There used to be a pig farm down the road from the place where I have been hunting. The gentleman who owned the place died earlier this year and his son took over the operation. After about three weeks he decided the pig business wasn't for him and he sold off the hogs.
Last week the guy who's place I've been hunting ran into the son. He said that three or four hogs had escaped months ago and he had never been able to catch them. They had been rooting up the property all around and the land owners weren't too happy. A couple of days earlier he had seen and shot two of them and called a guy to pick them up. The guy never showed, so he threw them into the woods at the edge of a sink hole. He told my friend where they were, and said it would be okay for us to hunt coyotes on the old farm and over that dead pile if we wanted to. He also told him if we saw that red hog that was still running loose we should shoot him.
I went deer hunting this morning, but needed to leave early. I decided that I would go check those dead hogs and see how much damage the coyotes had done to the carcasses in the last week. I walked in to where they were, and amazingly they were untouched. They have been laying there for a week and nothing has eaten on them! I walked back to my truck and was heading home. I got a couple of hundred yards down the gravel road and spotted that hog in a field about a hundred and twenty five yards away. He was about five yards outside a little patch of woods feeding in a winter wheat field.
I stopped the truck, uncased my muzzle loader, grabbed my shooting stick and got out. I took a couple of steps toward the hog and primed the rifle. He looked up at me for a couple of seconds, but then went back to feeding. I took a couple more steps, got down on a knee, laid the rifle across the shooting stick and fired.
The hog took off running like nothing was wrong. He ran about seventy or eighty yards along the wood line and then turned into the woods. I could see him running through the woods for several more seconds, then lost sight of him. I had a steady rest when I fired and felt like I had made a good shot, so I reloaded and went to look for blood. When I got to where he had been standing there was a huge amount of blood. The old saying about "bleeding like a stuck pig" came to mind. A three year old could have followed the blood trail. It looked like someone was running with a bucket of blood just sloshing over the sides. I found him about forty yards into the woods up under a tree blown down in a recent storm. He was very hard to see because the dead leaves on the tree were nearly identical in color to the hair on the hog.
I dragged him out of the woods, field dressed him and he's now hanging in my garage. Tomorrow I'm going to skin and butcher him and try my hand at curing ham and bacon. This wasn't a Russian boar or razor back, or even a very big hog, just a domestic pig gone feral. But he was a nuisance to the land owners and I had fun taking care of the problem for them.
Pat
Little red feral hog
(http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg115/rlageman/2008Hog003.jpg)
T/C Encore .50 cal. muzzle loader got him at 125 yards.
(http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg115/rlageman/2008Hog007.jpg)
Yes, feral hogs can do an amazing amount of damage. They're thick as fleas here in Texas, and we consider them vermin.
Congrats on your feral hog. Perfect size for eating!
That is a good thing that you have done in more way's than one. Congrat's on a good shot and I would think the neighbor's will thank you. Our Alberta government just put a bounty on wild hog's that have escaped from game farm's and are becoming a nuisance in some area's.
Nice shot Pat. That'll be some good eating. And a good write up too :yoyo:
That bad boy is gonna make some fine fixins :congrats:
Nice story and a GREAT Shot!........Thanks for sharing I really enjoyed it.
Now for some pics of the plate..... :biggrin:
Nice write up, Pat! It is amazing the amount of damage hogs can do to the land. They up root and eat everything. Good job! :yoyo:
Good shot with the M/L Pat, Country cured Ham ! mmmmmmm Good :congrats: cc
:highclap: Fire up the stove and break out the skillet !! :congrats:
Great write up, Pat, thanks for sharing your hunt :yoyo: :biggrin:
Good shooting Pat. Nice story and write up.
Jim
Hhhhmmmmmmmmmm..........................................When I read the subject line,well,I really did think this was about hog huntn' in SW Wisconsin ! :shrug:
I honestly expected to see Jim with his new trophy. :yoyo:
(http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f176/straycat55/fat-chick_01.jpg)
Pat,
That is great news - hog for supper. What is even better is that you didn't need to use your deer tag to shoot it. :biggrin: Free meat. Good luck with the curing and smoking.
Jerry
Quote from: Hawks Feather on December 21, 2008, 11:55:09 AMWhat is even better is that you didn't need to use your deer tag to shoot it. :biggrin: Free meat. Good luck with the curing and smoking.
Just what I was thinking. :wink:
This is what the hams look like after six weeks:
(http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg115/rlageman/2008Hog003-1.jpg)
(http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg115/rlageman/2008Hog002-1.jpg)
Pat
mmmmmmmmm!!! :yoyo: :yoyo: :yoyo:
They look fine to me. You had them in a brine for six weeks?
HEY PAT!! WHAT'S FOR SUPPER??
:laf: :laf:
Looks good!! :eyebrow:
Quote from: pitw on February 01, 2009, 10:59:58 PM
They look fine to me. You had them in a brine for six weeks?
Barry, I used this dry cure from Morton:
(http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg115/rlageman/2008Hog.jpg)
I grilled some of it last night. I should have soaked it for a cuple of hours first. SALTY! :shck:
Pat
thats the same cure i use. Looks great.
Same cure I use as well. I go with a little less than it says to anymore and my bacons are not as bad as when I started.
Thats the cure we used back when I was a young Ladd
Those hams look just right
Bill watch your mouth :rolleye: