I have done a few hog hunts over the years and love it. Best one was in Florida we hunted a very large ranch off of a swamp buggy. So much fun and then we went to an island in the Everglades with the buggy and two air boats. We brought one of the hogs for a roast went frog gigging at night with the air boats. Of all the hunts I have been on this one was the best, most fun, and the food
I have never done one but I have wanted to go on one for a long time. I see those heli hunts where you can use whatever weapon you like and unlimited hogs. I would take one of my Hungarian AKMs with 7.62x39 tracers. Giddy up!!
Killed many a hog when I was in the town of Brunswick in Georgia. All through High school we hunted and ate what we killed. You could see anything from a ginger haired sow that had escaped from a farmers pen to a 450# razorback from old Spanish stock. No helicopters, AR rifles, flachette rockets or clusterbombs for us. Everyone used shotguns and double OO buckshot. I had an old Savage 16G pump and my buddy had a 16g single shot. Hogs were hard to kill as they have a layer of exceptionally dense fat and gristle on their sides protecting the innards from slashing attacks from other hogs tushes. Several shots were sometimes required even though we mostly shot from very close range and tried for head shots. We would find a perfect 10 in. pattern of buckshot holes in the side gristle (we always skinned instead of scalding and scraping) and when we looked on the inside perhaps only half would have penetrated through. We would pile in a 16ft open boat just north of Brunswick and head further north to the hummocks and islands in the swamps where the Altamaha river met the intracoastal waterway. We would sometimes run home with limited free board because we would have us and three or four hogs on board. There was an old black gentleman in town who owned the Three Little Pigs Restaurant and Smokehouse who would BBQ smoke and baste halved or quartered hogs overnight in his brick ovens for a few pennies a pound. Next day about noon you could pick up the meat, purchase sides of smoked beans, slaw and cornbread and have a big neighborhood feed. The meat was excellent but leaner than penned pigs. We always chose our pigs judicially and went for medium sized sows or smallish boars. Lots of good times past!
Having fished the pier at the end of Mallery Street on St. Simon's Island many years ago, your story both conjured up vivid memories and made me super hungry
Have fished there a time or two myself although the pier looks a bit larger on Google Earth than I remember it being. Probably has been added to over the years. Were you on vacation? I know what you mean about getting hungry, I was, just remembering those times. Back then when we were teenagers we were hungry all the time!
Back when I was 22 living in Tampa Bay Florida, a couple coworker buddies and I spent a long weekend there. They were originally from Kentucky but their grandfather owned a house within walking distance of that pier.
I haven't hunted hogs yet. I've got enough guns and either the 6.8spc mini14 or the arin 7.62x39 would be perfect for it. My brother lives in St Pete Florida and he hunts them with his AR in 7.62x39. Luckily we don't have hogs here in Wisconsin that I've ever heard of or seen, but it sounds like they'll be coming eventually... I'll be ready when they do.
Probably a bigger freezer too. If the wild pigs taste anything like the farmed ones, my wife and I will have no problem with eating them.
All this hog talk has made me hungry, I keep asking my wife to pickup a pork shoulder, haven't smoked one since October Not much of a hunter but I'd love to hunt something I'd enjoy eating. Hog and Elk come to mind but Elk are pretty rare and highly sought after.
Did a few hog hunts with buddies a while back. Different “guides” each time. The meat wasn’t handled in a manner that I cared for. I think that’s where a lot of the “off taste” comes from. I’m pretty much a meat hunter so killing a big boar was never on my priority list. They still go every year. One dude likes to get as close as possible, I call him “pig sticker” lol
I’ve been on several hog hunts over the years. Always in Texas. Always a good time. The earlier ones were the most fun. The last one was 2 years ago I think. My wife, 1 buddy and myself went. Only managed to get 2, wife and I each got one. It was a pretty marginal area, but we knew that going into it. Hunted there 2 other times about 15 years ago or so. But it was a nice vacation with really soft weather compared to late February in Nebraska. The last two were the only ones that were not very good eating out of the couple dozen that we have given rides back to Nebraska. Only once did we use a “outfitter/guide” (and I use those terms loosely) because we had several other people that wanted to go and they all bailed before it was time to go. The highlight of that hunt for me was calling in 2 bobcats ( not at the same time, but same day) and getting them both. The first one pounced on my head from behind I’m sure I’ll pursue wild hogs again
SO THERE I WAS….. Sitting crossed legged with my back to a pokey bush of some sort, out on a point overlooking a pretty big flat area and trying to call up a coyote in the late morning. We had been hearing coyotes sounding off all through the last couple days and had seen a couple while driving around checking hog baits. We had also seen a few cat tracks, and it seemed like good cat country. So after a bit of calling, shor ‘nuf, a coyote showed up dead downwind in front of me out on the flat. But as soon as I moved to try and get the crosshairs on him he took off and made it into the brush before I could get the shot. He showed up so soon into the set that I just waited a couple minutes and called again. Shortly after I finished that series of calls, I heard a crow close behind me sound the alarm call that crows make. At that exact instant I felt like someone had tossed a full flour sack onto my head from behind. The impact knocked me forward and in doing so I must have clutched my rifle and had my finger on the trigger because the rifle went off which was surprise #2! I instantly knew what was happening because whatever impacted my head also continued forward and I could see it was a bobcat. He only went a couple yards in front of me then swung around to head towards where he came from. I was able to quickly stand up and shuck the bolt to chamber a fresh round and figured I might get a fleeting shot. Much to my surprise the cat only had gone about 20 yards and stopped. Apparently he was just as shocked as I was and stopped to try to figure out what the hell had just happened! I didn’t give him much time to mull it over. and so young listeners, that’s the story of how I was attacked and killed my first bobcat in self defense
