Dispatching of Feral Hogs

[Unclebuck257]

Before you consider a shotgun, just know that this animal's favorite food is rattlesnake and skunk!! Their brisket is anywhere from 1-3 inches of thick, hard, grissle, depending on the pig's size. Thus their liking for rattlesnake since the snake's fangs can't penetrate that brisket.

Additionally, a big boar when just wounded, if you go after him, he will then start to hunt you!! If he gets you, he and the other pigs will eat everything you are wearing except your metal belt buckle, your rifle, except the metal parts, OH AND EAT ALL of YOU TOO!!

A big boar with those tusks will go for your leg(s), to immobilize you and then he and the others will move in for the rest of you.

I'm telling you this, not as a joke, but to impress upon you the dangers that come with hunting these pigs. Yes, they are fun to hunt and I've shot and killed a bunch of them, but what most people don't realize or care to look at is that they are also about the MOST DANGEROUS animal in N America to hunt. They are almost as dangerous, or more dangerous, than hunting a grizzly bear, if the truth be known.

Not trying to scare you but just trying impress you with exercising caution. I've hunted these big boar hogs west of here, and in tall grass, on some ranches and farms. We hunt them out of pickup beds and IF we just wound one and it runs into the tall grass, we DO NOT go in on foot to finish it off!

Otherwise, they are really a lot of fun to hunt and have fun!!

 

[EddieWalker]

This was at 11 am about three weeks ago.

I shot one of the smaller ones for eating.

Eddie

 

[dooleysm]

How does their taste compare to their domestic cousins?

Or are they like other wild game and just 'taste like chicken'?

 

[texasjohn]

Hmm.., EddieWalker, looks like you are going to be able to keep the freezer full.... good feeder set up! Obviously works very well!

 

[dmccarty]

UncleBuck is right about how dangerous pigs can be.

I saw one in Florida one year that was huge. I thought it was a black bear at first. I'm guessing it was close to three feet at the shoulder. The long story short is that it had popped out of a place in the wood that I had been in early in the morning. The ground looked like a dozer had been in there working between the palemetos. The hair on my neck stood up as I was walking around and the little Safety Man on my shoulder was telling me to leave the area ASAP. I did. A few hours later I saw that pig run out of where I had been walking. It had been in there watching me I'm sure....

There is no way in heck I would hunt pigs with a AR15. Its called a Mouse Gun for a reason. 308 or larger for me. If someone wants to a semi auto to shoot at pigs get a M1A or a M1 from the DCM. I'll be danged if I would hunt a dangerous animal like a pig with a 22 caliber bullet that cant be used in many states to shoot deer....

But I guess that is just me. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Later,
Dan

 

[gsganzer]

Dang, Unclebuck! I'm sitting here going through hunting withdrawls, day dreaming of hunting cape buffalo in the african bush. Now you have me all worked up and hankering for some dangerous game adventure closer to home!

I think I'm going to go hunt feral hogs this weekend, wearing nothing but a buckskin and wielding a sharpened stick. /forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif

On second thought, the heck with the stick!

 

[gsganzer]

Here's a sow one of my hunting buddies took this year. Anyone who's tried to skin one, knows that they're a PITA.

 

[3RRL]

I tend to agree with Dan. I know you can kill about anything with any caliber but I prefer larger calibers myself. At least 30 cal range. Remington and Browning make nice autoloaders in 30:06 cal. (I rather take my .378 Weatherby Mag) but my trusty 30:06 is is my main squeeze and has been for many years.

 

[Bird]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( are hogs primarily noctural movers )</font>

Hogs cannot perspire, so too much heat will kill them. That's the reason domestic hogs like a mud wallow. So in hot weather in my part of the country, yes, they're primarily nocturnal. Several years ago, the Corps of Engineers hired some company out of Ft. Worth (according to the local newspaper) to fly around over Navarro Mills Lake property in a little helicopter to shoot feral hogs with a shotgun. Since I was living across the road from the lake property, I saw the helicopter 2 or 3 times, and I heard that they killed about 150, but I never saw anything to say what ammo they were using.

 

[stevenf]

caylor, I have loads of experience with hogs, this is not for the tender hearted but this works for me, bear in mind I eat what I shoot or give it to good friends. Wait until they come out nick a little one hard, like blow a leg off the smaller the better, they won't leave until he stops squealing and if they do its only for looking for you and then they come back in. I dropped 17 under a feeder with a bolt action 223 shooting all of them in the ear at 100 yards or so, I had to reload 4 times its a ruger m77 no clip.
In addtion to this day when I went out to start butchering I only took a 380 with me 16 shells in the mag, I had a boar come back in that wasn't happy I shot 16 times while on top of my feeder 12 of them connected I only shot when he tried to come up on the feeder with me, I spent the next 8 hours on top of the feeder with no more bullets and a very mad boar waiting for me at the bottom of the ladder, about dark he wandered off. Be very careful hunting hogs! This was at my dads ranch in Bandera, I've attached some pictures of hogs from my ranch in Boerne.
Steve