I mentioned this guy previously in the tracks thread, but thought I would share the story of his demise here. This has to be the most interesting hog I have shot, though the text is more documentary than story. It was just before Christmas in 2011...
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2011 23 December Unusual Boar
I got a chance to hunt with a buddy of mine on his land (TBR) to help deal with feral hogs and to demo my new Pulsar N550 Digisight night and day vision scope. The scope was mounted to a Marlin 1895 .45-70.
We sat in one of his box stands that is located about 140 yards from his feeder. About an hour after we arrived and nearing the end of twilight, my body spotted a pig under the feeder and told me to shoot it. At that point, my buddy estimated the hog's weight at 150-180 lbs. Needless to say, I didn't need encouragement to shoot it.. While I could not see 140 yards with my naked eye, the scope could and did so without using IR illumination.
The pig was impacted below/behind the ribs as the pig was quartering away. This was not immediatey lethal and the hog ran off. We waited a bit and then went looking for it. First we went to the feeder where the hog was shot at in hopes of finding a blood trail There was none. We looked for fresh hog tracks and also found none. So much for tracking it.
After a brief search, we found him, we found the hog about 100 yards away from the feeder, behind trees and brush from us. The reason why we didn't find a blood trail was because the hog's bulet wound. It wasn't bleeding. There was no blood on the hog to be seen. The entry hole was found later when the hog drained a bit onto the golf cart. The reason why we didn't find his hog's track was because the hog would not be making stereotypical tracks.
So we loaded the hog in the back of golf cart. As this point, he revised his weight estimate for the hog to be at least 200 lbs. When we got it back to my buddy's barn, we took his heart girth. He turned out to be 220 lbs.
Examination the hog revealed some interesting things. First, his tusks were broken. Second, he smelled awful (my first stinky hog). Third, it turned out that the hog is mulefooted. This condition is fairly rare but maybe not all that practical. And fourth, this hog had been spied on the property for the last several months because of a specific wound. The hog was missing a large chunk of flesh over the thoracic vertebrae. The gash was oriented diagonally across the top of his back and it is still an open wound. It was because of this gash in the back that the hog could be recognized on the game camera images. He had been snacking at this property for several months, the gash never fully healing.
When we saw his wife, I won't ever forget what he said to her. They knew this hog. He said, "We got old Gash Back." She knew exactly what hog he was talking about.
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Here are some pics. There are better pics of his feet in the tracking thread. You can see the gash in his back, across the shoulders, in the game cam image.
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2011 23 December Unusual Boar
I got a chance to hunt with a buddy of mine on his land (TBR) to help deal with feral hogs and to demo my new Pulsar N550 Digisight night and day vision scope. The scope was mounted to a Marlin 1895 .45-70.
We sat in one of his box stands that is located about 140 yards from his feeder. About an hour after we arrived and nearing the end of twilight, my body spotted a pig under the feeder and told me to shoot it. At that point, my buddy estimated the hog's weight at 150-180 lbs. Needless to say, I didn't need encouragement to shoot it.. While I could not see 140 yards with my naked eye, the scope could and did so without using IR illumination.
The pig was impacted below/behind the ribs as the pig was quartering away. This was not immediatey lethal and the hog ran off. We waited a bit and then went looking for it. First we went to the feeder where the hog was shot at in hopes of finding a blood trail There was none. We looked for fresh hog tracks and also found none. So much for tracking it.
After a brief search, we found him, we found the hog about 100 yards away from the feeder, behind trees and brush from us. The reason why we didn't find a blood trail was because the hog's bulet wound. It wasn't bleeding. There was no blood on the hog to be seen. The entry hole was found later when the hog drained a bit onto the golf cart. The reason why we didn't find his hog's track was because the hog would not be making stereotypical tracks.
So we loaded the hog in the back of golf cart. As this point, he revised his weight estimate for the hog to be at least 200 lbs. When we got it back to my buddy's barn, we took his heart girth. He turned out to be 220 lbs.
Examination the hog revealed some interesting things. First, his tusks were broken. Second, he smelled awful (my first stinky hog). Third, it turned out that the hog is mulefooted. This condition is fairly rare but maybe not all that practical. And fourth, this hog had been spied on the property for the last several months because of a specific wound. The hog was missing a large chunk of flesh over the thoracic vertebrae. The gash was oriented diagonally across the top of his back and it is still an open wound. It was because of this gash in the back that the hog could be recognized on the game camera images. He had been snacking at this property for several months, the gash never fully healing.
When we saw his wife, I won't ever forget what he said to her. They knew this hog. He said, "We got old Gash Back." She knew exactly what hog he was talking about.
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Here are some pics. There are better pics of his feet in the tracking thread. You can see the gash in his back, across the shoulders, in the game cam image.
