Took advantage of the situation

[ddgarcia]

Went out to do some work on my property today and check my cameras. One of those cameras is under some persimmon trees. I had just gotten there and was scanning the trees with my scope for the status of the fruit on them when I heard something coming at me from my right. Turned and here was this lil feller trotting at me. Don't know if he finally "saw" me, I was wearing a hi-vis yellow shirt, or if he smelled me but he finally pulled up at about 20yds broadside.
Instead of the mid motsnack of persimmons he was expecting, he got "fed" 150gr of copper jacketed lead. I think it gave him a bad case of indigestion.

 

[sleepr71]

Good going. He was only going to grow into a bigger nuisance animal?

 

[madsam]

I love it when things fall into place like that !!!! Nice kill !!!

 

[ddgarcia]

So I've been busy lately and going to catch up a bit. Went out Saturday Dec 12th for a "second rut" but and as I was wandering the trails with my grunt call making estrous bleats I got near an unknown to me until that moment for bedding area. After the does had run off I walked another 20 or so yds up the trail and let out a couple bleats and within seconds I heard what I just knew was a monster buck that had been bedded just up the way waiting for one of these does to come into season. As I dropped to my knee and leveled my rifle in that direction I saw them. A sounder of about 10 trotting towards me at about 70yds. After my initial disappointment I decided to "make lemonade outta lemons" and put my crosshairs on the forehead of the leading boar. As he rounded the last bend in the trail at about 50yds. He dodged to my right just as I squeezed the trigger and I watched as the bullet creased his right side. I thought sure his guts would start spilling out in short order, so as I worked my bolt I was searching for my next target.
Now I'd like to say I chose her because she was a pregnant sow but reality is she just in the right spot at the wrong time. It wasn't until I recovered her that I realized what she was. As she ran broadside from my right to left, I picked a hole in the trees and touched off the Remington 783. Hit her square in the heart dropping her in her tracks. I jacked another round in the chamber as I scanned for another target but by now the rest had made it far enough into the junk that although I could still see them a running shot would have been a prayer at best.

I searched for about 30min for the first boar I shot but apparently didn't do as much damage as I initially thought as I found no sign of him at all.

When the processor gutted her she had 5 babies likely within days birth in her.

 

[ddgarcia]

Went back out on the evening of Jan 11th for a sit at a gravity feeder that I had a couple nice bucks coming to in the evenings. I had only killed one deer so far this season and wanted to get another if possible. I parked my tractor about 150yds down the hill from the feeder and started walking. As I poked my head over the top of the hill about 50 yes away from the feeder I spotted them. 1 BIG boar, 1 sow and 10 piglets at the feeder. I have had pictures of this boar jumping up and leaning on the feeder so I have been wanting to take him out for some time but I really wanted a deer. Practicality won out.

They were standing facing from my right to left with the sows head pressed up against the boars ham. I placed my crosshairs on her earhole and waited. The wind was in my favor and they had no idea I was there. I didn't have to wait long and she took two steps forward placing her head right against his belly. The Browning BAR barked and 130 grains of copper jacketed lead slammed into her right ear. The bullet then exited just forward of her left ear and hit him in the gut.

She of course was DRT and I watched as he took off like Hades Hounds were after him. I did not bother pursuing him as I had no interest in eating a 300+lb boar. Not wanting to waste .270 ammo on piglets, have y'all priced it lately, I went back to my truck and got my 40cal pistol and returned. 5 shots later I had killed two of the piglets and two more were dragging their butts as they ran off with the rest all of which I figure will fail to survive on their own. Between temps near freezing at the time , coyotes, bobcats and the fact that I don't think they were weened yet, I pretty sure they all died.

Technically speaking I can say I killed 12 with that first shot with a fair bit of confidence, but certainly 6 of the twelve are dead with six shots.

 

[ddgarcia]

As a reward here is a ham from one of them, the first one I started this thread about I think, that I cooked New Years Day. I brined it for 12hrs then put it on the smoker for 8hrs. This was my first time trying this and it turned out pretty well but I think next time I'm going to brine for 24 and smoke for 12.


After brine, about 6.5hrs on the smoker and the final product ready for eating.

 

[bfriendly]

Way to go brother! Making lemonade out of lemons is always a good thing! Those pigs all look nice and healthy like they have been eating good too! Thanks for sharing your adventures with us. Some days are better than others and those were some great days!
Man that ham smoked up real nice too!

 

[antharper]

So I've been busy lately and going to catch up a bit. Went out Saturday Dec 12th for a "second rut" but and as I was wandering the trails with my grunt call making estrous bleats I got near an unknown to me until that moment for bedding area. After the does had run off I walked another 20 or so yds up the trail and let out a couple bleats and within seconds I heard what I just knew was a monster buck that had been bedded just up the way waiting for one of these does to come into season. As I dropped to my knee and leveled my rifle in that direction I saw them. A sounder of about 10 trotting towards me at about 70yds. After my initial disappointment I decided to "make lemonade outta lemons" and put my crosshairs on the forehead of the leading boar. As he rounded the last bend in the trail at about 50yds. He dodged to my right just as I squeezed the trigger and I watched as the bullet creased his right side. I thought sure his guts would start spilling out in short order, so as I worked my bolt I was searching for my next target.
Now I'd like to say I chose her because she was a pregnant sow but reality is she just in the right spot at the wrong time. It wasn't until I recovered her that I realized what she was. As she ran broadside from my right to left, I picked a hole in the trees and touched off the Remington 783. Hit her square in the heart dropping her in her tracks. I jacked another round in the chamber as I scanned for another target but by now the rest had made it far enough into the junk that although I could still see them a running shot would have been a prayer at best.

I searched for about 30min for the first boar I shot but apparently didn't do as much damage as I initially thought as I found no sign of him at all.

When the processor gutted her she had 5 babies likely within days birth in her.

View attachment 1062232

5 ? I think he miss counted ! That is one fat pig . Congrats on all the kills

 

[ddgarcia]

5 ? I think he miss counted ! That is one fat pig . Congrats on all the kills

I stood there chatting with him as he gutted it. They was fully developed. Ready to pop any day.

 

[Pig Predator]

Way to lay the smack down!

 

[bany]

Excellent!

 

[sleepr71]

Piglets will survive at just a few weeks old. Very resilient,especially if they have a food source like a Corn feeder nearby. Don’t count on Coyotes & Bobcats getting them ?

 

[ddgarcia]

Well the last year and a half have been crazy busy at work and my hunting time has been near nil so once again I took advantage of an opportunity when it presented itself. A fellow member here was kind enough to invite some of us to his lease in Stewart Co and I jumped at it. I took that Friday off from work, got my stuff together and headed out a little after lunch time. Our host and the other member of our party arrived shortly before me and as soon as I arrived we were in the camp truck and headed for the field.

He dropped me at a stand and told me that more hogs had been killed out of this stand than any other on the club. Now I don't know if that is because there are more hogs in this location or the member who's stand it is is just that dedicated to killing them but I settled in with great anticipation. Now this particular stand is located on a transition between a hardwood ridge and a slight downhill slope that is covered in 10-12yr old planted pines straddling one of the rows. Now the first thing I notice when I climb in the shooting house and start setting up is the the shooting "window" is a slit about 3'wide but only maybe 6" tall. This is going to become an important detail a little later.. Now my weapon of choice for this hunt is a Browning BAR in .270 Win topped with a Sightmark Wraith 4K. Now due to the lack of height of the slit I can only rest the barrel of the rifle on the ledge.

Now that I've sorted all this out, I settle in and wait and I didn't have long before I hear rustling and soft grunting off to my right signaling the arrival of my quarry. But alas after about 10min of listening to them it goes quiet again and I assume they have passed me by on the right where I can't see them. Then i hear a shot a couple hundred yards off, then a squealing thrashing pig, followed by a second shot about a minute later. After a couple texts I learn our host has shot what turned out to be about a 300lb boar. Huge, ugly sucker it turns out. About this time I catch a flicker of movement out the slit and see just enough to identify a smallish brown pig trot across my shooting lane from the right to left. Dang!!! I grab the rifle anyway and put it up in the slit. I am rewarded a couple minutes later as a pig walks out and stops in the middle of the lane about 70yds away. I line up the shoulder and drop it where it stands. Turned out to be a black, approx 100lb sow.

Now that I've fired a shot I figure that I've scared every hog within 300yds for the foreseeable future so I settle back and relax a little. Now up until thus point in our story it has been light enough that the IR Illuminator on my scope has been irrelevant but now it's starting darken up and I decide to start playing with the scope and Illuminator as this is the first time I've actually hunted with it. Now y'all remember that maybe 6" tall shooting slit I described earlier? This is where it becomes relevant. Now since I can't get the rifle out the slit very far the scope and more importantly the Illuminator are so far back in the house that the light from it are hitting the wall and reflecting back effectively blinding the scope. Great!!

Now I'm not ready to give up on this hunt just yet so I start fooling around trying to cover just enough of the Illuminator with my fingers and do find a "sweet spot" where I stop the blinding refraction but can still see down range. So happy about this I settle back in and wait. Again it doesn't take long as I hear a some noise off to my left. I put the rifle up and find a smallish brown pig, I assume it's the same that had crossed the lane earlier coming back looking for it's friend, more like mama I'm guessing now as the first one I shot was a sow, hovering over the body. I get my fingers situated over the Illuminator just right, find the shoulder and pull the trigger. CLICK!!!! For some reason I have yet to determine, this rifle sometimes does not chamber a round. Maybe that's why I got such a good deal on it. So I pull it down, jack the action and feel it chamber the round and throw it back up in the slit all the while knowing this pig ain't gonna hang around all night with the ruckus I am raising 70ish yds away.

Now I am rushing trying to get thus shot lined up and just can't seem to get my fingers right on the Illuminator. Now this has all only taken about 10 seconds but that pig doesn't tneed to take but about 4 steps and it's out of sight. I finally find just the right spot where i can see and find the pig. I don't even try to pick my shot, I just fill the reticle with brown and pull the trigger. The jerks as the bullet impacts it and drags it butt into the woods. We found it about 10yds away in the brush.

All in all 4 of us ended up killing 5 pigs with 5 shots that weekend. Here are my two. And a "group" shot of the three killed that night.

 

[ddgarcia]

Man!!! A year and a half since I've had the chance. How time seems to fly. Had planned a couple trips late last and/or early this year but life got in the way. That and they all but disappeared from my property...........not a bad thing according to most, but it appears they have returned and there are some good'uns among em.



Hope to make an excursion Wednesday night and maybe again Saturday.

 

[frankwright]

How is that gravity feeder set up?

Do hogs just bump into the post spilling corn?

I seem to be constantly replacing electric feeder motors.

 

[ddgarcia]

How is that gravity feeder set up?

Do hogs just bump into the post spilling corn?

I seem to be constantly replacing electric feeder motors.

They can bump it, but it doesn't do them any good. It's about 6 feet deep and doesn't move for squat. They just come through and clean up what the deer spill mostly.

I had one big boar a couple years ago that could/would jump up and lean on it and stuff his snout in the tube. He's the one I described in post 5. I have yet to see one of this latest batch do that yet. Not to say they aren't, but I haven't seen it yet. If they do figure out to jump and bump the feeder itself and not the post they can knock some out but that's it.

 

[ddgarcia]

Went out this morning and set up two of these.


Roll barrels. Put about 50# of corn in em and some hog attractant. Have holes drilled in the side to allow a little corn to spill out when they roll it. Keeps em busy, makes em make noise and saves on corn because the holes are just big enough to allow only a kernel or two out at a time.

Set them up so I can scan them from about 200yds.

Pulled the card on the gravity feeder while I was out and they're coming there between 11pm and 2am the last couple of nights. Think I'm going to run home when I get off at midnight and grab the thermal and go take a midnight stroll around the property.

 

[ddgarcia]

Well, as usual, life gets in the way. Finally managed to get out Tuesday morning. Was really after deer but knew that the pigs were coming to the feeder every morning between 8 and noon so was not surprised when they showed about 1010 that morning.

There was about 12 of them, 6 "grown" between 80 and 150lbs I'm guessing and 6 little ones, somewhere around 20lbs. I thought about trying to "double up" as they were all crowded around under the feeder but didn't feel like dealing g with multiple carcasses that morning had to be somewhere with the wife for lunch. So I waited for one to separate itself from the pack and put one through his ear.

Despite reports of the .270 being "too fast", the 150gr soft point performed flawlessly, even at only 50ish yards. Dropped it in its tracks.



I stripped out the hams, shoulders and back straps. Hams and shoulders got drained for about 10hrs last night and will have been on the smoker for about 12hrs when I take them off a little later.

 

[antharper]

BBQ , congrats !

 

[georgia_home]

The hams on the smaller ones eat like turkey legs.

nice work and good food.