity to test my dog’s developing killer instinct.
On the last pig I killed, my dog went for the hind quarters as the pig kicked violently from a brain shot - same gun, same ammo. On this boar he went straight to the head! He grabbed its ear and began tugging on its ear and eventually holding its head down. The boar squealed as my dog pulled and jerked its ear as it bled out (mostly internally). It’s not pretty, but
this is a part of hunting.
I let my dog work for maybe 20 seconds to see how he’d handle this sort of pressure. The boar could sit up/lift its neck, but could not stand. My dog didn’t allow those tusks near him, but he would not go for the boar’s throat. He also didn’t go in for the for the kill, but the ear area of the head isn’t a bad spot to hang on to for a “catch dog.” For readers who are not familiar, the term, a “catch dog” is usually a strong and fit dog used to hold a bayed (cornered) or downed hog (or other animal) until the hunter or a finishing dog(s) comes in to deliver the coup de grâce. When I got close I stopped recording, unholstered my GK1, walked up and shot the pig in the temple with a single .25 caliber diabolo pellet. I placed the GK1’s muzzle very close to the skull before the shot. This shut the pig down. From there we tried to follow the sounder. We ran into some of the pigs over an hour later, but they were on an adjacent property. It is not legal to shoot across property lines without permission.
Later I returned to take some photos of the pig’s carcass. When taking photos I discovered that it was a young boar and that I got a clean pass through shot.
It appears to be a lung shot judging by the bubbles piling up over the entry wound on his right side.
Entrance wound
Exit wound
As a young male he didn’t have much of a shield. I do not think he’s done much fighting in his short life. His cutters weren’t too developed either.
I really don’t like laying my guns on top of dead pigs and hogs, but I did this time to snap some photos.
This was taken after dragging off the carcass for the scavengers. This is the exit wound side. The other side is pretty scuffed up from dragging it.
