Well, yesterday was the last day of hunting for a while. In Georgia, we can hunt hogs on public land any time another season is open, but we must use the weapons that are legal for that season. This really reduces the opportunities for a lot of people who hunt them with firearms because they are limited to when rifle deer season is in. Air guns are legal for small game, however, and that season runs from Aug. 15 until Feb.28. So by using the air rifle, I get the longest public hog season possible in GA. I made the last day count with a nice brown sow.
Being public land, there is no baiting allowed, so you have to develop the skills to spot and stalk. With wild hogs, in the thick south GA swamp bottoms, that is both easy and extremely difficult. Hogs don't really see all that well, and they are not quiet animals, so they don't pay that much attention to small sounds. But that nose is probably the best in the world, and if they get the slightest scent of you that whole sounder is gone. So once you locate them, the trick is working the wind (which is very variable in a swamp bottom) to get close enough for a shot. I like to be inside 60 yards. This one was 43 on my range finder.
I spent a good bit of the afternoon chasing the bore for this area. I had actually found him the day before when I was squirrel hunting and all I had was the Gamo Urban. I've killed a piglet at about 15 yards with the Urban, but I wasn't about to take a shot on a 250 lb bore with it. So yesterday (the 28th - last day of the season) I went back with the AF Texan .457 Carbine CF. I did find the bore again, but let him get downwind of me and he was gone. I was on a hammock that was above the flood water levels, so it was a good bet that whatever sounder the bore was associated with would be somewhere on it as well. I started on the far down wind end of the hammock and worked a slow pattern into the wind until I ran across them about 120 or so yards ahead. I was zeroing in on a black sow when I saw this brown one and had to have her. I managed to work to 43 yards on the rangefinder and got her right through the eye and into the brain with a 300 grain Mr Hollowpoint slug.. No tracking on this one.
Being public land, there is no baiting allowed, so you have to develop the skills to spot and stalk. With wild hogs, in the thick south GA swamp bottoms, that is both easy and extremely difficult. Hogs don't really see all that well, and they are not quiet animals, so they don't pay that much attention to small sounds. But that nose is probably the best in the world, and if they get the slightest scent of you that whole sounder is gone. So once you locate them, the trick is working the wind (which is very variable in a swamp bottom) to get close enough for a shot. I like to be inside 60 yards. This one was 43 on my range finder.
I spent a good bit of the afternoon chasing the bore for this area. I had actually found him the day before when I was squirrel hunting and all I had was the Gamo Urban. I've killed a piglet at about 15 yards with the Urban, but I wasn't about to take a shot on a 250 lb bore with it. So yesterday (the 28th - last day of the season) I went back with the AF Texan .457 Carbine CF. I did find the bore again, but let him get downwind of me and he was gone. I was on a hammock that was above the flood water levels, so it was a good bet that whatever sounder the bore was associated with would be somewhere on it as well. I started on the far down wind end of the hammock and worked a slow pattern into the wind until I ran across them about 120 or so yards ahead. I was zeroing in on a black sow when I saw this brown one and had to have her. I managed to work to 43 yards on the rangefinder and got her right through the eye and into the brain with a 300 grain Mr Hollowpoint slug.. No tracking on this one.
