jbogg
Senior Member
I shot this boar at last light opening day of turkey season. I just took up muzzleloading this year specifically to take advantage of the hog hunting in the North Georgia Mountains. Full disclosure, I have had a steep learning curve in the few months I have been hunting the mountains. In my thirty years of hunting I have never hunted public land, never seen a hog, never hunted evenings, never hunted the mountains until last fall, and never used a muzzleloader. I was reluctant to share this story as it was not my proudest moment, but thought someone else might benefit from my experience.When I first saw this hog at last light at the other end of a clover plot I initially thought it was a bear due to the angle, color, and shear size of this pig. Once he turned broadside it was evident that it was a huge boar. He started closing the distance walking towards me. Almost instantly I felt the wind hit the back of my neck, and within a couple of seconds he stopped and put his nose in the air. He started walking quickly to the corner of the field, so just before he would disappear behind some thick young pines I whistled him to a stop and squeezed off behind the shoulder. I am still not used to the smoke produced from a ML. As the cloud of smoke cleared from my 100 grns of Whitehots I was able to see the pig running flat out as it cleared the far end of the field. Realizing I had very little daylight left I immediately went to where he had been standing and began searching for any sign of a hit. After searching the field for twenty minutes I had not discovered a drop of blood and the light was fading fast. I returned to my setup to pack up my gear and retrieve my headlamp to resume my search. I ended up walking to the last place I had seen the hog at the far end of the field, and with no blood to follow I just started following the drain down into the woods where I was sure he had headed towards. After searching for another twenty minutes just hoping to stumble on him it was now pitch black and my small headlamp was not casting near enough light to see a black pig in those shadows.
I ended up walking the mile and a half back to my truck convincing myself I had missed. Looking back now I know I was just trying to make myself feel better after not being able to recover an animal that I had likely mortally wounded.
Fast forward one week. I had spent Saturday of the following weekend backpacking in about three miles on the AT to hunt turkeys on the NF. Woke up Sunday morning in my hammock to a bird gobbling on the ridge behind my camp but he went quite before I could even get my boots tied. I ended up packing out a little after lunch. Once I arrived at the parking lot at Tesnatee Gap I agreed to give a couple of weary thru hikers who had surrendered for the day a ride into Helen. At this point I decided there was still enough daylight left to return to the food plot where I had shot at the boar the week prior in hopes of finding the gobbler that had gobbled his head off for almost an hour the week before up on a ridge above the food plot just a couple of hours before the boar entered the field.
As I approached the field, I noticed some buzzards flapping around in the white pines just off of the trail leading to the food plot. I had a good idea of what that meant, and sure enough as I rounded the bend I saw movement off of the trail about 40' into the woods. What I expected to be buzzards on the ground turned out to be the largest black bear I have seen in the woods clearly feeding on something in the large pines. As I moved closer I was able to observe the bear drag the carcass a foot or so and then begin to rake pine needles and other debris on top of the what he had clearly decided was his dinner. I hesitated not knowing if he would defend his meal, but was relieved to see him take off up the hill when I started shouting at him.
Sure enough it was the hog from the week before. He had barely cleared the field, and I had walked within 40' of him the week before but had failed to see him in the black of night with my feeble headlamp. I called killerkyle on my way out that evening to relate the story and he reinforced my decision to return to salvage the head of this huge animal for a Euromount. We returned the next morning in a monsoon to complete the task. Looking back there are several things I should have done differently. First and foremost I should have been better prepared to search for a downed animal in the dark of night. A small headlamp may be fine for walking in or out in the dark, but it is not nearly enough light to adequately find a black animal in the pitch black of a pine forest. Additionally, I should have been more familiar with my weapon as well as the animal I was hunting. I have since learned that muzzleloader s often fail to leave an exit hole, and large hogs are notorious for leaving little or no blood. My friend Joe Brandon had offered to help me look for the hog the following day, but I turned down his offer still telling myself I must have missed. I broke a couple of my own cardinal rules. Always assume you hit the animal and exhaust every measure in trying to find it. As I said at the start, this was not my proudest moment in the woods, but I am a better hunter for it, and will not make the same mistake again.
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