I had been regaling an old high school buddy with my pig hunt exploits for the last year. He expressed an interest but lives in a pig free zone known as Indiana. Ironically, his nickname in high school was “Razorback”. No one ever knew where it came from but it stuck. Well kinda out of the blue he gets some work that will take him to Arkansas and thats pretty close to Louisiana so the hunt is on.
As I am packing Thursday morning, I glance at my lonely 223 with its 3-9 scope and wonder if I should bring it along for backup. You never know what could happen, broke parts, something weird, might be good mojo to show it some love maybe, NAW! I’m good, just more crap to haul in to the hotel.
Razorback got hung up on his job and will now get in around 8 instead of the 3 we had kinda planned on. No worries, I need to swap a battery in the wheeler and can find plenty of ways to kill a few hours. I always like to confirm that my Vampire scope is sighted in so I get set up with my targets, spotting scope and sand bags. Get my magazine loaded with a few rounds, snap it in and chamber a round. Turn on scope and….hmmm, black. Pretty sure I didn't leave it on but not the first time thats happened. Battery change and on and….black. Seriously? After running through 4 or 5 more batteries and a call to Armasight confirming I had done all the available troubleshooting, I was done. Reckon I'll just play driver / spotter / guide on this trip.
Thursday night we got out to the fields around 10 and saw a couple groups of pigs. We had rented a Pulsar HD19A thermal monocular from Tyler @ UNV and it worked really well for detecting objects way far but we soon found out that ID’ing those objects was a different story with this unit. To distinguish between deer and pigs, we needed to be 200 yards or less. With my buddies Vampire and my T20 Illuminator, we could verify at a slightly farther distance. The lack of breeze made for a really noisy night and we ended up scaring off a number of targets at distances that had never been a problem before. This situation resulted in some extreme stalks that ended up being a deer. We started stalking one group but the tanker truck that had been idling on the well pad for the last hour or so decided it was time to split and so did the pigs. A couple other targets sensed our approach and sceedadled as well. We knocked off around 3:30 without taking a shot.
Friday night and we are well rested, fed and organized. We head out at 7. Again, we go through our routine of long ass stalks only to ID a deer at the end of it. Hmmm. Off to new hunting grounds to the South. About 12:30 we get to a high point overlooking the fields and stop and scan. After we scanned and saw nothing we hung out for another 10-15 minutes and I scanned again. HOLY MOTHER OF ALL THAT IS SACRED! A DJ sized monster pig just ambled out of the woods about 200 yards away and was just casually snacking on piggy snacks. We stalked up to about 80 yards and my buddy set up for the shot. Im watching through the thermal as he drops him with one shot (223 Barnes Vortex 55gr) to the noodle. I suggested he hit him a few more times for insurance. When we get up to him, he is every bit the size that we thought he was. Probably the biggest that me or my buddies have shot in the last couple years. Just dragging him around to position him for his portrait was a challenge. Definitely the perfect 1st pig for my pal.
Razorback experienced all the emotions of a pig hunter. the thrill of victory and the agony of hitting a pig multiple times only to watch it get up and stumble into the woods never to be seen again. He did end up getting one more 160#’er that took 3 .45 headshots before he relaxed.
A great time was had by all and a new pig hunting aficionado inducted in to the clan. And if that wasn't enough, our call number at McDonalds was….223.
As I am packing Thursday morning, I glance at my lonely 223 with its 3-9 scope and wonder if I should bring it along for backup. You never know what could happen, broke parts, something weird, might be good mojo to show it some love maybe, NAW! I’m good, just more crap to haul in to the hotel.
Razorback got hung up on his job and will now get in around 8 instead of the 3 we had kinda planned on. No worries, I need to swap a battery in the wheeler and can find plenty of ways to kill a few hours. I always like to confirm that my Vampire scope is sighted in so I get set up with my targets, spotting scope and sand bags. Get my magazine loaded with a few rounds, snap it in and chamber a round. Turn on scope and….hmmm, black. Pretty sure I didn't leave it on but not the first time thats happened. Battery change and on and….black. Seriously? After running through 4 or 5 more batteries and a call to Armasight confirming I had done all the available troubleshooting, I was done. Reckon I'll just play driver / spotter / guide on this trip.
Thursday night we got out to the fields around 10 and saw a couple groups of pigs. We had rented a Pulsar HD19A thermal monocular from Tyler @ UNV and it worked really well for detecting objects way far but we soon found out that ID’ing those objects was a different story with this unit. To distinguish between deer and pigs, we needed to be 200 yards or less. With my buddies Vampire and my T20 Illuminator, we could verify at a slightly farther distance. The lack of breeze made for a really noisy night and we ended up scaring off a number of targets at distances that had never been a problem before. This situation resulted in some extreme stalks that ended up being a deer. We started stalking one group but the tanker truck that had been idling on the well pad for the last hour or so decided it was time to split and so did the pigs. A couple other targets sensed our approach and sceedadled as well. We knocked off around 3:30 without taking a shot.
Friday night and we are well rested, fed and organized. We head out at 7. Again, we go through our routine of long ass stalks only to ID a deer at the end of it. Hmmm. Off to new hunting grounds to the South. About 12:30 we get to a high point overlooking the fields and stop and scan. After we scanned and saw nothing we hung out for another 10-15 minutes and I scanned again. HOLY MOTHER OF ALL THAT IS SACRED! A DJ sized monster pig just ambled out of the woods about 200 yards away and was just casually snacking on piggy snacks. We stalked up to about 80 yards and my buddy set up for the shot. Im watching through the thermal as he drops him with one shot (223 Barnes Vortex 55gr) to the noodle. I suggested he hit him a few more times for insurance. When we get up to him, he is every bit the size that we thought he was. Probably the biggest that me or my buddies have shot in the last couple years. Just dragging him around to position him for his portrait was a challenge. Definitely the perfect 1st pig for my pal.
Razorback experienced all the emotions of a pig hunter. the thrill of victory and the agony of hitting a pig multiple times only to watch it get up and stumble into the woods never to be seen again. He did end up getting one more 160#’er that took 3 .45 headshots before he relaxed.
A great time was had by all and a new pig hunting aficionado inducted in to the clan. And if that wasn't enough, our call number at McDonalds was….223.
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