Strange turns of events...
Plans got changed a couple of times during the day about hunting, the final change being when my buddy at his property (TBR) called and said that he and his wife had been turkey hunting that morning and had found fresh hog tracks. He asked if I had plans for the evening and I said I hoped to be hunting and he nicely indicated that I should come hunt at his place. Cool.
I showed up before dark and got into the stand overlooking a single feeder and large hay field with a small food plot. There was a chance of rain and I thought it would miss us, but it did not. So for a couple of hours, I saw nothing but a few rabbits and enjoyed the light rain sounds and fairly gentle breeze. Temps were in the 50s and the breeze ranged from dead calm to about 8 mph according to the weather folks.
Right at 9:00, I heard what I assumed was a neighbor hunter using a rabbit in distress call, but it only lasted a few seconds. I had gotten to hear my first real life rabbit in distress and from the sounds of it, he didn't make it. Maybe 2 minutes later, a coyote loped into the field due south of me and plopped something down and then was pulling on it. Apparently, this coyote was eating the rabbit. It was right at 150 yards and I hit it with the first shot, but had to followup with another when it tried to get up again. I went out and checked the coyote (female) and found a cottontail with the back of its neck ripped out. I disposed of the coyote into the deep ravine "bone yard" at the SE corner of the field.
Rain started to pick up and right after I got back into the stand, hail started. It wasn't big hail, about nickel-sized, but it was LOUD in the box stand. It finally tapered off and things were back to a light rain when I noticed a thermal target at the SE corner of the field that moved like a hog. I got my rifle up and got a good look and by golly it was a hog! This was roughly an hour after the coyote kill and the hog was sniffing around the area I had dragged the coyote not 30 minutes earlier.
The hog was at 170 yards or so and I waited for him to orient himself for my shot and BOOM and he was down. Beautiful. I called pig down, the distance, and started to go into a mentally rehearsed monologue documenting the hunt details for the recorder when the hog decided he wasn't down.
After the dancing hog back in February that folks suggested I waited too long on for the followup shot, I blasted him again. BOOM and he didn't go down. I cursed, forgetting the recorder, and hit him again. BOOM. Still moving, BOOM. And through the smoke yet again, BOOM. I wasn't taking any chances of this guy getting away. He was 10 yards from the edge of the deep ravine and I wasn't going to go down into the ravine and go after him if he managed to get there, LOL.
All 5 shots hit. Three were shoulder/torso shots, one in the chin, and one through the gut.
The boar itself was pretty neat. He was a bit mangy, but also has several scars around his shoulders and a couple of fresher, scabbed wounds that looked to be from fighting as they were pretty large. I don't usually noticed such things, but the owner of TBR looked over the boar quite well...and then we dumped it into the bone yard which just happened to be very close by! This was good because the boar taped out at 210 lbs.
I was shooting reloaded ammo that I have not chronographed. Accuracy seemed good, but I did not see the expected through and through penetration that I have gotten repeatedly with Hornady's factory ammo using the same 123 gr. SST bullets.
I did record the video using UNV MDVR and that worked out very well this time. I tried to get a little more lead time in before shooting (that's for you, Dave!). I also discovered as with the last hog, that I apparently say things to myself that I have no recollection of saying until playing back the video, LOL.
I have not worked out the washed out appearance of the video. Sorry. I think I am getting too much illumination. I tried cranking the contrast up on the scope, but I don't think that applies to the video out feed. The coyote didn't show up well at 150 yards, but the boar contrasted nicely and showed up fine at 170 until the smoke occluded the view.
In the end, the landowner was quite pleased. I had an exciting hunt and more shooting practice than I expected. I stopped by and picked up cookies on the way home. As for Angry Bird, it turns out that he is afraid of hail and would not come out of the car for photos. Hell, I have been home for nearly 3 hours and he is still in the car.
